‘Tops’ of Sonoma Valley businesses

The very best of Sonoma’s business community came together to honor their contributions to the Valley during a morning brimming over with laughter and tears on Friday. The annual Tops of Sonoma recognized businesses old and new, including the Business of the Year, the girl & the fig.

In what is becoming a tradition of the annual business breakfast, girl & the fig proprietor Sondra Bernstein was serenaded into accepting her award by longtime friends and colleagues, Gary Saperstein, Suzanne Brangham, Bill Blum, Wendy Peterson, Kathleen Hill and Mayor Tom Rouse. Set to the tune of the Cole Porter classic “You’re the Top,” Saperstein worked with Transcendence Theatre Company Executive Director Steven Stubbins to honor Bernstein in song.

“You’re biodynamic, you’re so organic,” Saperstein crooned.

Bernstein’s eyes welled with tears as she laughed her

way through the song. “It was amazing,” she said later. “I’m sure I was bright red the entire time.”

Notoriously shy, Bernstein never intended to start a culinary empire when she launched her first business in Glen Ellen almost two decades ago. Charmed by the area’s farmlands and varied array of artisan producers, she launched a restaurant model based on farm-to-table fare long before it was the hallmark of a national movement.

“It’s not a trend, it’s just how it should be,” she lamented. “If you live here, you have no excuse. There are just too many wonderful producers.”

Her various businesses, including girl & the fig, the Fig Cafe, Suite D and girl & the fig caterers, are the jewels of the culinary crown that have put her, and Sonoma, on the map for foodies.

But Bernstein was honored for the way she operates her businesses as much as her businesses themselves. With a high level of personal touch, she knows who farms each of her ingredients and even remembers the birthdays of most of her 200 employees’.

“To me, Sondra (Bernstein) genuinely cares about every aspect of not only the business, but the people she works with, her purveyors and, of course, her customers,” said Saperstein. “She wanted the restaurant to really capture Sonoma, and that’s exactly what she’s done.”

The awards presentation followed a moving speech by Janet Hayes, president of Williams-Sonoma, that touched on Chuck Williams’ dream of bringing his internationally renowned luxury housewares business back to its original location on Broadway.

In addition to the girl & the fig, the event recognized the “top tax generators in the Valley,” said Angela Beran of the Sonoma Valley Chamber of Commerce, which hosted the event. Those businesses include: Chevron, CVS Pharmacy, Della Santina’s, El Dorado Kitchen and Hotel, El Pueblo Inn, Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn, Friedman’s Home Improvement, Gloria Ferrer, HopMonk Tavern, Inn at Sonoma, the Lodge at Sonoma, Lucky Market, MacArthur Place, Mary’s Pizza Shack, McCaulou’s department store, Peterson’s Mechanical, Ramekins, the Red Grape, Rite Aid Drug Store, Safeway, Sebastiani Vineyard and Winery, Shell Service Station, Sonoma Chevrolet, Sonoma Market and the Glen Ellen Village Market, Sonoma Raceway, Sonoma Valley Hospital, Sonoma Valley Inn, Staples, the Swiss Hotel, Union 76 service station and Whole Foods.