The bank that welcomed him in In December 1987, Steven Papai simply wanted to open a business checking account. He didn’t need a loan. He had just established a document destruction (paper shredding) business, Berkeley Shreds, and was holding $3,000 in customers’ checks as his planned initial deposit. But that wasn’t good enough for two U.S. banks, one of which Papai had done his personal banking for a decade. “The banker there said to me, ‘Why don’t you come back in five years when you’ve demonstrated that you can operate a company?’ ” So Papai kept walking in the same neighborhood in Albany, California. At a corner, he came to Sumitomo Bank and went inside. The banker there happily accepted his money, even though Papai had never banked there. “That’s a big part of the reason I’ve stayed with them all these years,” he says. About a decade later, that bank became California Bank & Trust. Along the way—and ever since—Papai has appreciated what his bank has done for him, including with his personal banking. “They provide terrific
checking account at a major bank that not only held her allowance money and included checks printed with her name, but was her source of payment for purchases at local retailers. Zemke’s mother taught her how to fill out a check, sign it and present her California ID to a cashier who almost always accepted the check because Zemke
proved who she is. Grossmont Bank in San Diego, where she opened that first checking account, became California Bank & Trust in 1998. Today, Zemke
is the owner of Personal Touch Dining, a San Diego-based
wedding and special-event catering company that she opened in 1988. In 2023, her company’s annual revenue exceeded $9 million. Zemke isn’t at all surprised that she’s been a CB&T customer for more than 50 years. She has always appreciated the service she’s received from the bank, and still owns the vintage tote bag she received in 1972 when she opened that first checking account as a child. Robert Whitelaw was her banker from the day she opened her business account in 1988 at the El Cajon branch until he retired at the end of 2022. “I have always found a home at CB&T. It’s more than a banking relationship,” Zemke says. “It’s a personal relationship.” Joshua Hill is now Zemke’s banker and he says, “Tracy has not only been a long-time client, but CB&T has been a customer of hers, as well. Personal Touch Dining has provided catering services for our annual Christmas parties and other special events.” No matter what she needs from the bank, Zemke says she can communicate once and it’s taken care of. When her company moved into a new building at the end of December 2023, “we had all these different accounts with the bank, and with one email from me, they changed all the addresses on the accounts, including our credit cards.” That long-term relationship with the bank “is key to our success,” Zemke says.
customer service and personal relationships that have guided me in my business career and have made all of our banking easier,” he says. “I know all the Albany branch employees by their first name.” Mary Yuan has been his personal and business banker for
the past 25 years. She has continued to be the point person for him, even after he and his wife Cameron retired to Cooperstown, New York. “Steve prefers having a banker who can be responsive to his needs and concerns,” Yuan says. “He’s not very much into the high-tech way of banking and appreciates the human element.” When the Papais wanted to sell their home in Berkeley, CB&T became the couple’s escrow center and provided necessary legal documents. “They did everything we needed,” Papai says. “Yuan provides an amazing level of personal interest and consideration and care of our finances.”
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