U.S. Consumers Embrace Olive Oil in Squeeze Bottles

Despite the growing popularity of squeeze bottles for their convenience, some question the potential impact on olive oil quality and the environmental burden of the packaging.

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By Daniel Dawson
Nov. 15, 2024 14:58 UTC
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OOT Illustration

The squeeze bot­tle olive oil for­mat has been a grow­ing trend in the United States in the past four years, and some of the country’s largest and most well-known brands have taken notice.

While chefs have been fill­ing plas­tic squeeze bot­tles with olive oil for cook­ing and dress­ing for decades, the founders of Graza adapted the for­mat for retail con­sumers to aston­ish­ing lev­els of suc­cess.

You get a lot of peo­ple who love the plas­tic and love the squeeze bot­tle because it’s fun and ver­sa­tile, and then you have very vocal groups of peo­ple who hate it.- Michael Fox, CEO, California Olive Ranch

According to Bloomberg, the company’s sales were on track to reach $60 (€56.8) mil­lion by the end of 2024, a $10 (€9.5) mil­lion increase from what Graza pro­jected at the begin­ning of the year.

Graza has also man­aged to get its two flag­ship brands on the shelves of large retail­ers, includ­ing Whole Foods and Costco, and report­edly plans to enter Target and Walmart, the country’s largest olive oil retailer.

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(Photo: Olive Oil Times)

California Olive Ranch (COR), the country’s largest olive oil pro­ducer, is among the com­pa­nies that have watched Graza’s suc­cess and decided to adopt the for­mat.

Graza showed up, and the squeeze bot­tle for­mat has proven suc­cess­ful, so we jumped in pretty quickly,” chief exec­u­tive Michael Fox told Olive Oil Times.

California Olive Ranch intro­duced squeeze bot­tle brands, which it calls Chef’s Bottles” in trib­ute to the format’s ori­gins, in sev­eral retail loca­tions ear­lier in the year, includ­ing a 100-per­cent California option.

We launched it with one part­ner, and it’s done well here in California,” Fox said. The for­mat is being seen across the store, and con­sumers like its func­tion­al­ity. They use the squeeze for­mat for food prepa­ra­tions where con­sumers want more con­trol.”

Fox esti­mated that COR’s squeeze bot­tle brands sell at com­pa­ra­ble lev­els to Graza. We’re opti­mistic about the for­mat,” he said.

Overall, Fox antic­i­pates that squeeze bot­tles will con­tinue to grow in pop­u­lar­ity as they become more accepted by con­sumers.

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He added that the for­mat also has the poten­tial to attract a younger demo­graphic and may help dis­pel the per­sis­tent myth that olive oil can­not be used for cook­ing.

I think this prod­uct skews young, which is good because I think it’s bring­ing in a new demo­graphic,” he said. Graza has done a great job mar­ket­ing to younger peo­ple online, too.”

They’re attract­ing new con­sumers, which is good for the cat­e­gory,” Fox added. The ques­tion is, how much do those con­sumers shop and cook at home ver­sus eat out.”

While Graza’s sales per­for­mance shows an appetite for the squeeze bot­tle, some pro­duc­ers are con­cerned about qual­ity and sus­tain­abil­ity.

Katerina Mountanos, founder of Kosterina, told Modern Retail that she would not put her Greek-ori­gin extra vir­gin olive oil in plas­tic due to qual­ity con­cerns.

We would never do a squeeze bot­tle,” she said. Olive oil should never be pack­aged in plas­tic.”

Mountanos added that the for­mat works in com­mer­cial kitchens because chefs decant the olive oil into the plas­tic squeeze bot­tles daily, which means that the olive oil is not oxi­diz­ing in the for­mat over time.

They’re refill­ing the bot­tle every day from a large tin,” she said. It’s not sit­ting for six to 12 months in a [plas­tic squeeze] bot­tle.”

Aside from qual­ity, Mountanos said that the plas­tic used in the squeeze bot­tles is bad for the envi­ron­ment and can­not be recy­cled in some places.

While Graza insists that its matte-fin­ished plas­tic is recy­clable, the com­pany tac­itly acknowl­edged this con­cern by intro­duc­ing alu­minum canned refills for its two flag­ship brands. (Graza declined to com­ment for this arti­cle.)

For its part, Fox said COR uses a translu­cent PET plas­tic that can be widely recy­cled across the United States.

Plastic is very polar­iz­ing,” Fox told Modern Retail. You get a lot of peo­ple who love the plas­tic and love the squeeze bot­tle because it’s fun and ver­sa­tile, and then you have very vocal groups of peo­ple who hate it.”

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, any plas­tic or alu­minum that has not been thor­oughly cleaned and dried can­not be recy­cled.



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