Alkenyl succinic anhydrides are important specialty chemicals that are used in the paper, oilfield, and fuel additives, industries. In this paper we investigate the link between the physical properties of alkenyl succinic anhydrides and the identities of their linear alkyl olefin precursors. We describe a straightforward GC analysis of olefin isomer distributions and show that these correlate well with the freezing temperatures of the subsequent alkenyl succinic anhydride products. This allows the identification of olefin isomer profiles that are required to give the desired physical properties in the alkenyl succinic anhydrides; it also provides a method to predict the freezing temperatures of alkenyl succinic anhydrides synthesized from a particular supply of olefin.