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www.gourmetnews.com 4 Oli e Aceti • Gourmet News www.gourmetnews.com LEE M. OSER JR. Publisher KIM FORRESTER JULES DENTON PAUL HARRIS Associate Publishers LORRIE BAUMANN Editorial Director RICHARD THOMPSON Associate Editor MICAH CHEEK Assistant Editor YASMINE BROWN ANDRE GRESSIEUX Graphic Designers JAMES GENNETTE Account Manager CAITLYN ROACH Customer Service Manager TARA NEAL Circulation Director JAMIE GREEN Circulation Manager Oli e Aceti is a product of Gourmet News, is published by Oser Communications Group ©Copyright 2015. All rights reserved. Reproduction, in whole or in part, without written permission of the publisher, is expressly prohibited. Executive and editorial offices located at: 1877 N. Kolb Road • Tucson, AZ 85715 T 520.721.1300 • F 520.721.6300 www.oser.com OSER COMMUNICATIONS GROUP Boundary Bend Comes to America BY LORRIE BAUMANN Australia's leading olive oil producer, Boundary Bend Olives, had been in Cali- fornia just long enough to get stationery printed with its address at a former John Deere dealership in Woodland, California, about 20 miles northwest of Sacramento, before the company started winning awards for its California oils at the New York International Olive Oil Competition. The April 15 competition drew nearly 700 olive oils from 25 countries for judging by an international panel of experts, and Boundary Bend took home four NYIOOC awards for Cobram Estate oils produced from California olives as well as five awards for oils produced in Australia. Cobram Estate Ultra Premium Picual, a medium picual oil from the U.S., won a NYIOOC Silver. Cobram Estate Super Pre- mium Robust Blend, which combines lead- ing varieties from California and Australia for a blend with a cut green grass nose, a strong spicy aroma and complex fruit fla- vors, earned a NYIOOC Gold Award. Co- bram Estate Super Premium Medium Blend took home a NYIOOC Gold Award for appealing fresh fruity aromas and pen- etrating flavors, and Cobram Estate Ultra Premium Mission, from olives ultra cold- pressed within four hours of picking, re- ceived a NYIOOC Silver Award. The company's NYIOOC awards for Australian oils included two Best in Class Awards for Cobram Estate Ultra Premium Hojiblanca and Cobram Estate Super Premium Pre- miere, a Robust Blend oil that also won a Best in Class Award in 2014; Cobram Es- tate Robust Flavour Intensity, a full-bodied blend from Australia that was pressed within six hours of picking, which won a Silver Award; Cobram Estate Classic Flavour, a medium blend from Australia also pressed within six hours, which won a Gold Award and Cobram Estate Ultra Premium Picual, which was ultra cold- pressed within four hours of picking and won a Silver Award in both 2015 and 2014. Boundary Bend Co-founder and Execu- tive Chairman Rob McGavin announced the company's plan to expand its opera- tions to the United States in May, 2014, and in January of this year announced that it had set up operations on eight acres near Woodland, California under the guidance of fifth-generation California farmer Adam Engelhardt, formerly of California Olive Ranch, and now CEO of Boundary Bend's U.S. operations. The company had a small crush last October using another com- pany's plant for trial runs with small batches of oil. Boundary Bend plans to be in commercial production in California this calendar year. "We do plan to plant our own groves. We've got the trees for the plantings ready and are assessing suitable land and expect to have that in process within the next year," McGavin said. "We're just waiting for all the balls to line up." The company is eager to enter the American market because the country's olive oil consumption is quite high, but domestic production is quite low, McGavin said. The U.S. is the fourth-largest con- sumer of olive oil globally, with consump- tion growing spectacularly over the past 25 years from a bit more than 100,000 metric tons per year in 1990 to the current figure of almost 300,000 metric tons per year, ac- cording to the International Olive Council. Per capita consumption in the United States is only 0.9 kg, which is comparable to per capita consumption in the U.K. and Germany, and the vast majority of that is imported, with only 3.8 percent of the olive oil consumed in the U.S. produced domestically. "Consumption of U.S.-pro- duced oil is growing but is limited by sup- ply," McGavin wrote in a May 2014 letter to Boundary Bend stockholders in which he announced the plan to expand to the U.S. Boundary Bend Olives, founded in 1998 by college buddies McGavin and Paul Ri- ordan, currently sells more olive oil in Australia than anyone else, and its Aus- tralia production, from its own groves in the Murray Valley region of Victoria, is greater than the entire volume of olive oil currently produced in the U.S. "We've grown from nothing 10 years ago to the number-one selling brand in Australia," McGavin said. To his stockholders, he wrote that, "We believe we can replicate, in the USA, the success of our Australian integrated business, but we will be taking a conservative, long-term approach to our business strategy." GN G OURMET N EWS A G U I D E T O O I L S & V I N E G A R S A ceti O li

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