The San Jose Mercury News' 17th annual Best In Silicon Valley Reader's Choice Awards have been announced and Downtown Campbell again has a few businesses included in the list of winners. For a small downtown that has to compete with fewer resources than most other downtowns, it really means a lot to us every time one of our shops lands on a "best of" list.

Let's congratulate the three winners in Downtown Campbell!

Bombshell Boutique

Tied for 1st place for Best Boutique in Silicon Valley

Bombshell Boutique is one of the longest running boutiques in Downtown Campbell. Only Simply Smashing has been around longer. Bombshell is particularly near and dear to Downtown Campbell because its owner, Brooke Ramirez, is highly active in the Campbell community and has organized or helped to organize countless events and activities in Downtown Campbell throughout the years. This store not only tied for best boutique in Silicon Valley, its owner helped to make Downtown Campbell the place that it is today.

Oh, so you want to see what they offer? Take a look at the Bombshell Boutique Instagram page.

Campbell Farmers' Market

The Campbell Farmers' Market run by Urban Village needs no introduction. If you haven't been, you need to go. People visiting the US from other countries actually come to Campbell just to check out the Farmers' Market. In the past year alone the Campbell Farmers' Market has been featured in visitor guides for British Airways and a Mercedes Benz travel club.

Flex Fusion Studios

Winner of Best Fitness Club & Best Yoga Studio

Flex Fusion is more than a barre studio. They offer classes in various fitness regimens: barre, yoga, TRX, and boot camp to give you a well rounded workout in one place. Their instructors are fantastic and the make fitness a bonding activity for their members.

Recycle Bookstore

Winner of Best Neighborhood Book Store (2 locations)

Despite its name, Recycle Bookstore, doesn't just carry used books. It started off as a used book store, but these days you'll also find a healthy selection of new best sellers, young adult, children's books, graphic novels, and academic paperbacks in addition to the wonderful preloved volumes filling up their shelves. As if having a great selection of books wasn't enough, they also host regular meetings of the Recycle Book Club several times a month and often have author appearance events happening with the Sunday Farmers' Market in Downtown Campbell.

Therapy Stores

Winner of Best Gift Store in Silicon Valley (multiple locations)

Therapy is a gift store full of novelties and amazingly handy items that you never knew you needed. It's also a clothing boutique and has some housewares too.

They already had several popular locations before they decided to open up in Downtown Campbell, but the timing of their start in Downtown Campbell could not have come at a better time and helped in the rebirth of Downtown Campbell from a sleepy downtown of antique shops to the one that you know today. They're family owned and despite their larger size, remain an active participant* in community affairs in Downtown Campbell and 1% of their sales every day is donated to local charities.

*-This is not common and speaks to the great culture of the company. As the editor of DowntownCampbell.com, I've worked with numerous other downtowns and once a business has several locations, they're more likely than not to have checked out. - Sheldon Chang