Glittering Night Pays Tribute to an Assortment of the Region’s Top Businesses

The newly refurbished Shendish Manor, Apsley, was the venue for this year's prestigious Business Excellence Awards – a celebration that annually pays tribute to the region’s top businesses.

The dinner and awards ceremony took place on the evening of  Friday 6th June, opening with a champagne reception sponsored by the Snow Centre in Hemel Hempstead, which is due to open in April 2009 and is destined to be Britain's premier indoor snow sports destination.

Representatives from leading businesses in the region assembled to celebrate the occasion, which was hosted by Sky News Presenter Dermot Murnaghan.  Of the 30 nominated finalists, only 8 were awarded with the much sought after titles.  ‘The judges were faced with an exceptional level of quality amongst the finalists and judging each category was extremely difficult’, commented Jackie Withey, Associate at Alliotts Chartered Accountants and Business Advisors and co-chair of the Awards.

However the winners on the evening were:

• Tom Smith from Clock for ‘Graduate of the Year’
• Pexhurst for ‘Success Through People’
• Carter Chemists for ‘Entrepreneur of the Year’
• Durbin PLC won ‘SME of the Year’
• Renewable Energy Systems (RES) for ‘International Trade and Export’
• VIT Innovation won the award for ‘Innovation’
• Faber Maunsell won ‘Growing Business’

The coveted award, ‘Business of the Year 2008’, was awarded to Safestore.

‘The 2008 awards have highlighted the exceptional talent of our local businesses across extremely diverse sectors’ added Julie Gingell, SA Law’s Head of Marketing and co-chair of the awards. ‘It was a fantastic event, with both the winners and commended businesses in each category greatly enjoying the Awards Ceremony’.

The applications for the Business Excellence Awards 2009 will open from 1st October 2008, for further details please email Jackie at jackiew@alliotts.com or Julie at julie.gingell@salaw.com.

The Awards are sponsored by Alliotts Chartered Accountants and Business Advisors, SA Law, BDO Stoy Hayward, Coutts, University of Hertfordshire, Lombard, Natwest and RBS and are supported by the Watford Chamber of Commerce, WENTA, UK Trade and Investment, WFC and the Snow Centre.

To see all the winners from the 2007 Awards Click here