Food for thought: "You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take." ~ Wayne Gretzky
During a recent marketing discussion, a person asked me how we got into the condiment business. The condiment business??? I must have missed the point with my marketing approach.
"No," I replied, "we're in the olive oil business." The conversation continued. "You produce oil, right?" Yes. "You're producing flavored oils, right?" Yes. "You produce vinegar, right?" Yes. "You produce specialty seasonings, right?" Yes. "You produce jams and jellies, right?" Yes. "So you're in the condiment business."
As we are preparing to roll out -- yes, you guessed it -- an entire line of specialty seasonings and flavored oils, that thought has been reverberating in my head repeatedly. Are we in the condiment business? I suppose we are. We hadn't intended to be. How did this happen?
Here in wine country, the first thing the dreamers start with, of course, is wine grapes. Very quickly, those dreamers realize that farming isn't as easy as that romantic notion -- wells break, coyotes eat through lines, locust cause vibrant vines to literally disappear overnight. Snakes haunt the place. Suppose said dreamer/winemaker gets to the point of having grapes. How are your wine making skills? You'll realize your skill level very quickly. There is a lot of room for error in wine making, from volume calculations to mistakes in yeast and chemical additions. Once the dreamer actually has wine, it needs to barrel age for two years, then in the bottle for a half year. Keep those balls in the air, but what to do while waiting for those grapes to grow?
The next thing the dreamers move on to while that wine is aging is olives. Let's plant some of those. The idea is to have a platter of brined olives with a glass of that wine. Note to self: Need to learn to brine olives. You know what else would be good? Drizzled olive oil on grilled bread. Note to self: Learn to make olive oil. That is SOOO delicious, what could be better? Chopped rosemary and sea salt sprinkled on, that's what. Get to work on it. What? We need to have a Health Department License to bottle olive oil and to put olive oil seasonings in a tin? Get to work on it. Piles of paperwork later, with lots of cleaning and prep, a Health Department Inspection, building an e-commmerce website and learning to barcode and track inventory, the dreamers are back on track.
So the dreamers now have wine in barrels (not for sale, just for personal consumption, TTB), olive oil in bottles, said Health Department license, the dreamers are ready to go, but -- always a big but -- this is the alternate-producing year for the olive trees. In past alternate-producing years, the trees just produced less.
This year appears to be much less -- much, much less. Huh. But wait, there are some blossoms on the trees, there could be olives. And like a lightning bolt from heaven -- it actually was a lightning bolt from heaven -- with a hard pounding rain with a little hail mixed in, the blossoms have been dashed to earth.
Now what? The reality is that there will probably not be olive oil from the 2014 harvest, following a not-so-great harvest in last year, although there is oil from last year (see our new line of flavored oils). What are these optimistic, yet down-trodden, dreamers left with now? Good guess, condiments. All those condiments they've been tinkering with and working on to accompany that perfect little cocktail party.
Some day, there will be olive oil again -- it's scheduled for 2015, which is technically the 2016 harvest (hear that, Mother Nature???) In the meantime, there will be amazing new offerings coming to accompany every aspect of culinary pursuit, flavored oils, smoked sea salts for the grill, BBQ rubs, dipping spices to mix into the AyO olive oil (use the 2014 until next year), the list goes on and on. As it turns out, we are in the condiment business.
Watch for our new line of specialty oils, spices, and rubs soon!
Signed,
The Condiment Makers
"No," I replied, "we're in the olive oil business." The conversation continued. "You produce oil, right?" Yes. "You're producing flavored oils, right?" Yes. "You produce vinegar, right?" Yes. "You produce specialty seasonings, right?" Yes. "You produce jams and jellies, right?" Yes. "So you're in the condiment business."
As we are preparing to roll out -- yes, you guessed it -- an entire line of specialty seasonings and flavored oils, that thought has been reverberating in my head repeatedly. Are we in the condiment business? I suppose we are. We hadn't intended to be. How did this happen?
Here in wine country, the first thing the dreamers start with, of course, is wine grapes. Very quickly, those dreamers realize that farming isn't as easy as that romantic notion -- wells break, coyotes eat through lines, locust cause vibrant vines to literally disappear overnight. Snakes haunt the place. Suppose said dreamer/winemaker gets to the point of having grapes. How are your wine making skills? You'll realize your skill level very quickly. There is a lot of room for error in wine making, from volume calculations to mistakes in yeast and chemical additions. Once the dreamer actually has wine, it needs to barrel age for two years, then in the bottle for a half year. Keep those balls in the air, but what to do while waiting for those grapes to grow?
The next thing the dreamers move on to while that wine is aging is olives. Let's plant some of those. The idea is to have a platter of brined olives with a glass of that wine. Note to self: Need to learn to brine olives. You know what else would be good? Drizzled olive oil on grilled bread. Note to self: Learn to make olive oil. That is SOOO delicious, what could be better? Chopped rosemary and sea salt sprinkled on, that's what. Get to work on it. What? We need to have a Health Department License to bottle olive oil and to put olive oil seasonings in a tin? Get to work on it. Piles of paperwork later, with lots of cleaning and prep, a Health Department Inspection, building an e-commmerce website and learning to barcode and track inventory, the dreamers are back on track.
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| The blossoms after the storm |
This year appears to be much less -- much, much less. Huh. But wait, there are some blossoms on the trees, there could be olives. And like a lightning bolt from heaven -- it actually was a lightning bolt from heaven -- with a hard pounding rain with a little hail mixed in, the blossoms have been dashed to earth.
Now what? The reality is that there will probably not be olive oil from the 2014 harvest, following a not-so-great harvest in last year, although there is oil from last year (see our new line of flavored oils). What are these optimistic, yet down-trodden, dreamers left with now? Good guess, condiments. All those condiments they've been tinkering with and working on to accompany that perfect little cocktail party.
Some day, there will be olive oil again -- it's scheduled for 2015, which is technically the 2016 harvest (hear that, Mother Nature???) In the meantime, there will be amazing new offerings coming to accompany every aspect of culinary pursuit, flavored oils, smoked sea salts for the grill, BBQ rubs, dipping spices to mix into the AyO olive oil (use the 2014 until next year), the list goes on and on. As it turns out, we are in the condiment business.
Watch for our new line of specialty oils, spices, and rubs soon!
Signed,
The Condiment Makers
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