Female Supremacy Articles - Page 8

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Unlike many others, the Nonino operation is a matriarchy through and through, with one sex clearly reigning supreme.

Giannola is the muse and mastermind of the enterprise. The senior executives are her three spirited daughters: Cristina, 40, Antonella, 37, and Elisabetta, 35.

They have no brothers. Their father hovers on the fringes of the frenetic activity. Their spouses are kept at an even greater distance.

"There is a family rule that husbands stay out of the business," Elisabetta said.

That formula works. Exactly 30 years to the month since Giannola and her husband, Benito, 69, unveiled the first truly high-end grappa, they have a brand and business well known not only throughout Italy but also in Germany, Japan, South Africa and America.

From their headquarters here near the northeastern Italian city of Trieste, the Noninos produce about one million liters of grappa a year, about 20 percent exported.

In recognition of that, they just received a special prize given annually by the president of Italy to the entrepreneur who has helped to bring worldwide prestige to the phrase "made in Italy."

That award belongs above all to Giannola, the mother of all Italian grappa at least as it is currently seen, sipped and savored and a sharp-tongued, sharp-witted, obstinate force of Italian nature.