Turkish Producer Brings Native Cultivars to U.S. Market

Summary

Zagoda Olive Oil, based in Turkey, is work­ing to intro­duce Turkish extra vir­gin olive oils to inter­na­tional con­sumers, pro­duc­ing sin­gle-vari­etal oils from over 16,500 olive trees. The com­pany focuses on qual­ity con­trol, early har­vest­ing, and same-day milling to pre­serve fresh­ness and aro­mat­ics, while also adapt­ing to unpre­dictable grow­ing con­di­tions and pric­ing its oils based on the real costs of pro­duc­tion.

From a fam­ily grove in west­ern Turkey, Zagoda Olive Oil is work­ing to bring Turkish extra vir­gin olive oils to a wider inter­na­tional audi­ence.

The com­pany, founded by Ceren Su Sahin, pro­duces sin­gle-vari­etal oils from more than 16,500 olive trees, includ­ing Arbequina and Turkish cul­ti­vars such as Ayvalık and Trilye.

“We estab­lished the grove and built the farm from the ground up,” Sahin told Olive Oil Times. ​“I founded Zagoda Olive Oil LLC in the U.S. to bring our oils to con­sumers in the U.S. with the same stan­dards we fol­low at home.”

Sahin said the brand grew out of a fam­ily project and remains tied to the grove where its olives are grown. Its aim, she added, is to intro­duce more con­sumers to fresh, high-qual­ity extra vir­gin olive oil and encour­age reg­u­lar use at the table.

“What moti­vates us is see­ing peo­ple taste truly fresh extra vir­gin olive oil for the first time,” she said. ​“They notice the dif­fer­ence right away, then they start using it daily.”

The com­pany sells its oils in 250- and 500-mil­li­liter bot­tles, along with gift sets for spe­cialty food mar­kets. Sahin said Zagoda adapts bot­tle sizes, label­ing and pre­sen­ta­tion for dif­fer­ent sales chan­nels, includ­ing con­sumers, retail­ers and whole­sale part­ners.

At the farm, olives are har­vested early and milled the same day, a prac­tice intended to pre­serve fresh­ness, aro­mat­ics and sta­bil­ity.

“We har­vest early, han­dle fruit care­fully, and mill quickly,” Sahin said. ​“Same-day milling is essen­tial because the clock starts the moment the olive is picked.”

The pro­ducer uses a two-phase con­tin­u­ous extrac­tion sys­tem, which gen­er­ally requires less added water than three-phase sys­tems and can help pre­serve nat­ural com­pounds that con­tribute to struc­ture and inten­sity.

Sahin said equip­ment is only one part of the process. Fruit han­dling, milling con­di­tions and stor­age after extrac­tion also deter­mine the final qual­ity of the oil.

“The sys­tem mat­ters,” she said, ​“but the con­sis­tency comes from how inten­tion­ally we run it.”

Quality con­trol begins in the grove and con­tin­ues through milling, stor­age and pack­ag­ing. Sahin said the farm is cer­ti­fied organic, while the com­pany holds ISO 9001 and ISO 22000 cer­ti­fi­ca­tions.

The oils are tested annu­ally by the Aydın Commodity Exchange Laboratory, an accred­ited facil­ity in the region. Zagoda pub­lishes the results online so cus­tomers can review them directly.

The company’s focus on ver­i­fi­ca­tion comes as many con­sumers con­tinue to face a wide range of qual­ity in the retail olive oil mar­ket.

“Low-qual­ity oils still dom­i­nate many shelves,” Sahin said, adding that the com­pany uses lab results and direct cus­tomer rela­tion­ships to build trust.

Zagoda received a Gold Award for their Ayvalik mono­var­i­tal and a Silver Award for their Trilye at the 2026 NYIOOC, recog­ni­tion Sahin said helped intro­duce the brand to more con­sumers and spe­cialty buy­ers in the United States.

“Many peo­ple do not real­ize how wide the qual­ity range is in olive oil,” she said. ​“For us as a fam­ily, awards are not only recog­ni­tion. They are con­fir­ma­tion of care and effort, and they also add respon­si­bil­ity.”

Like many pro­duc­ers in the Mediterranean, Zagoda is also adapt­ing to increas­ingly unpre­dictable grow­ing con­di­tions. Sahin said late-sea­son rains, win­ter cold snaps and extended sum­mer dry peri­ods can affect flow­er­ing, fruit set, ripen­ing and har­vest tim­ing.

“The biggest chal­lenges are agri­cul­tural,” she said.

Still, Sahin said, dif­fi­cult sea­sons can some­times yield oils with con­cen­trated aro­mas and strong struc­ture, par­tic­u­larly when lower yields coin­cide with high fruit qual­ity.

The company’s response includes water man­age­ment, soil health prac­tices and har­vest plan­ning designed to pro­tect both qual­ity and con­sis­tency. It also plans pack­ag­ing and logis­tics early to reduce dis­rup­tion when exter­nal con­di­tions shift.

For Sahin, sus­tain­abil­ity is tied to the eco­nom­ics of pro­duc­tion. She said the com­pany prices its oils around the real costs of organic farm­ing, early-har­vest labor, same-day milling, stor­age and pack­ag­ing, rather than cut­ting stan­dards to reach lower price points.

“We do not dilute that stan­dard to hit a lower price point,” she said. ​“Instead, we choose chan­nels and for­mats that can sup­port the true cost of pro­duc­ing the oil cor­rectly.”

As the com­pany expands, Sahin said the goal is to grow care­fully while con­tin­u­ing to intro­duce Turkish cul­ti­vars to con­sumers who may be unfa­mil­iar with them.

“We want to grow thought­fully while stay­ing qual­ity-first,” she said. ​“We also want to con­tinue intro­duc­ing Turkish cul­ti­vars to a wider audi­ence in the U.S., and help peo­ple learn what they taste like when they are truly fresh.”