It’s hard for all us here at the Business Monthly to believe that we recently celebrated the 15th Annual Entrepreneurial Awards of Greater Lansing.  I’m not sure why it’s hard to believe, because we have now been publishing this magazine for nearly 23 years, but still it is.  This local awards program came about because our publisher, Chris Holman, had served as a judge for the statewide entrepreneurial awards, sponsored by Ernst and Young for many years, and every year as he was judging, he realized there were never any mid-Michigan nominees.  He knew there were successful businesses in our area, and wasn’t sure why they weren’t being submitted as nominees.

So after a staff meeting, he decided that we should start our own local awards program, and then send some of our recipients on to the statewide competition.  We have been successful at getting some of our local winners to win at the state level.  People like Mary Ellen Sheets, Jim Herbert, and Tom Dixon and Sherrie Myers to name a few.  It has been very rewarding for our staff to see some of these “local” recipients compete and win at the statewide and even the national level.

In our fifteen years of celebration, we have now recognized nearly 150 individuals and businesses with this program.  This May issue of the Business Monthly is always one of our favorites each year, because it is so rewarding to give these people featured the recognition they deserve.  Their countless hours, sacrifices, hard work and determination are what make Lansing a great place to do business.  And it is our hope that after reading this issue, it will serve as a great reminder of the good things that are happening right here in our own backyard.

Awards programs such as these do not happen without some great people and businesses behind them.  We must thank our sponsors, judges, and award dinner attendees for making this program such a success for fifteen years.  We have two people on the judges panel who have served all fifteen years of this program, Mark Hooper of Andrews Hooper and Pavlik and Bruce Dunn of Maner Costerisan & Ellis CPA, PC.  We thank them both for their time and dedication to this program, and for bringing the consistency needed from year to year.

Now sit back, and enjoy reading the stories behind each of the 2009 recipients.  All of us here at the Business Monthly congratulate them on their success and are proud to serve in this business community along side them.

Author: Stacy A. Adado