BOW VALLEY – The second annual Bow Valley Chamber of Commerce Business Excellence Awards event is coming soon, and the chamber’s board is looking for nominations.
For 2018, the awards have increased from four in the inaugural event to six and now include community impact award, customer service, innovation, new business of the year, youth entrepreneur and business of the year.
The deadline for nominations is Saturday (Sept. 15), with awards to be handed out on Oct. 18 at a luncheon event.
Once nominations close, a five-member independent committee will weigh them and make the decision on which businesses will be awarded.
Business owners, members of the public and fellow chamber members may make nominations.
“The committee takes a look at the businesses with a business lens. There are no board members involved and the committee does the heavy lifting,” said chamber president Janet Nystedt.
To date, she said, there are nominations from customers who have had excellent experiences with local businesses, to employees who appreciate what their employers and doing for them to business owners nominating colleagues or even themselves.
“Last year, there were over 90 nominations from throughout the valley (Lake Louise, Banff, Canmore, Exshaw, Morley and Kananaskis) and I hope for that to repeat.
“Even getting nominated for an award, I think, is an accomplishment in and of itself, because someone’s taken the time to try to recognize what you’ve done.
“I think it’s fantastic we have so many people who think we have great businesses in the valley. Which, of course, we do.”
Once the committee receives the nominations, businesses will be called for more information, then awards are decided.
“The whole point is to recognize business excellence,” said Nystedt. “We could have come up with 10 to 15 achievement awards because there’s all kinds of things that companies are doing in the valley.
“Every now and then it’s nice to know that you’re doing a good job and to have some external recognition.”
For more information, or to nominate a business, visit www.bowvalleychamber.com and go to the Business Excellence Awards button.
