Stig has been Senior Brand Manager at Haugen-Gruppen AS, the largest food import company in Norway.
He has worked in the food sector for more than 25 years, in companies such as Nestlé, Mars, and Haugen-Gruppen AS. He started working with olive oil in 2000 when he joined Haugen-Gruppen as a Key Account Manager. He sold olive oil to the main retail chains in Norway. For 15 years he has been a brand manager in the retail sector.
For 3 years he has been a brand manager in the food service sector. In 2015, he took a technical course for olive oil tasters and started training to become a professional taster. He has participated in international meetings for “ONAOO tasters” since 2017.
He has taken part in many olive harvests and presses in Spain, Italy and Greece in the last 12 years to get to know the different “cultures” of olive oil production (from small producers to large ones) and to understand the differences. He has been teaching Norwegians about olive oil by tasting it with managers of big companies, shop managers, journalists, salespeople, and others. He now runs his own company, Lukt, Smak og Nyt (Smell, Taste and Enjoy), teaching consumers how to select and use extra virgin olive oil.
Osman, who is passionate about olives and olive oil, grew up in Izmir, one of the major olive producing regions of Turkey.
He has extensive experience in blending and sensory evaluation in the tobacco business since 1996 and is currently a master blender and panel leader in a leading global tobacco company. In 2019, he decided to expand his sensory knowledge in olive oil with ONAOO’s technical course.
After two years of training, he obtained the qualification of Professional Taster of ONAOO in 2023. He provides consultancy to farmers and olive oil producers in Turkey and product experience in Switzerland.
Besides her management career as a Civil Engineer and Economist, Ilknur pursued her ambition to learn more about the plants and herbs of her native Turkey and their nutritional importance since 2004, gaining degrees in Agriculture and Culinary Arts.
Growing up on the Aegean coast of Anatolia amongst ancient olive groves led her become a Certified Olive Oil Sommelier and in 2019 started her educational path in the ONAOO School ended in 2022 becoming a Professional Taster.
She currently conducts masterclasses and is a consultant on the subject of the Mediterranean lifestyle, specializing in olive oil tasting and its use in cooking since she’s a Chef. She’s also a Business Consultant based in UK.
Berk is a researcher at the World Bank with a PhD in economics.
He has been an ONAOO Professional Taster since 2022. His partner, Sarah Baird, and he have young olive trees in the South Island of New Zealand (Aotearoa) and they hope to produce extra virgin olive oil from their grove.
They live with two dogs and two sheep, love animals, and enjoy plant-based cooking.
Francesca Salvagno represents the third generation of milling art in the family company in Verona.
Besides being the marketing and communication manager of “Frantoio Salvagno”, managing the web and social media, she also cares the overseas market of the company to keep costumers and enthusiasts’ interest alive from all over the world who research more and more detailed product information.
Francesca has been a taster of ONAOO since years because she does firmly believe that knowledge and right communication can increase awareness of this special product, extra virgin olive oil.
Training as professional olive oil tasters is not only a personal pleasure: the universe that revolves around olive oil and its supply chain also offers a wide range of job, growth and specialization opportunities.
The advanced course allows you to consolidate and deepen your knowledge of oil tasting and obtain the qualification of ONAOO Professional Taster, but above all, to be included in the "International Register of Professional Tasters".
Participants learn about varieties, processing, and sensory tasting, with practical exercises under the guidance of experts.
Participants are invited to recognize strengths, weaknesses, qualities and organoleptic characteristics of the various oils
