12th Annual Million Dollar Women Symposium

Fee: $35.00 per person

 

For over a decade, the Enterprise Center has presented the Million Dollar Women Symposium.  The event features outstanding women who have succeeded in building their businesses with revenue of one million dollars or more.  This year’s panel and keynote speaker have exceeded even our own expectations. Join us as we celebrate these five accomplished women.  Hear their journeys, ask questions and get inspired!

 2017 Million Dollar Women Symposium Panelists:

Victoria Bondoc, Founder and CEO, Gemini Industries
Lucy Dearborn, Owner, Lucia Lighting & Design
Jackie King, Owner, A&J King Artisan Bakers
Carole Lynn Sharoff, President, AVH Realty, Inc.

Keynote Speaker:
Sheree Zizik, Owner, Beauport Hospitality Group

Founding Sponsor 

Presenter

Victoria Bondoc

Victoria Bondoc is the founder and CEO of Gemini Industries, a strategic advisor to the US Departments of Defense and Homeland Security anticipating and averting terrorist attacks across the globe. Since 1986 Victoria has grown Gemini from one person to an operation with 12 locations in United States and overseas. She started Gemini from a single contract working with the United States Army investigating black market crime in Panama. She has built a “No-Fail, No-Excuses” culture at Gemini and has created “The Gemini Edge”, a consulting arm of the company working with leaders and CEO’s to allow them to adopt her military approach to commercial business. Her workshop “Battlefield to the Boardroom” is a sought after training tool for leaders in all industries.
Victoria has been recognized for her entrepreneurial leadership and for the success of Gemini with the Small Business Administration 2017 Massachusetts Person of the Year and Woman Business Owner of the Year Awards. In 2016, she received the Blue Ribbon Small Business Award from the United States Chamber of Commerce. She has also been recognized by the Boston Business Journal New England Top 25 Defense Contractors and has received other citations and awards for her work.
Ms. Bondoc is the Chairman of the Board of the North Suburban Chamber of Commerce, and a member of the Entrepreneurs Organization Boston Chapter. She is a charitable supporter of The Ellie Fund, The Bill Belichick Foundation and several other military organizations. She holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Mathematics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Master’s Degree in Computer Science from Boston University.
Gemini Industries is located in Burlington, MA. Victoria has been a Massachusetts resident for more than 50 years.

Presenter

Lucy Dearborn

Owner Lucy Dearborn brings over 25 years of experience in the lighting industry and a lifetime of passion for lighting to Lucía. After graduating from Salem State College with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English, and a minor in Business, Lucy took a temporary job in a local lighting store. Over the course of her lighting career, she attended numerous lighting seminars and worked with amazing architects and designers, solidifying her passion for lighting design. A member of the Executive Board of Designers Lighting Forum, Lucy is active in many trade, community and business organizations. She was named Businessperson of the Year in 2009 by the Lynn Chamber of Commerce and is a Certified Lighting Specialist.

Presenter

Jackie King

Jackie King is a bakery owner and author. She attended the New England Culinary Institute (Montpelier, VT) where she met her to-be husband, Andy. After working as cook for Nasturtium (Newburyport, MA), she trained for 3.5 years at Maine’s premier artisan bakery, Standard Baking Co.

The couple opened A&J King Artisan Bakers (Salem, MA) in 2006. They have won multiple Best of Boston awards (Boston Magazine), The Best of the North Shore (North Shore Magazine) for 10 years running, supply some of the region’s top restaurants and stores (including multiple Whole Foods and Daniel Boulud’s “Bar Boulud” at the Mandarin Oriental), and have been featured on national and international television programs. In 2013, they co-wrote Baking by Hand, their first book on artisan baking, which was chosen as an Amazon.com Editor’s Pick of the Month for September 2013. In August of 2017, A&J King opened their second location and 7,500 square foot production facility on Boston Street in Salem.

Presenter

Carole Lynn Sharoff

Carole’s real estate business began when visitors to her weekend antique shop she operated in Gloucester would ask if she knew about any apartments or houses they could rent or buy. As it happened, she often did, so it dawned on her that this might be a better business than selling curios. Local real estate agents told her they were “too busy” to deal with rentals. Sniffing opportunity, she got her real estate license and went into business with an attorney with a real estate practice. In time, she got her broker’s license and struck out on her own.
At first, she thought she had invented the vacation rental business, but then a British company expanding to the U.S. recruited her, while continuing to run her own business, to find and manage rentals in New England attractive to British tourists. This was a period of great learning and laid the foundation for steady growth.
A Realtor, today, she operates AVH Realty, Inc. a residential real estate sales agency with a niche market, and Atlantic Vacation Homes, by far the oldest and largest vacation rental management company on the North Shore. With around 150 properties, her ten-person staff balloons to as many 30 in the busy summer months. Her company has been called the “rental agency to the stars” for providing location advice and housing for many A-list actors, directors, producers and film crews—yes, even some with Oscars. Interestingly, a few of these, falling in love with our area have quietly come back to rent our homes for their own get-aways.
Carole has been and is a leader in both her community and her industry. Locally, she has been on the board of Discover Gloucester, the Cape Ann Chamber of Commerce and chair of its tourism committee, secretary and president of the Gloucester Rotary Club, and co-president of Temple Ahavat Achim in Gloucester. Early in her term, the temple burned to the ground along with a neighboring apartment building in which, tragically, a life was lost. Moving the operations of the Temple to the basement of her office building, she managed Temple affairs and oversaw a major fund-raising effort and the first phases of the building of the new Temple.
She has cast an even longer shadow over her industry. She is currently a member of the board of her industry association, the Vacation Rental Management Association where she serves as membership chair and a member of the credentialing committee which is busily setting industry standards, an accreditation process, and educational programs. She chairs the New England Vacation Rental Management Association. A graduate of the University of Connecticut, Carole holds a Master’s in Anthropology with a specialization in Historical Archeology from Boston University.
She lives in Gloucester, with her husband, Bill Fonvielle and has three children, two of whom are working at Atlantic Vacation Homes.
Carole continues to be active at the Enterprise Center as a member of the Million Dollar CEO Group. This monthly meeting of peers has been an invaluable tool toward her company’s growth.

Presenter

Sheree Zizik

Owner, Beauport Hospitality Group
Sheree is an accomplished and well-respected business owner who has devoted her entire career to hospitality and food management. She received a degree in Business from Merrimack College and her Culinary Arts degree from Newbury College. Sheree worked for the Marriott Corporation from 1978 to 1998, ultimately serving as Vice President of Quality Control in their New York headquarters. In 1981, she became the first woman to serve as a General Manager of a Marriott property worldwide. Sheree represented Marriott in many countries and was a turnaround specialist for properties in need of management consulting.

In 2006, Sheree opened Cruiseport Gloucester, a highly successful conference and function facility. In 2009, she added The Seaport Grille restaurant, adjacent to Cruiseport, which has been thriving since. Sheree is also Partner/Owner of Gloucester Marine Terminal, one of only three private Homeland Security Ports in the United States. Gloucester Marine Terminal is a Mega Dock servicing the Cruise, Ferry, Mega Yacht, and Freight Industry. Berthed at the Terminal is Beauport Hospitality’s dinner ship called The Beauport, the region’s most unique floating event venue. She plays host to many wedding and event functions and features public brunch, luncheon and dinner cruises in Gloucester harbor.

Sheree has worked to restore the area near Gloucester’s Pavilion Beach by bringing a beautiful new boutique hotel to the area that embodies the historical significance and charm of the area, but creates the largest meeting and conference venue on Cape Ann. The 94-room Beauport Hotel at Gloucester celebrates the charm of a working waterfront with the amenities of a luxury hotel.

Most recently, just one year after opening the hotel, Sheree and Beauport Hospitality opened Rail Stop Restaurant and Bar. A 10,000 square foot restaurant on the Allston/Brighton line, this restaurant celebrates the history of the rails in the region with a vintage feel inspired by the railroad system in the 1920’s and 1930’s. Rail Stop Restaurant and Bar stands at Boston Landing, Boston’s dynamic new neighborhood for businesses, families and shoppers pursuing active lives and the new home of the Celtics, the Bruins, New Balance and Boston’s best brands.

Sheree is continually looking for opportunities to help organizations that promote positive change and who better the lives of those who live and work in the region. She is extremely active in a number of civic and charitable groups and is particularly generous – with both her time and resources – to the Cape Ann community. Sheree currently sits on the Board of Addison Gilbert Hospital and North Shore Chamber of Commerce.

Sheree was a founding Board Member of GMGI (Gloucester Marine Genomics Institute), an addition to Gloucester’s harbor of ocean-centered enterprises. The new institute works in collaboration with fishermen, scientists and the environmental agencies to create a world-class facility dedicated to the signature marine sciences of the region.

Sheree has always been a thought leader and often speaks at industry and regional business conferences and events. She is candid and quick to share her expertise with audiences big and small. She is a role model to other aspiring entrepreneurs who see her business model as one to emulate.

Sheree’s properties have garnered regional acclaim and attention. Seaport Grille and Beauport Hotel in its first year have been awarded best of the North Shore winner while the Cruiseport Gloucester has won numerous Brides Choice awards from Wedding Wire as well as Best of Weddings from The Knot.