SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Det'on Cho Corporation was named business of the year by the Yellowknife Chamber of Commerce at the organization's annual President's Ball, held at the Explorer Hotel on Saturday night.

Mayor Mark Heyck, left, congratulates Yellowknife Chamber of Commerce business of the year recipient Roy Erasmus Jr., CEO of Deton'Cho Corporation, who accepted the plaque on behalf of the company on Saturday night. - Daron Letts/NNSL photo

Award winners Business of the Year: Det’on Cho Corporation Business Person of the Year: Trevor Kasteel Business Community Support Award: Top of the World Travel Safety Business of the Year: BBE Ltd. Safety Person of the Year: Luc Cyr

"I was quite surprised and very honoured to hear our name announced at the award ceremony," said Det'on Cho CEO Roy Erasmus Jr., who accepted the award on the company's behalf at the event. "We are very honoured and pleased to receive this award in recognition from other businesses in the city."

Det'on Cho earned the honour for the hard work of its leadership and the strength of the company and its 16 subsidiaries, said chamber president Jason McEvoy.

"It's a strong, strong board that they've got – great leadership," he said. "I think we'll be hearing about Det'on Cho for a long time to come in a very positive light. A lot of hard work has come to fruition."

Det'on Cho was recognized by Profit Magazine earlier this year when it named the company to its list of fastest-growing Canadian businesses. The company directly employed more then 360 workers this summer, most of whom were Northerners.

"We want to be the best at what we do and in doing that we're constantly looking at ourselves and our organization to see how we can do things better and how we can deliver a better end product to our customers and clients," Erasmus said. "We are going to be continuing to work hard on the business and trying to secure some more contracts and push for more work and more opportunities for the Yellowknives Dene and in turn the City of Yellowknife to try to help grow our economy and keep our communities of Ndilo and Dettah and the City of Yellowknife moving forward to the future."

McEvoy said he is also optimistic about the future of the chamber after the membership elected the new board at last week's annual general meeting.

"We have 10 returning board members and a full board going forward this year, so we've really got a lot of positives, good stability going forward and continuity," he said. "I'm pretty impressed with the names on the list and their resumes. It should be a great year with a full board and an engaged board."

The new board has hit the ground running with Small Business Week, which continues with seminars and networking events until Friday. After that, the board will focus on a membership drive before preparing its signature events, such as the trade show and gold tournament, in 2014.

The chamber has about 300 members.

"We're always looking at ways to improve our membership value and engage with the membership to see what they want and what's important to them and we'll continue to do that," McEvoy said.

The board's first task will be to hire a new executive director to replace Leslie Campbell, who is leaving the position after a year in the job to pursue other opportunities.

"She is going to be hard to replace," he said. "Our loss, somebody else's gain, for sure."

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