” In the world, the Tunisian terroir is not highlighted enough. He is even invisible,” deplores entrepreneur Sarah Ben Romdane. Tunisia, she recalls, is the third world producer of olive oil, but more than 80% of it is sold at low prices, in bulk, to foreign large-scale industrial groups, which resell it without mentioning its origin. For this reason, this 30-year-old Parisian, born to a Syrian mother and a Tunisian father, set out to restore local olive oil to its former glory by creating her brand, Kaïa.
The turning point occurred in 2020, after the first confinement caused by the Covid-19 crisis. Sarah Ben Romdane flies away, “like every summer”, for the family estate of Mahdia, in eastern Tunisia. For nearly four generations, from the end of the 19th centuryecentury to the 1950s, his family grew olive trees and was the first in the country to export its oil to the United States. Eager to reconnect with her history and work on the land, the young woman decided to relaunch production, which had been dormant for seventy years.
Editor for luxury brands, she leaves ” without thinking “ his employment in an agency to develop a business plan. Kaïa will be an organic olive oil, produced in a short circuit, and in the old-fashioned way: “The olives are harvested by hand by local workers from century-old trees,” and not with a comb, as is commonly done, a process which damages trees. “They are then brought to a mill the same day, to be cold pressed,” explains Sarah Ben Romdane, attentive to the quality of the product, but also to its image. “I wanted it to be Instagrammable,” she confides.
Nice vintage can
And Instagram has undeniably allowed the brand to emerge. Work in the fields, colorful recipes, card games in the shade… “This page lets you discover my Tunisia, its agriculture, its art of living. » Unfiltered, packaged in a pretty vintage can or in a vintage limited edition bottle, Kaïa olive oil has found its place at La Grande Epicerie in Paris, at Maison Plisson, or Selfridges in London. Chefs like Xavier Pincemin or Alice Roca celebrate it on the networks, and it is now the main oil used in around fifteen restaurants in Paris, Lyon and Marseille. A step which allows the brand to establish its culinary credibility, before very soon developing another Tunisian product: a harissa.