EVERYTHING YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT THE FABA 2018, CLARA BIJL, GIVING BACK AWARD, NOMINEES...

There is no such thing as a ceremony without a Master of ceremony! This year, the FABA celebration and dinner will be hosted by ... Clara Bijl. The come back!

The 5th edition of the FABA will be held on June 7, 2018 in San Francisco. The best French and American entrepreneurs, executives and companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area will be honored for their annual results and lasting performance in management and leadership.

In 2014, the French American Chamber of Commerce of San Francisco (let's say FACCSF) organized the 1st edition of the French American Business Awards in San Francisco. Three years later, the event grew in importance and recognition to become a flagship moment within the French American business community in the Bay Area.

That is also most probably the event that best embodies the achievement of the FACCSF mission which is to foster the French-American business community and support companies in their settlement and development in the Bay Area, from Napa Valley to Silicon Valley.

THE FABA 2018

IN A FEW WORDS & FIGURES

11 categories with a large and promising one dedicated to young start ups. It is widely about tech but not only.

58 nominees

Among them, you will find some local stars like Dominique Creen who was just honored by the James Beard Foundation that is sometims compared to the Oscar awards in the gastronomy field.

Photo by Patricia Chang

Dominique Crenn — who owns Atelier Crenn, Petit Crenn and, the latest sibling, Bar Crenn — won the ''best chef in the west region'' award (including Californie, Hawaï and Nevada). The Michelin starred chef, Dominique Crenn, is the first woman after 11 years to get this reward.

Dominique is a nominee for the Women Role Model category alongside with Mathilde Collin, Yseulys Costes, Claire Delaunay, Odile Disch-Bhadkamkar & Fidji Simo !

We really like the Social Impact category with Alter Eco Foods, Code for Fun, Give Us the Floor and Lalilo that we discovered thanks to the Refiners, some months ago.

Among the startups - the largest category -, we noticed Palate Club (we attended their launching party early May), an app whose purpose is to deliver wines, selected by expert sommeliers, based on your palate, Sarmentine in the pastry and bakery field, and Doubleoone, that we also discovered recently at Parisoma with the Refiners.

The FABA start up competition took place last May 16. The outcome? 5 start ups selected for the People's choice prize and 4 other ones for the Jury's prize. Here they are... > FABA 2018 - the start ups finalists

We let you discover the nominees in each of the 11 categories and think of what your prize list would be.

> And the FABA 2018 nominees are...

A jury of dozen of experts will make the final decision. Awardees will be announced on June 7, 2018 at the celebration/dinner organized at the Bimbo's 365 Club.

THE GIVING BACK AWARD

The FABA Laureate of the Giving Back award has been announced. It will be Jean-Noel Fourmeaux, owner of VGS Chateau Potelle Winery in St Helena. He showed an impressive involvement and support to our community, specifically during and in the aftermath of the tremendous wildfires of October 2017 in the Wine country.

AND THE MASTER OF CEREMONY IS...

Clara Bijl, who accepted the invitation by the FACCSF to come back and lead once again the event at the pace of awards announcements. The whole audience applauded and laughed at her performance last year. Leading that kind of event is definitely a performance!

Photo by Sabrina Bot

Clara Bijl... you most probably learned about her through our different past articles on LostinSF. Her sense of humour, off-the-wall, a bit provocative, handling derision and ridicule with talent is her trademark.

It happens that, last year, I introduced Clara Bijl to Laurence Fabre with this short sentence...

''Doing business, doesn't mean we don't have a sens of humor.

And humor can actually be a business...''

Some ''food for thought'' while waiting for this great upcoming event.

FABA 2018

Business Award ceremony & dinner

@ the Bimbo's 365 Club

1025 Columbus Ave, San Francisco

Thursday, June 7, 2018

To read more about the event and register for the ceremony, cliqck here.