Prem Pithwa spends his days on aerospace and automotive engineering. Off the clock, he’s engaged on his ardour venture: delivering high-quality additional virgin olive oil by way of OliveAura.
The concept traces again to his mother and father, who launched him to additional virgin olive oil when he was younger. Over time, dwelling within the UK and the USA, Prem struggled to seek out olive oil of the best high quality that remained true to freshness and pure strategies, so he started sourcing it privately.
Finally, he determined to make it accessible for everybody.
Rooted in a household custom
Prem is of Indian heritage, however he grew up within the UK. His mother and father, then again, grew up in East Africa throughout a time when processed meals was uncommon.
Meals got here from dwelling gardens, native farms and markets, and seasonal harvests. The meals was recent as a result of there have been few alternate options. “My mother and father are an outdated technology the place there was no such factor as a grocery store,” Prem defined.
That upbringing formed how Prem got here to consider meals. He grew up with the identical appreciation for actual, unprocessed meals, one thing that caught with him nicely into maturity.
It’s a worth that discovered its match years later, after settling within the UK, when Prem’s mother and father have been launched to Greek additional virgin olive oil by a household buddy.
The ingredient shortly turned a staple of their kitchen, and the behavior stayed with Prem into maturity. Even after shifting away from dwelling, he continued sourcing high-quality Greek additional virgin olive oil privately for himself and his household.
That non-public behavior quickly revealed a market hole. Discovering genuine, high-quality Greek olive oil was tougher than it ought to have been, inspiring Prem to launch OliveAura within the second half of 2025.
The journey behind each tin
Pushed by his ardour for actual meals, Prem enjoys working the enterprise virtually completely on his personal proper now.
Having tasted olive oil from producers all over the world, Prem is specific about high quality. Greek and Jordanian oils stay his favorites, which is a part of why OliveAura’s sourcing has stayed rooted in Greece from day one.
He sources the olive oil from his buddies’ small household farms within the Northern Peloponnese area of Greece, and returns every harvest himself. The primary harvest produced 750 tins throughout three label sorts.
His journey later this yr, in October and November, will mark OliveAura’s second harvest, throughout which the olives will probably be pressed at an area extraction facility earlier than being shipped to the UK.
From harvest to homepage
Sourcing distinctive olive oil was simply the beginning. Prem additionally wanted to construct a model and make strategic strikes to succeed in extra folks. He determined to construct a web site as considered one of his on-line communication and promoting channels.
He first got here throughout Hostinger by way of a video on Veritasium – the science and engineering YouTube channel hosted by Derek Muller. Then he explored a number of different choices earlier than selecting Hostinger, believing it met all his wants as a solo enterprise proprietor.
Prem created OliveAura’s web site utilizing Hostinger’s AI web site builder. At first, he tried the drag-and-drop web site editor, however then found vibe coding in its place.
It was his first expertise constructing a web site with AI. He shortly discovered that constructing the positioning by describing what he needed in plain language sped up the method.
Utilizing conversational prompts, he refined the web site, added a database, and arrange ecommerce performance. Because of his current coding abilities, he additional tweaked the positioning’s supply code throughout the built-in Code Editor to match the web site design he wanted.
As soon as he had settled on the general construction, the positioning itself got here collectively in about two days. “Probably the most useful function has been the vibe coding immediate and the flexibility to simply combine store options and merchandise,” Prem stated.
For Prem, nevertheless, the web site was by no means meant to be simply an internet storefront. He didn’t wish to place OliveAura as one other premium meals model or depend on advertising and marketing buzzwords to promote his merchandise.
To method new prospects, Prem leaned extra in direction of serving to folks perceive what they’re shopping for. “It’s about educating folks and being clear,” Prem defined. He needed his prospects to make knowledgeable choices.
That intention formed a lot of OliveAura’s web site content material. He crammed it with detailed explanations of olive oil manufacturing, sourcing, and the science behind additional virgin olive oil, together with product pages and academic sources.
Because of this, a lot of the roughly two-month journey to launch was spent researching, writing, and refining the content material – from sourcing info to the weblog, which he continues to replace.
Rising OliveAura, one step at a time
Only a few months after launch, Prem describes early curiosity in OliveAura as encouraging – pushed largely by phrase of mouth and rising social media engagement, moderately than high-volume search visitors simply but.
For his journey again to Greece for OliveAura’s second harvest, he hopes to seize extra behind-the-scenes footage from the farms and extraction amenities.
Orders have picked up for the reason that web site went reside, however Prem sees search visibility as the subsequent milestone. His objective is to rank on the primary web page of search engines like google for related key phrases, reminiscent of “natural additional virgin olive oil UK.”
To get there, he’s steadily increasing OliveAura’s instructional content material, publishing weblog posts a couple of times a month, and sharing them on Instagram to succeed in a wider viewers.
He’s additionally weighing a transfer into YouTube promoting to succeed in new audiences. On the similar time, he’s exploring Hostinger Attain to experiment with electronic mail advertising and marketing technique.
For Prem, each new customer is one other alternative to share the information he’s gained over time. If folks depart OliveAura higher geared up to acknowledge a high-quality olive oil, he considers {that a} success in itself.
