COOC's Patricia Darragh: 20 Years With California Olive Oil

At this year’s Summer Fancy Food Show, we met up with Patricia Darragh, who has led the California Olive Council (COOC) as its exec­u­tive direc­tor since October 1997. We asked Darragh about her expe­ri­ences at the orga­ni­za­tion, its growth over the years, and the most impor­tant projects the COOC has taken on, as she reflected on twenty years amid the buzz of the con­ven­tion hall.

Darragh decided to assume her role at the Council in 1997 after find­ing inspi­ra­tion in the local industry’s excite­ment at the time. ​“I fell in love with the indus­try dur­ing my inter­view. The board mem­bers were so pas­sion­ate and com­mit­ted to devel­op­ing an orga­ni­za­tion focused on achiev­ing high stan­dards,” she remem­bered.

When Darragh began with the Council, it had no web­site. ​“Communications were rather prim­i­tive but [there were] tons of excite­ment and enthu­si­asm for the nascent indus­try. The enthu­si­asm remains.”

Since that time, Darragh notes two piv­otal moments in the organization’s his­tory. The first was when super-high-den­sity pro­duc­tion (SHD) was intro­duced in the state. In the throes of this period, Darragh explained that ​“the COOC was able to emerge as an orga­ni­za­tion that could suc­cess­fully rep­re­sent pro­duc­ers in all pro­duc­tion size cat­e­gories.” Today, the COOC proudly rep­re­sents over ninety per­cent of California-based olive prod­uct pro­duc­ers among a wide vari­ety of sizes and capa­bil­i­ties.

The orga­ni­za­tion expe­ri­enced another cru­cial turn­ing point in 1998 with the estab­lish­ment of both the COOC Seal Certification Program and the taste panel, which will be cel­e­brat­ing their 20^th anniver­saries in 2018. Darragh said its taste panel was the first sen­sory panel for olive oil in North America.

Throughout the industry’s pro­gres­sion, the COOC has achieved a num­ber of what Darragh sees as land­mark goals, the organization’s con­tri­bu­tion to stan­dards in grade ver­i­fi­ca­tion and trace­abil­ity chief among them. ​“The COOC seal is now rec­og­nized and sought after and the COOC has emerged as a leader in the indus­try for stan­dards and qual­ity,” she said. For the future, her pri­mary goal is to ​“keep com­mu­ni­cat­ing and increase the demand for COOC-cer­ti­fied extra vir­gin olive oil.”

In order to achieve this objec­tive, the orga­ni­za­tion has focused on improv­ing its exist­ing pro­grams such as the taste panel and devel­op­ing more edu­ca­tional projects. Beyond this, Darragh is also ​“plan­ning a major strate­gic plan­ning meet­ing for the board later this sum­mer.”

As the indus­try con­tin­ues to grow with the assis­tance of the COOC, Darragh believes California olive oil has achieved a unique posi­tion through its ​“unwa­ver­ing focus on stan­dards, truth in label­ing and trace­abil­ity.” Demand con­tin­ues to increase and statewide, pro­duc­ers are hop­ing to posi­tion them­selves col­lec­tively ​“as the source for authen­tic extra vir­gin olive oil.”

For those look­ing to break into the indus­try, Darragh offered a few words of advice: ​“Take the time to learn every­thing that you can about the indus­try. Take classes, attend sem­i­nars, meet with indus­try lead­ers and taste as much olive oil as pos­si­ble to hone your palate. After twenty years in the indus­try, I learn some­thing new every day. As Einstein said, ​‘I have no spe­cial tal­ent, I am only pas­sion­ately curi­ous.”