Hawke’s Bay Olive Oil & Wine Producers Join Forces

MEDIA RELEASE
February 12, 2004

Top Hawke’s Bay Olive Oil and Wine Producers Join Forces

It’s the power of two – and much more tasty than the power of one.

Hawke’s Bay’s top olive oil producer The Village Press and award-winning wine producer Sileni Estates have joined forces at Sileni’s winery to provide a food, wine and extra virgin olive oil tasting treat for visitors.

Both companies have signed an agreement for The Village Press to process its fruit on the Sileni Estates site in Maraekakaho Road, near Hastings, in special purpose buildings provided by Sileni Estates.

The existing Village Press’ traditional press is being relocated from Havelock North to Sileni Estates and will soon be supplemented by a new $400,000 state-of-the-art olive press currently in transit from Italy.

The Sileni Estates winery, with its gourmet cellar store and restaurant, is a mecca for discerning wine and food buffs and the addition of the olive press will add to their enjoyment of the experience, says Village Press principal Wayne Startup.

“Visitors to Sileni’s will get the whole package of tastes that Hawke’s Bay has to offer on one site and can see the olive press in action as well as visit the winery in the vineyard,” says Mr Startup.

Graeme Avery, owner of Sileni Estates says, “We’re thrilled to enter this joint marketing venture with The Village Press. It’s just the sort of added-value experience the wine and food market is looking for.”

The Village Press is also importing a mobile bottling plant that can travel to New Zealand’s olive oil-producing areas to help promote industry growth and capture the liquid green gold of extra virgin olive oil within The Village Press’s distinctive dark bottles. Deleted.

He said the company’s joining forces with Sileni Estates is a further step forward in 12 months of satisfying achievements.

Late last year The Village Press became the only New Zealand olive oil on the shelves of English retail chain Sainsbury’s 180 up-market delicatessens. This added to its earlier successes in being stocked by other top-of-the-range English retailers including Fortnum and Masons and Liberty and their contract with Air New Zealand to supply The Village Press olive oil on long distance flights.

The Village Press has turned olive oil into a major industry in the Hawke’s Bay in recent years. Wayne and Maureen Startup formed a syndicate of 110 investors to operate 45 hectares of 30,000 trees producing extra virgin olive oil of the finest quality after conducting research in several countries to find the best tree cultivars and processing techniques.

Hawke’s Bay is globally recognized as a mild Mediterranean climate with productive soils that make it a food and wine lover’s paradise. It has the sunshine hours, rainfall (supplemented by irrigation) and soil profile to be New Zealand’s premier olive-growing region.

The Village Press olive groves are sited in the golden wine triangle of Hawke’s Bay, seven kilometres from Hastings, among major wine company vineyards.

ENDS

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