Muttville rescues older dogs and prepares them for adoption.
"We're also the call of last resort for many of these dogs. A lot of them are in kill shelters," Muttville founder Sherri Franklin said.
They've rescued more than 800 dogs since Franklin began in 2007. Her friend and publicist Patty Stanton wrote to the Oprah show which was looking for local heroes. They were picked, but didn't know what to expect.
They showed up, as the Favorite things audience from Friday's show was leaving -- Oh well.
"I'm thinking we couldn't carry all that stuff home anyway," Franklin said.
But there was a surprise.
"I decided let's do two special shows," Oprah said on the show.
The audience was filled with heroes and givers who got thanks for touching others' lives. One of the prizes given was an iPad – perfect for Muttville.
"Because when we're at adopting events, we often show binders of dogs, so now we can just show it on the iPad," Stanton said.
Other goodies given include clothing, gift certificate and kitchenware. They even got serenaded by Johnny Mathis and Josh Groban.
Oprah is also giving a 2012 re-designed VW Beetle and will paint it with the Muttville logo.
"I'm going to be carrying around a lot of our little guys in our new mutt mobile," Franklin said.
Some of the items they have received will be auctioned off and you can find them on www.muttville.org These auction items will be up through Dec. 6. It costs about $850 per dog to prepare them for adoption.
Galaxy Desserts
Among all of the gifts Oprah passed-out, were pastries made by a Bay Area company. Now, that company is gearing up for the "Oprah" effect, for the second time.
"The Oprah team called and said she liked our croissant and wanted to use it again," said Jean-Yves Charon, founder Galaxy Desserts.
Eight years ago the golden, flakey, mini croissant was one of Oprah's favorite things and it seems it still is. For a second time the pastry chiefs at Richmond's Galaxy Desserts have baked up a winner.
Now, the staff is gearing up for a flood of orders. They even brought in a third shift -- something they should have done the first time they were on the show.
"The first year we thought we were going to do an extra 1,000 boxed of croissant. We did 15,000 and we didn't have enough airplanes for UPS to ship our product and we had to land at Moffett Airbase," says Charon.
Oprah might have picked these mini croissants as one of her favorites because it is so rich with butter. The company says they use 60,000 pounds of it a month.
Community involvement is also important to the owners of Galaxy Desserts. Some of what they make goes to local food banks.
"We give to food banks especially in Contra Costa and Alameda Food Bank and a company called Food America that distributes a lot of our food products to the food banks in the local community," says Avarlyn Hangad from Galaxy Desserts.
A good deed, even when they're not in the national limelight.
