Sudbury’s Bell Business Excellence Award winners ecstatic

Hear from some Bell Business Award winners The 23rd Annual Bell Business Excellence Awards were held last night and CTV's Molly Frommer talked today with some of the winners.

Sudbury — Tuesday evening, the Greater Sudbury Chamber of Commerce hosted the 23rd annual Bell Business Excellence Awards. The event was held as a way to acknowledge local businesses and entrepreneurs.

Among the winners was Ionic Mechatronics, a local company that specializes in industrial automation for medium and heavy industries. It won the innovation award and its president says it truly is an honour.

“Steve, the founder of our company, always liked that good ideas are a dime a dozen, but having innovation, which is actually an idea to develop something that the customers actually want to use and are going to use, that’s true innovation,” said Andre Dumais.

The entrepreneur of the year award went to Stitch & Stone, a clothing company that has been operating now for six years.

“We started really small and I think we’ve really built good relationships in the community with a lot of our customers,” said owner Gabrielle Roy. “We really try to deliver amazing customer service. Our business is all based on the experience first and then we hope that people buying product is a big product of that experience so I think that’s why we stand out a little bit in the community.”

This year, the company of the year was awarded to Cambrian Ford. Its management said just being nominated was overwhelming.

“It was refreshing to find out that our group of people here at Cambrian Ford have been acknowledged to be a leader in the community,” said president Scott McCulloch. “Cambrian Ford has been in business for more than a hundred years and you don’t do that overnight. It’s not longevity from being randomly successful, it’s about proper planning and taking care of customers, taking care of employees, proper management. That’s the reason why we're successful.”

Winners said they this is an award they’ll never forget.