Oleavia wins two more Silver Awards as U.S. reach expands

Oleavia added two Silver Awards at the 2026 NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition, lifting its total to nine and underscoring the Minnesota-based brand’s growing U.S. customer base. The family-owned company is leaning on specialty retailers, education and provenance as it expands beyond its home market.

Why it matters: - Oleavia’s latest NYIOOC wins add outside validation at a time when the brand is pushing deeper into the U.S. market. - The awards help reinforce the appeal of Turkish olive oil in a market long associated with Italy, Spain and Greece. - The company’s growth strategy relies on customer relationships, not broad retail saturation.

What happened: - Oleavia earned two Silver Awards at the 2026 NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition for its Havaalani I and South Aegean Special editions. - The latest awards bring Oleavia’s total NYIOOC tally to nine. - Since first entering the competition in 2020, the family-owned brand has collected four Gold Awards and five Silver Awards. - Oleavia first placed a bottle of extra virgin olive oil on a Minnesota retail shelf in 2019. - The company says its U.S. customer community now stretches beyond Minnesota into multiple states.

The details: - Oleavia is distributed in the U.S. through Minnesota-based Coccinella. - The brand’s olive oils come from Türkiye, which the International Olive Council lists among the four leading suppliers to the U.S. market alongside Spain, Italy and Tunisia. - Oleavia says its production approach covers milling, storage, filtration, bottling and temperature-controlled care. - The company’s goal is to protect quality from harvest to the moment the oil reaches customers. - Oleavia also sells fused extra virgin olive oils made by crushing olives with fresh ingredients such as lemon, garlic, basil and peppers. - The company says those flavored oils are intended to make Mediterranean cooking more approachable while maintaining attention to ingredients and process.

Between the lines: - Oleavia is positioning Turkish olive oil as a story of place, craft and provenance, not just a commodity product. - The brand’s focus on independent specialty retailers suggests a deliberate move to reach consumers who value tasting and education. - The company is using awards as proof points, but the broader message is about repeat purchases and word-of-mouth. - Seher Kaplan said the people in Türkiye’s olive-growing villages are central to every bottle Oleavia shares. - Umut Kaplan said the company wants to be in the right places, not everywhere.

What’s next: - Oleavia plans to keep growing through customer relationships and specialty retail partnerships. - The brand expects its award recognition to support broader awareness of Turkish olive oil in the U.S. - The Kaplan family says its longer-term aim is simple: help more Americans discover Türkiye’s olive oil tradition.

The bottom line: - Oleavia is pairing award-winning oil with a selective U.S. growth strategy, betting that provenance and repeat customers will matter more than shelf count.