New-look Geelong Business Excellence Awards attract hundreds of entries

A STREAMLINED entry process has helped more than triple entries for this year’s Geelong Business Excellence Awards (GBEAs), with organisers also reporting a sharp rise in first-time entrants.

The Geelong Chamber of Commerce received more than 300 entries across 15 categories, up from 89 entries across 21 categories in 2025.

Judges have begun assessing the submissions and finalists will be announced on 6 August.

Geelong Chamber chief executive Jeremy Crawford attributed the increase to a new application process designed to make entering easier and more efficient.

“We deliberately brought in these changes based on feedback from previous entrants and with the assistance from judges and the business community, and it looks like the changes have landed really, really well,” he said.

“It’s just set up the program to be really rich this year in terms of its content and its quality.”

Crawford said the number of unique businesses and leaders entering the awards had increased by nearly 70 per cent compared with last year.

Bellarine business The Q Train is a repeat entrant and previous winner, taking out category awards in both 2024 and 2025.

 

The Q Train chief executive Marie-Claire Trotter said the recognition gained through the awards helped attract customers from outside the Geelong region, who account for 90 per cent of the business’s sales, while also raising its profile locally.

“Those local customers that come to us are our most high-value target market because they become repeat business,” she said.

“But Geelong is so hard to advertise to, so for us, the awards are a really great way for achieving PR and advertising to a captive market.”

Trotter said the awards also encouraged businesses to take a closer look at their own performance.

“You’re asking ‘What are you doing well? What are you not doing well?’,” she said.

“It makes you think more critically, in a way, about how to improve your business.”

Crawford said the changes to the entry process would help ensure the awards retained their reputation into the future.

“The brand of the Geelong Business Excellence Awards is known well outside of Geelong for the integrity that the program holds and how it’s been run for many decades,” he said.

For more information, head to gbea.com.au