An Honor to be Nominated....

In the nearly 7 years of business, we have been nominated for several different awards.  We have been lucky enough to win some of these awards in the past too.  This year, we have been named one of the Blue Ribbon Finalists for the Dream Big Small Business Awards through the U.S. Chamber and Wichita American Marketing Association Category Winner.  

We are also honored to be one of the Top 5 Finalists for the Wichita Chamber’s Small Business Awards.  This local award has been a great honor to be a part of.  We have been really excited, as an organization, to pull together through the application process, finalist announcements, panelist activity and soon the award announcement in May. 

For those of you that don’t know the process of this particular award, we thought it would be fun to see the award process through our eyes.

The nominations were due in December.  Someone took the time to nominate us for this award based on the criteria of the contest.  Thank you! Applications were due at the end of January.  This was fun!  We didn’t realize how much you have to put together, and being perfectionists, we were constantly changing and editing our application.  Such a perfect time to be doing this application too…since Valentine’s was right around the corner!  But, we made the deadline and delivered our application to the Chamber. 

From there, the Chamber held a Metro Mingle.  All the applicants, were able to exhibit.  We brought our “dog and pony show” to the Mingle and showcased some of our signature Cocoa Dolce flavors.  And, we had our whole Management Team attend as well.  It was great to get to know the other businesses and network.  Towards the end of the event, the top 10 Finalists were named.  There are two tiers (under 25 full time employees and over 25 full time employees).  We were all so nervous during the announcement and were SO excited when we were named one of the Top 5 Finalists (for the under 25 employee category)!!!!

Angie Gonzalez, Aimee` Schumacher, Amber Travis, Kelley Collier, Lisa Mickey, Beth Tully, James Tully, Jay Tully (not pictured)

Profit Builders, Inc.
Ruggles & Bohm, P.A.
Cocoa Dolce Artisan Chocolates
Armstrong Shank Advertising
Xenon International Academy Hair-Skin-Nails

The next event was held at the Hyatt.  A representative from each business sat on a panel and answered a question about their business.  Luckily, everyone knew their question ahead of time.  Beth was excited to talk about our process of creating new chocolates and innovation in our field.  There was a little roar of the crowd when everyone realized the chocolates on the table are a new addition to Cocoa Dolce’s line.  The chocolates are from a rare chocolate that is thought to be lost for over 100 years old. 

Now we just wait until May 9^th for the big announcement.  The Chamber will feature each business with a short video.  There is also a lunch served at this event too.  We are all really excited about this whole process.  We have been honored to be nominated!  But, we are all very competitive…..so a win would be really nice too!!