Congratulations to our Awards Finalists!
Your next step is to meet our panel of judges.
Your submitted entry has made you a finalist in the Farmer Autovillage Tauranga Business Awards 2025.
We have pooled the finalists together so each of you can meet with the judges before they determine the finalists for each of the categories and the eventual winners.
This page provides you with tips and guides on how to present to our judges.
Click the link below for more information about our finalists announcement.
Your time to meet the judges
13 & 14 December 2025
Chamber staff are contacting all finalists to arrange a time to meet the judges on Fri, 13 Dec and Sat, 14 Dec at Tauranga Business Chamber’s new office – 58 Cross Road, Sulphur Point, Tauranga.
Keep an eye on your emails for confirmed details.
Meeting the Judges
Finalists are invited to ‘pitch’ their business/application to the judges. It’s your chance to emphasise key points and answer their questions to inform their decisions.
You will present to the judges for 5 to 10-minutes, and then you get to answer questions from the judges for another 5-20 minutes, depending on how broad your business and/or application was.
Finalists often gain a lot of value by presenting their business to our panel of judges. It’s not often that you get to pitch your business to a wide range of experienced business leaders. It can lead to sparking new business ideas or opportunities.
For more tips, see the frequently asked questions below.
Frequently asked questions
Yes. Given the nature of the category, we have a separate judges panel who are dedicated to the HAYS Emerging Leader category.
The judges will reach out to you separately to arrange a time to meet in person.
The process is similar to a typical job application process:
- Your application was your resume.
- Being a finalist means you’ve been shortlisted to have an interview with the judges about your application.
- Judges may possibly ask for additional information, if necessary.
On Friday 13 & Saturday 14 December, the finalists pitch their business to the panel of judges.
Enter your preferred meeting times in the survey below.
Where the judges consider it to be relevant, they may also want to visit your work site. These will be arranged separately.
Finalists in the HAYS Emerging Leader category: the judges will reach out to you directly.
Each finalist has 5-10 mins to present to the judges. Judges then ask questions for between 5-20 minutes.
The top 8 tips:
- Keep your pitch simple
- Manage the timing of your pitch
- Tell your story
- Stay focused on the key points (not detail)
- Convey the unique value of your business
- Let the judges experience your product first-hand, if possible
- Be clear on who your target audience is and why
- Know your numbers.
You will present to a judges panel in the Tauranga Business Chamber’s new training room. There will be a TV to present any slides, videos or audio. We encourage you to make it memorable.
See the more tips in the remaining FAQs below.
At the very core of your pitch is the presentation – the tools you use to build and show off your presentation are incredibly important. The example below is just a guide.
- Introduce yourself and your company
- Context
- Problems, gaps & solutions.
- Traction
- Market Opportunity
- Competitive Edge
- Team
You want to showcase your point of difference and make it memorable for the judges.
No. You can showcase your business in any way you like. You can bring in props, products or displays that convey your points.
How ever way you present your pitch, please be organised and cohesive to make the best impression of your business.
There will be a TV to present your slides and any relevant videos or audio.
Here are our top tips for using slides/powerpoint
- Limit each slide to expressing one idea – keep the judges on the same page as you’re talking
- Don’t use slides as your speech notes. Keep it visual: show pictures, charts, GIFs and even memes.
- Keep slides consistent and readable: use same font, colour, grammar, capitalisation. Don’t put off judges.
- Don’t make it too long – about 30 seconds per slide is a good pace.
- A good pitch is succinct, with focus and momentum. A good pitch tells a story and follows a narrative pattern.
- Make it memorable, as judges are hearing from a range of finalists
Bring your own device/laptop and an adapter to fit the HDMI connection with the TV.
See this ‘pitch’ as your opportunity to substantiate your written entry. If you have stated that you’re a market leader, demonstrate to the judges how you’ve measured this.
In regards to financials, don’t do lots of slides or graphs, but have an excellent view and knowledge of your figures. You will impress the judges if you know the key financial aspects of your business.
If you don’t know say so, don’t make it up, they will see through that. Again, remember they have read your entry.
They aren’t necessarily interested in day to day figures either; more about growth and projections, not what is necessarily in the bank account. You may nothing in the bank account, but your R & D and future is really exciting.
Yes, although it’s less important for categories like marketing and employer of the year categories.
Here are some tips for discussing your future growth targets:
- Don’t overstate the market opportunity – judges will see through it.
- Instead of top-down forecasts where you ‘only need to get one per cent of a huge market’ to be successful, focus on bottom-up forecasts where you detail your expectations for how you’ll acquire customers.
- Show the growth over past years and potential into the future
- If you have data on how your product is selling, show those numbers.
No, but it’s in your best interest to meet the judges, so you can highlight key points and answer questions that the judges may have before reaching their decision.
If you are not available on either 13 or 14 December – and you want to meet the judges – please let us know ASAP so we can arrange a special appointment with a smaller group of judges. This will be subject to their availability.
The judges may also want to visit some worksites after the pitches to inform their decisions. This will be at the judge’s discretion and will be confirmed after the pitch weekend.
Email: carrie@tauranga.org.nz
At the very least, a representative from your organisation must attend the Awards Ceremony on 13 February 2025 if you want to win an award.
You can purchase tickets through Tauranga Business Chamber’s website via our events calendar.
Winners of each category will likely be briefly interviewed by the MC (Kerre Woodham) to allow the audience to understand your success story and why you won. You (or your representative) will need to be comfortable speaking into the microphone for a couple of minutes.
You can also subscribe to the Tauranga Business Chamber e-newsletter to get notified of further updates: Click here to subscribe.
The judges will be announced when your appointments are confirmed.
1 person is more than enough. However, you’re welcome to bring up to two others if you wish—no more than 3 people, due to room capacity and ensuring your presentation runs smoothly and coherently for the judges.
Each finalist has been allocated a 30-minute slot. If you are late to start, the head judge will still stop you at the end of your scheduled time. Judges are meeting 17 finalists over two days, and we need to stay on time.
Please arrive on time. We have a separate waiting room for any early arrivals.