Red Rose Awards judges hail county’s business champions

The judges for this year’s Lancashire Business View Red Rose Awards have praised the diversity, strength and skills of this year’s entries.

A total of 84 judges from across the county and from all sectors of commerce took part in a detailed and focused process to find this year’s worthy finalists and winners.

The panels for the judging were made up of sponsors of the event, Lancashire’s premier business awards, and invited sector experts.

A shortlist was created after a full day of pre-scoring by the Red Rose Awards judges, who combed through and debated hundreds of nominations.

Those chosen for the final judging stage then had to pitch and explain why they should win in 10 minutes, followed by 10 minutes of questions and answers. The aim, as always, was to find the very best of Lancashire businesses.

This detailed final judging process took place over two days and was hosted by Northcote at the Rovers at Ewood Park in Blackburn.

Official judging partners the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) were also on hand to speak to finalists and offer advice and business support to them.

Headline sponsors of the Red Rose Awards, Forbes and Barclays, also took part in the process, which provided an opportunity for all the judges the chance to meet and discover the talent on their doorstep.

The full list of judges can be seen at: https://www.redroseawards.co.uk/about/judges

Organisations of all sizes from every corner of the county across a wide variety of industries are represented on the final list of 150.

The winners will be revealed at a glittering, fun-packed, black tie event taking place on March 8 at Blackpool’s Winter Gardens.

Richard Slater, publisher of Lancashire Business View and founder of the Red Rose Awards, said: “Our thanks go again to all the judges who took part in this year’s process.

“The finalists get to sell themselves to the judging panel, who use all their expertise and experience to ensure that we have worthy finalists and winners in all our categories.

“It also gave them the chance to meet businesses from the county and talk with them about their success and their ambition and what drives them forward. As a result the judging team also get a lot out of the process.

“The winners are now decided, and the worthy 150 finalists will discover their fate in front of a 1,100-strong audience and we can’t wait for the big night!”

He added: “The Red Rose Awards tell the world about Lancashire. Those taking home a trophy have done great work putting the red rose county on the map.”

Dr John Lonsdale, director of innovation and enterprise at UCLan, judging partner for Red Rose Awards 2018, said: “This year’s Red Rose Awards entries have been exceptionally strong. The judges have yet again been impressed and delighted by the innovation, entrepreneurship and business excellence we have seen.”

Oliver Burton, CEO at Forbes Solicitors, headline sponsors of the awards for the eighth year, said: “We always enjoy the judging element of the awards and this year has been no different.”

John Stanworth, head of corporate banking at Barclays in Lancashire, a headline sponsor for five years, added: “As always the entries this year have been of a very high standard making judging a very difficult job indeed!”

The full list of finalists can be seen at www.redroseawards.co.uk

The charity partner for Red Rose Awards 2018 is Cash for Kids and funds will be raised at the awards event to support their work in Lancashire.