Facilities & Production
A Private Press
Our facility operates as a private olive oil press. This means we only process olives that will be bottled under the Carpos brand — no third-party production, no shared runs, no mixing with outside oil. This is a deliberate choice. By keeping our press exclusive, we control exactly what goes in and what comes out. The presses never handle olives of varying or unknown quality, which means every batch meets the same standard.
We source all our olives from trusted growers in the Kerameia area — the same region where our facility is located. Every supplier is hand-selected by our team, and we work only with growers who meet our standards for cultivation and harvesting practices. Only olives capable of producing extra virgin grade oil enter our facility.
Our Olives
Koroneiki & Tsounati
We work with two olive varieties, both native to Crete.
Koroneiki is the most widely cultivated olive in Greece and the backbone of Cretan olive oil production. It produces a robust oil with herbaceous notes, a peppery finish, and a natural bitterness that comes from its high polyphenol content. Those same polyphenols act as natural antioxidants, giving the oil excellent stability and a longer shelf life.
Tsounati is one of the oldest olive cultivars in Greece, grown in Crete since the Minoan civilisation. It produces a more complex, milder oil with a buttery texture and aromas of artichoke, herbs, wildflowers, and nuts. It is far less common than Koroneiki, and most international buyers will not have encountered it — which makes it a distinctive part of what we offer.
The combination of both varieties gives our oil its character: the robustness and stability of Koroneiki balanced with the complexity and depth of Tsounati.
Our Process
From Harvest To Bottle
All our olives are hand-picked directly from the tree — never gathered from the ground. This distinction matters. Olives that fall naturally have already begun to degrade, leading to higher acidity and diminished flavour. By harvesting the fruit while it is still on the branch, we ensure the olives arrive at our facility in peak condition, producing oil with the lowest possible acidity and the fullest flavour profile.
From tree to press, the window is tight. All olives are transported to our facility in Kerameia and processed within 24 hours of harvest. We use cold press extraction at temperatures strictly below 27°C, which preserves the oil's nutritional content, polyphenols, and natural aroma. Higher temperatures would increase yield but at the cost of quality — a trade-off we don't make.
The short harvest-to-press window prevents oxidation and fermentation, both of which degrade the oil before it even reaches a bottle. Combined with our private press model, this allows us to guarantee consistency across every production run.
