Cannoli Connoisseur — Valerie Bono ’97

Cannoli Connoisseur

Valerie Bono '97

In addition to being head girls’ hockey coach at Cushing Academy, Valerie Bono ’97 has another career involving one of the most beloved of all desserts—cannoli. Val is owner and chief sales and marketing offi cer of Golden Cannoli, a Massachusettsbased company that her father founded with his cousin in 1970. Fifty years later, the company remains family owned, today run by Val in collaboration with her sister and two cousins.

Golden Cannoli is everywhere. “If you’ve eaten a cannoli in a Boston restaurant, or really any bakery or restaurant throughout New England, then you’ve likely eaten a Golden Cannoli,” Val said. She speaks of a “cannoli code of silence,” as most bakeries don’t have the fryer needed to produce the quintessential crunch of this classic dessert. “We provide the shells and fi lling and then individual establishments put it together and make it their own.”

Val began working at the family business in what was to be a temporary arrangement after college. Two decades later, she is steeped in the business and seasoned at adapting to challenging economic conditions. Val’s fi rst day of work was September 11, 2001, and she remembers the business struggling as many did that year in an atmosphere that mirrored the economic impact of the current pandemic. With restaurant business dramatically down over the past year, Golden’s own sales sagged by about 60 percent at one point. The company shifted resources to a retail product—cannoli chips and dip—that has performed very well. A huge point of pride has been Golden’s ability to keep its entire workforce during the pandemic.

Alongside her business career, Val remains deeply committed to hockey. After playing Providence College, Val coached at Burlington High School in Massachusetts and in club teams, eventually earning a Level 5 Master Coaching Certifi cate from USA Hockey. Val came to Cushing Academy as a coach in 2015. “I’ve often said that the company pays the bills, but coaching hockey feeds my soul,” she said.

Val has worked at Golden long enough to witness a dramatic shift in the number of women in the industry. “In the beginning, they were all men in sales and distribution,” she said. “Now they are primarily women.” Val recalls not always being treated seriously as a young woman and notes a more collaborative approach now. “My motto is always, “How can I help? How can I fi x this?’” Val currently sees that sentiment echoed in the industry as well.

Val and Golden have been on a mission to make cannoli more “mainstream” and to raise cannoli awareness by promoting the establishment of “National Cannoli Day.” Next up for the company will be messaging that is Golden Cannoli - specifi c, including the creation of an app to identify locations near users that carry the product. To ensure that her cannoli is “authentic,” Val is keenly aware of maintaining the balance between growth and product quality. “We associate cannoli with holidays and special occasions,” she said. “As much as we want business to grow, it still has to be that product.”

Val traces her business acumen and her passion for life in general to her time at Cushing and to the support and inspiration she drew from teachers including Jessica Devin, Deb Harmon, Beth Stone, and Bob Johnson. But it was former fi eld hockey coach Kelly Berner who encouraged Val to run for student body president in her fi nal year at Cushing, a move she never would have considered before coming to Cushing and that is echoed in her current role as Alumni Council Chair. “Cushing taught me not to be so set in my ways, and to try anything new.” Maybe it was Val’s winning that election that foreshadowed her leadership prowess as both a winning businesswoman and coach!

“If you’ve eaten a cannoli in a Boston restaurant, or really any bakery or restaurant throughout New England, then you’ve likely eaten a Golden Cannoli.”