June 18, 2014, Montreal – Cheese Champs, a project
submitted by Shep Ysselstein, owner of Gunn’s Hill Artisan Cheese in
Woodstock, Ont., is the winner of the 2014 BDC Young Entrepreneur Award $100,000 Grand Prize.
June 18, 2014, Montreal – Cheese Champs, a project submitted by Shep Ysselstein, owner of Gunn’s Hill Artisan Cheese in Woodstock, Ont., is the winner of the 2014 BDC Young Entrepreneur Award $100,000 Grand Prize.
Gunn's project involves the construction of a 2,000-square-foot,
climate-controlled curing and aging extension to his current building
that would allow him to double his annual production of cheese to 60,000
kilograms. His business needs to invest in this expansion to keep up
with high consumer demand for his premium cheeses from grocery chains
and specialty food shops across the province.
“I congratulate Shep on winning the 2014 BDC Young Entrepreneur
Award,” said Michel Bergeron, senior vice-president, marketing and public affairs at BDC, in a media statment. “His business illustrates how an entrepreneurial
vision can create real opportunities for any industry, anywhere in
Canada. Gunn’s Hill is more than a cheese plant; it’s a rural enterprise
that creates jobs and economic activity and drives a small community
forward.”
“We plan to use the $100,000 Grand Prize to accelerate the growth of
our business,” said Gunn in the release. “The new curing and aging rooms will allow us
to double our workforce, meet demand for our current products, and
create new premium aged cheeses that will further boost our revenue. We
also hope this boost will put us on track for a future national
expansion, so we can start selling our products across Canada.”Created by
the Business Development Bank of Canada in 1988, the BDC Young
Entrepreneur Award contest pays tribute to remarkable Canadian
entrepreneurs between 18 and 35. For the first time in 2014, a national
committee evaluated the quality of the finalist projects and gave each
finalist a ranking that was combined with the public vote. The national
committee evaluation was weighted to account for 30 per cent of each project’s
final ranking and the public vote accounted for the remaining 70 per cent of the
ranking. Online voting in the BDC Young Entrepreneur Award contest took
place between May 29 and June 12 at www.bdc.ca/yea .
Nine
projects competed for Canada’s votes in the 2014 BDC Young Entrepreneur
Award contest. Each finalist described, via a video submission, a
turning point their company had reached as well as their solution to
achieve future growth and success.
Print this page