Kennesaw State’s Cox Family Enterprise Center held its 25th annual Georgia Family Business of the Year Honoration on Thursday, Feb. 28, at Flourish Atlanta in Buckhead.
In the past 25 years of hosting these awards, CFEC has presented close to 100 awards to family businesses throughout Georgia. These awards seek to highlight two core values of a successful family venture — resilient families and sustainable businesses. This year, they also added an additional layer of maintaining the deserved respect of legacy to these elements, according to KSU’s website.
For the first time in the event’s history, business owners were recognized as “champions who have shown dedication, effort and made contributions to activities aimed at growing the overall wellbeing of family business,” according to KSU’s website.
Honors are given in three categories based on the size of the business and number of employees.
One of the awards given was the Resilient Family Honoration in which families are honored for bouncing back from adversity and celebrating how families thrive over time.
The second award, the Sustainable Business Honoration, celebrates innovative and sustainable practices that work to better the whole of the organization’s stakeholders and broader community.
The Legacy Honoration was given to a business that has been in existence for at least 100 years with the intention to continue on with many generations beneath the legacy.
This year’s finalists for the annual honoration were Beaumont Products, Inc., Blanchard & Calhoun, CKS Packaging, DeKalb Farmers Market, Inc., DeNyse, J.M. Huber and RefrigiWear.
The CFEC hosted many notable individuals, including Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger.
Featured speakers and guests included Mitzi Perdue, who shared her experiences as a part of two established family businesses, the Sheraton Hotel chain and Perdue Chicken.
Also serving as featured speakers were Sarah Riggs Amico, the executive chairperson of Jack Cooper Holdings Corporation, as well as Marc De Kuyper, the former CEO of the De Kuyper Royal Distillers and an 11th-generation member of a family business.
The Cox Family Enterprise Center’s annual honoration celebrates and recognizes family business and has done so since 1992.
Their mission is to “act as an intellectual and practical hub for this community. With specialized programming, events and services tailored to the needs of each segment of our community, [they] focus on creating growth opportunities that empower individuals and organizations,” according to the CFEC website.
