We were lucky to catch up with Christian Sullberg recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Christian , thanks for joining us today. To kick things off, we’d love to hear about things you or your brand do that diverge from the industry standard

Noble Folk Ice Cream & Pie has locations situated in the Northbay and over the years we’ve seen many others in similar industries struggle with attracting talented employees. This was also excacerbated during the wild fires and also through the pandemic, with these pressures maintaing our operations has been challenging but has also made us resilient in other ways.

We are a Latine & queer owned business in Sonoma County and we exist as one of the few out and proud owned bussinesses. One of the things that we practice differently from an industry standard is to be authentically yourself.

Each of our locations is situatated in their communities as not only a business but a safe space for all.

Our approach to living our full identities not only personally also translates to our business operations. We strive to build an inclusive work place and supports each of our staff members through quality beneifits and a good working environment.

We’ve found that those in similar industries struggle to find quality individuals to support their missions and or their services, that has not been the case for Noble Folk. Living our full identies as queer people has attraced many individuals to come and work for our team. Of our workforce 80% identify in the LGBTQIA+ spectrum and we are proud of that! Through the fires and the pandemic here in Sonoma County many industries struggled with employee attraction and rentention and we have not had the same challenges.

Many of our employees were tried of being mis-gendered, discriminated, unapprciated at their previous employers. Noble Folk is a place were you are free to be your self unburdended by all the micro agressions individuals face in a hetreonormative working environment.

Unsurprisingly, this leads to a healthy, positive working environment and in turn directly impacts the experience of our customers and products.

Christian , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Our founders Ozzy Jimenez & Christian Sullberg are married and live in Healdsburg with their 10 month old son Henry.

Our brand was built upon a love of desserts and community. When we started Noble Folk it was was a small grass roots effort led by both of us but supported fully by our small town in Wine Country. We started our business at the age of 22 and 23 years old in 2011 in a highly sought after competitive market. When we first opened our doors there were some in the industry twice our age that did not fully understand our business model and how we could support an entire business operation with a single scoop or a pie slice.

We time and again have proven our resilience and leadership in the small business sector and that is something we wear with pride.

We now operate locations on the Healdsburg Plaza, Courthouse square in Santa Rosa, and commerical kitchen operations in Windsor, California.

For two twenty year olds this was a herculean effort funded by ourselves for our selves with no outside investment.

How’d you meet your business partner?

Chirstian and I met at a coffee shop as a first date. We shared almost two hours during our first connection. In those first few dates/meetings we discussed everything from our professional aspirations to having children. In one of those first connections we talked about how my family from mexico with little english were able to start their own business and help support their family of five.

I was in college at the time when the 2008 recession occured and I saw so many of my collegues come back to Sonoma County with college degrees and no work. This made me apprehensive and made me question if finishing my degree was worth it to me. I had worked 3 jobs in colleges, and saved a small amount of funds through the years. Christian also did the same worked multiple jobs and saved as much as he could. Through our small savings we opened our first business with champange taste and a beer budget.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

The 2016 Tubbs & 2019 Kincaid fires were a critical time for our businesses. Not only did we have to grapple with losing Noble Folk but also possibly our homes.

This was a time where we had to turn off being a buisness and be there for our community.

We ceased operations and shifted gears usuing our delivery trucks to serve community needs. We along with others like Sonoma Family meal swithced our focus and started serving hungry individuals accross our county that were stranded due to the fires or evacuation orders. We used the infrastructure of our operations to support hungry individuals, families, and farmworkers.

This along with floods and power safety shutoffs forced our business to adapt and change at a moments notice. These experiences helped shape our business and when the pandemic presented it self we made strategic choices that had positive impacts because we were familiar with adapting at a moments notice.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.thenoblefolk.com
• Instagram: @noblefolk
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thenoblefolk/
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/noble-folk-ice-cream-and-pie-bar-healdsburg

Image Credits

Melissa Atle for the group photo and the outside store photo with Ozzy and Christian.