About us
Located in Imperial Valley along California’s southern border, we pride ourselves in being locally owned and processed in Imperial County. Our new mill sits on CalEVOO’s ranch next to the Salton Sea with over 200 acres of 20 different varieties of olive trees. In 2023, we launched our new mill and produced over 14,000 gallons for our first harvest. Local farmers continue to add new acreage, such that we expect to mill over 500 acres within the next five years.
We are committed to providing the highest possible quality of Extra Virgin Olive Oil. This includes ensuring it begins the milling process within 12 hours of harvesting, is stored in stainless steel tanks and is packaged in premium dark bottles. Our Extra Virgin Olive Oil contains no artificial flavors or additives. We compost all of our post-milling olive pumice to return nutrients to the soil. Additionally, we are experimenting with ways to filter and repurpose our olive mill wastewater and leftover olive wastes as part of our zero-waste initiative.
How it started
After spending a career in San Francisco on Wall Street, our founder Rick Benson returned to his Brawley, California roots to start Desert Milling. He went to UC Davis to get his Master Milling certifications and helped his father plant 15 acres to test farming trees in the desert in 2009. Excited by his early results, he created our olive oil company at the end of 2012 with the dream to produce the highest quality extra virgin olive oil in the Imperial Valley. The product of this dream is our Desert Gold olive oils, which we are proud to say are 100% olive oil milled locally.
