This Olive Oil Was a Hit Even Before It Landed Placement on ‘The Bear’

Frank Castronovo and Frank Falcinelli, chefs and co-owners of New York City-based Frankies 457 Specialty Foods, weren’t thinking about vertical integration, business expansion, or product placements when they launched their Frankies 457 Olive Oil line in 2007. To them, it was a simple progression of meeting customer demand for the popular extra virgin olive oil (“the one that made us famous,” as they note on their website) served in their celebrated Brooklyn restaurant, Frankies 457 Sputino.

At $24 for half a liter, the olive oil–which fans of the hit show The Bear might recognize from season two–isn’t cheap. But then again, high-quality ingredients rarely are.

Frankies 457 Olive Oil is sourced from Asaro Farm in Sicily, where the trees have seen the rise and fall of empires. The age of the trees–and the soil–helps bolster sustainable farming practices, since each tree yields a high volume of fruit, Falcinelli says. The majority of the olives grown on the Asaro farm are of the Nocellara del Belice variety, also known as Castelvetrano olives. Their signature is a bright green skin, silky smooth exterior, and meaty flesh, making these olives one of the most sought-after varieties in the world.

Castronovo and Falcinelli were one of the first to create an oil from 100 percent organic Nocellara del Belice olives. “We had to custom tailor that to set a high standard,” says Falcinelli.

As one of the first distributors of Nocellara del Belice blend olive oil, the Castronovo and Falcinelli were instrumental in the development of the Belice Valley Farmers Club. Created by Tommaso Asaro, the producer for Frankies 457 products, the club is a union of about 300 Sicilian farmers who collaborate and maintain rigid farming practices to ensure high-quality production and sustainable business practices.

But it’s not just the oil itself that appeals. The Frankies 457 Olive Oil can is designed to ensure each drop is well preserved and lands on the plate without dripping down the edges of the opening. It’s also made of tin. 

Light can damage oil, author and James Beard Award-winning chef Sarah Grueneberg notes, so good olive oil will always be found in an opaque container: “A tin or glass container is best, and any olive oil in a clear bottle is a dead giveaway that it is probably not extra-virgin.”

“When you understand what you’re getting, you realize the value,” Falcinelli says. “That was the main thing we had to overcome. Educating people on the quality of what they were getting.”

For almost 20 years now, the restaurateurs have worked to raise awareness around organic farming and high-quality ingredients with their Frankies 457 Sputino customers. On average, they see close to one million customers per year across their New York City restaurant and their new space in Nashville.

To their team, every customer interaction is an opportunity to explain the intensive labor and care that goes into bringing this olive oil to their tableside. This face-to-face pitch helped them elevate the product from a condiment to a fancy finisher — and, not long after launching it as an in-restaurant offering, land placement in Whole Foods stores in three East Coast regions. 

“We’re different in the CPG space in that we’re serving our product to live guests every day, 364 days a year,” says Falcinelli.

Being vocal about the quality of their product and its versatility is a strategic business lesson they learned from another Italian entrepreneur in the consumer packaged goods space.

“The person who set the tone for us was Frank Pellegrino at Rao’s,” says Falcinelli. The duo didn’t know Pellegrino personally but admired what he built from afar. “He took a common ingredient at the time — jarred tomato sauce — and made it a much higher-grade product,” says Falcinelli. “Instead of calling it tomato sauce, he would call it pasta sauce and go on Merv Griffin’s [show], Mike Douglas’s [show], and constantly be on a soapbox to show the American people, ‘This is what you can do with tomato sauce.'”

While Falcinelli and Castronovo declined to share annual revenue for their specialty foods business, they are excited about the milestones they’ve hit in the past year. Last year, in early summer, they added a range of olives and pastas to their offerings. They propped up an e-commerce site on their website not long after, and launched an Amazon storefront. It was time, they realized, to dedicate some marketing spend to this business. In the fall, all of their products hit 494 Whole Foods doors nationwide.

Of course, 2023 was also the year the olive oil made a cameo on season two of the Emmy-winning show The Bear. And, according to Falcinelli and Castronovo, it’s expected to make a repeat appearance in season three, which arrives on June 26. In fact, Falcinelli and Castronovo were asked to provide twice the product for this upcoming season as they did for season two.

Christopher Storer (producer and showrunner of The Bear), Courtney Storer (culinary producer and former head chef at Jon & Vinny’s), and Matty Matheson (chef, producer, and actor) were all long-time fans of both the Frankies 457 Sputino restaurant and the olive oil. According to Falcinelli, this enabled a seamless product integration into the show.

“Being in The Bear wasn’t a [growth] driver, but getting it out to the American public, to a wider audience, is rewarding,” Falcinelli says. “The creators and cast members are old friends of ours. So it’s nice to see the product featured because it’s products that they actually use themselves.”

Educating consumers on how to use olive oil, why it’s good for a person’s health, and the various flavor profiles that exist in the market is what drives the Franks. They both agree — they’re in the business of making people happy by offering healthy, good-for-you products

“The fact that our product is in the stores doesn’t guarantee they’re gonna sell,” says Castronovo. “But when they’re in the stores and the customers try it and see it’s a high-quality product that happens to be delicious, they order it again. The margins are better when selling direct-to-consumer, but it’s a slow process.”

Falcinelli and Castronovo don’t seem fazed by a slow and steady approach. The two seem in lock-step with what’s required to make their business thrive: a mix of relentless effort and perseverance.

“Anyone who wants to come into this business has to work their ass off,” says Falcinelli. “Success is not going to happen by accident. In grocery, you have to push and call and be tenacious and be annoying. If you don’t push, you just go away. That’s it.”