"Golden oil" By Katie Newton - Sunday Star Times

Golden oil

Tuesday, 10 July 2007
In the hills outside Auckland, a Croatian family’s centuries-old tradition lives on in a range of beauty products.
There’s a chute out the back of the processing plant at Simunovich Olive Estate that churns out a rich greenish sludge that looks a bit like tapenade. Nutrient-rich and faintly perfumed, for an olive fan it’s the weirdly appetising by-product of the estate’s olive press, ready to be fed to the herd of appreciative cows.
Inside, at the business end of the heaving production line, there’s a tube going into a steel vat with a tiny puddle of chartreuse oil in the bottom.

“That is why it is so expensive,” declares Branka Simunovich, managing director of the Bombay Hills estate.

“You get so little at the end!” Not only is that puddle some of the finest cold pressed extra-virgin olive oil produced in the country, it is also the vital ingredient in Simunovich’s Olive Body Care range.

Prized since ancient times for its vitamin content and antioxidant qualities, extra-virgin olive oil also penetrates the skin, helping it to retain its moisture levels without clogging pores. It has a naturally lower oxidation rate than other oils so it is able to form a protective barrier on the skin without exacerbating skin problems such as blackheads.

“Did you know Cleopatra was 65 when she died?” asks Simunovich. “It was amazing for her time. She used goat’s milk, honey and, of course, olive oil.” The Simunovich Olive Estate is the largest privately owned olive grove in the country, and is planted with more than 30,000 trees. Over the past few years Simunovich has added an impressive processing and packaging facility next door to the oil press, built to meet the international GMP (good manufacturing practice) standards.

Although initially she wanted to contract out the manufacturing of the skincare range, she was dissatisfied with her options and now oversees production of it here, where the lush vista of olive trees stretches out in all directions. “You have to relinquish too much control if you let someone else do it all,” she says. “I was not at all prepared to do that.”

While the technology in this facility is brand-new, the formulations are based on the original recipes her grandmother used back home on the Mediterranean island of Brac, where the Simunovich family has been growing olives for 200 years.

With the help of a range of international specialists including a chemist from Trieste University in Italy, Simunovich has expanded the Olive Body Care range to include soaps, moisturisers, shampoo and conditioner, a lip balm, massage oils and a baby care line. All the products are as natural as possible, are ph balanced and are suitable for sensitive skin. They don’t contain alcohol, parabens or sodium laureth sulphate, and are not tested on animals. Simunovich ensures none of the ingredients she gets from her suppliers are tested on animals either.

Behind the specially sealed door that keeps the facility sterile and the air temperature controlled, a hair-netted staff member plucks a bottle of hand cream out of a box. It has a silky, non-greasy formulation and sinks quickly into the skin.
As Simunovich leads the way to the laboratory, she points out how rooms are sealed off from each other to prevent cross-contamination between products. Once in the comparatively relaxed environment of the lab, she talks about the painstaking process of developing each product and the disappointment of having to shelve the odd one that doesn’t meet to her exacting standards.

“We work so hard on some things but we just won’t put anything out into the market that is not going to be perfect,” she says. “After all, we have a long tradition of high standards to live up to.”

the facts

Who?: Branka Simunovich, managing director of the Simunovich Olive Estate and Olive Body Care range

What?: Skincare based on the antioxidant and moisturising properties of extra-virgin olive oil.

Did you know?: The estate’s 30,000 olive trees mature in six years, five times faster than their European. counterparts do. The fruit is cold pressed on the same day it is picked to ensure optimum freshness of the oil.