Grown in the East Cape in New Zealand, the first place in the world to see the sun.
We harvest the leaves and twigs of wild mānuka from local farms. The crop of dried leaves and small branches is run through a chopper before being moved into large tanks and compacted by foot.
The leaves are then steam-distilled for five to six hours, during which the oil-laden vapour rises and travels through to a condenser where it cools and separates, creating a pure mānuka essential oil.
No chemicals are used in the extraction process, and care is taken to keep waste minimal — even the by-product of 15,000 litres of floral water, or hydrosol, is preserved and used to make our Alcohol Free Hand Sanitiser. It takes almost a tonne of mānuka leaves to distil approximately two litres of pure mānuka essential oil, and each carefully extracted drop is precious and powerful.