Grampians Olive Co

Grampians Olive Co operates the historic Toscana olive plantation at Laharum, beside Grampians National Park in western Victoria. Immigrant farmer Jacob Friedman established the property in 1943 as Grampian Olive Plantations Co., Australia's first large scale olive plantation. Later owners renamed it Toscana in the early 1960s; Grampians Olive Estate became an additional label around 2000, and the current Grampians Olive Co name was adopted in 2015. Andrew and Susan Mathews acquired the property in 2008 after experiencing freshly pressed oil in Italy, and today two generations of the Mathews family work with a small team managing the grove.

The single estate grove contains about 28,000 heritage trees - comprised mainly of Verdale, Bouquettier, Mission and Benito. Greg Mathews has also described 27 traditional and rare varieties across the plantation. The trees are planted in a widely spaced dryland configuration and grow without irrigation - relying only on the ~400ml of annual rainfall. Sandy, free-draining soil over mountain bedrock, hot dry summers and cool wet winters limit their yields and contribute to the quality. Sources claim about 7kgs of olives (or the annual crop of one tree) produce one litre of oil.

Oil fruit is mechanically shaken directly into catcher nets so it doesn't touch the ground, then taken to the on-site mill in as short as 30 minutes. The grove became the first in Australia to install a modern Pieralisi processing plant in 1989 and upgraded it in 2023. Leaves are removed, olives are washed and crushed, and a decanter separates the oil. Olio Nuovo is bottled cloudy from the first pressing but the remaining oil settles in airtight stainless-steel tanks and is stored under inert gas in a climate controlled room before bottling. No filtering, refining or secondary extraction is used. Pomace is returned to the grove, while mulched prunings and seasonal sheep grazing support their organic soil-management.

The grove has survived drought and bushfire, including the 2014 fires which badly damaged ~3,000 trees. Grampians Olive Co has also provided regional processing: Red Rock Olives identifies the Laharum mill as its former pressing partner. The farm shop is at 376 Olive Plantation Road and is currently open on weekdays.