On Friday night, the wait was over for the finalists of the 2009 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year contest for Utah and southern Idaho. Awards were given in a total of eight categories. Over 1,200 people attended the black-tie event at the Salt Palace Convention Center.

Utah Lt. Gov. Gary Herbert, the keynote speaker, noted that small businesses fuel the state’s economy, with about 57,000 “small employers” representing 97 percent of the state’s employers.

Utah’s economy favors free markets, which is why a handful of national business publications have rated Utah’s economy as No. 1.

“I fear, at least in some ways, (the importance of free markets is) being forgotten in Washington, just a little bit,” Herbert said as the audience applauded in agreement. “Capitalism is becoming a dirty word. I’m here to tell you that’s not going to happen in Utah.”

New this year in the awards competition was a social-entrepreneur category, described as being for well-managed organizations that solve problems in the community with strong leadership. Matt Minkevitch of The Road Home received the award.

Minkevitch said The Road Home’s clientele are people who live in the margins and have one setback that ruins them financially. They end up homeless.

“One of the significant transitions that has taken place over the last eight years is we’ve focused on the other end of homelessness,” he said, “to help people move into housing.”

The Utah award recipients will next compete against other companies for national awards. Diversified Insruance Group was one of the sponsors of the awards.

Award recipients in the Utah competition were:

Technology: Matthew Heaton — BlueHost

Retail and Consumer Products: Jonathan Freedman, William Freedman and Charles Freedman ?— DownEast Outfitters

Emerging: David Flynn and Rick White — Fusion-io

Contract services: Douglas Sayer — Premier Technology Inc.

E-Commerce: Ryan DeLuca — Bodybuilding.com LLC

Social Entrepreneur: Matt Minkevitch — The Road Home

Services: Andrea Anaya — Career Step

Distribution and Manufacturing: Dallin Larsen — MonaVie

Diversified extends congratulations to all of the finalists and award recipients.

This entry was posted on Monday, June 15th, 2009 at 8:55 am and is filed under 21st Century Business, Business, Entrepreneur of the Year, Ernst & Young, Local Events, Utah. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.