2025 Martin County Business Awards
The annual business awards ceremony will occur in October, and the 2025 Martin County Business Awards nomination period is open.
Dedicated to celebrating Martin County businesses that significantly impact the economy and workforce, the annual celebration of the community’s top innovators, creators, manufacturers, and more is moving up in the calendar—and so is the nomination period.
The annual Martin County Business Awards, the Business Development Board of Martin County’s signature event, has been sold out for several years. This year, it also adds a new category to honor those dedicated to addressing one of the economy’s most pressing challenges.
The 2025 Martin County Business Awards will be held from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Oct. 6 at Hutchinson Shores Resort & Spa, where the Innovation in Workforce Development Award category will be awarded for the first time.
Nominations for all awards open now through June 23.
Click here to submit a nomination.
“On our Pulse meetings with the leaders of local businesses, CEO across industries consistently share with us that they’re contending with the same challenge—how best to find, train, and retain talent,” says William Corbin, BDBMC executive director. “Fortunately, this community has fully embraced this challenge. Entities across the private, public, and nonprofit sectors are engaged in creative solutions. Their unified effort contributes to the long-term resilience of the local economy, and there’s no better forum to showcase and celebrate such efforts than the 2025 Martin County Business Awards.
“We’re excited for the opportunity to celebrate these leaders who are making a difference in this area,” Corbin added.
Award categories:
NEW! The Innovation in Workforce Development Award: This award is intended to recognize a Martin County business, business leader, workforce development professional, or partner for their contributions, innovations, and significant accomplishments in workforce development and addressing businesses’ employment/workforce needs.
Business Excellence Award: Honors a long-established company that consistently serves as an industry leader, remains actively engaged in the business community, and makes, year over year, a significantly positive and measurable impact on the local economy. Recent winners include Pursuit Aerospace (2024), International Training (2023), Bluestream Fiber (2022), Sunshine Land Design (2021), and Cleveland Clinic Martin Health (2020).
Company to Watch: Honors a new business that’s undergone a transformation of some sorts and introduces new technologies and innovations to the market, blazing trails within its industry while creating new economic opportunities for the county. Previous winners include Grind Hard Ammo (2024), ADDiTEC (2023), and Willis Custom Yachts (2022).
Headquarters of the Year: Honors a company that has made Martin County the managerial and administrative center of the organization. Previous winners include Paradise Air Fresh (2024), Awareness Technologies (2023), Team IP (2022), Seacoast Bank (2021), and Visiting Nurse Association (2020).
Manufacturer of the Year: Honors a local manufacturer dedicated to best practices and innovative processes while meeting or exceeding industry standards and serving as a leader in their field. Previous winners include Value Tool and Engineering (2024), Pace Machine and Tool (2023), and WMR Competitive Products (2022).
Entrepreneur of the Year: Honors an entrepreneur for their ingenuity, courage, and creativity who has innovated new solutions, reimagined existing ones, and (oftentimes) bootstrapped their business from inception to success. Previous winners include Pete Morello of CIS Security Solutions (2024), Eddie Kolos, H20 (2023), Jon Justak, AGTI (2022), Brian O’Connor, AirBurners (2021), and Eric Kiehn, C&W Technologies (2020).
Youth Entrepreneur of the Year: Honors individuals 18 years of age or younger for their entrepreneurial ambitions, innovations, and work ethics in creating services or products for the market and realizing some early accomplishments along the way. Previous winners include Parker Smith of Smith Marine Services (2024), Jaxon McIntyre and Matthew Elder, Bright Delight Windows (2023) and Keegan Nunes, and KSoap (2022).
Newcomer of the Year: Honors a company that moved to Martin County within the last two years and added to the existing base of businesses, bringing new skills, workforce opportunities and additional vibrancy to the local economy. Previous winners include TrenchBadger (2024), Containing Luxury (2023), Daher (2022), Comfort Suites Stuart-Hutchinson Island (2021) and The Roofing General (2020).
Some of the more recent winners of the Charlene Hoag Leadership Award—which recognizes leaders who live in Martin County and have advocated for the continuous improvement of the local economy and the creation of sustainable and resilient opportunities—include Suzy Hutcheson (2024), Tom and Sue Whittington (2023), Kelly Johnson (2022), Janice Norman (2021), and Debra Duvall (2020).
For a list of category descriptions and previous winners, click here.
The BDBMC would like to thank Bank of America for being the Presenting Sponsor of the annual awards for the third year in a row. If you are interested in being a part of the elite roster of sponsors, click here to see the various sponsor levels, or contact Inez van Ravenzwaaij, Director of Programs and Partnerships at inez@bdbmc.org or 772-221-8660
Speaker
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William T. CorbinExecutive Director, Business Development Board of Martin CountyA certified economic developer, Corbin has helped stimulate hundreds of millions of dollars of diversified commercial development in various municipalities—most recently in Georgia, including the cities of Duluth and Norcross, as well as Clayton County.
“I’m honored to be chosen for this leadership role, and I’m excited to live and work in Martin County and learn more about its legacy industries such as aerospace, marine, and advanced manufacturing,” says Corbin. “I’ve always loved boating and flying, so this BDB opportunity is appealing. I hope to apply my insights into building economic ecosystems, helping strengthen existing industries, and assisting companies in their expansion plans.”Corbin distinguished himself among a field of more than 90 applicants, which the BDB selection committee pored over for three months. “We’re extremely excited to welcome William to this role of executive director for the Business Development Board,” says Susan Rabinowitz, president of the BDB. “Our selection committee deserves tremendous credit for carefully vetting an array of compelling candidates to find William—who’s extremely qualified to step into the role right away and make meaningful contributions.”
While he got his start as an economic development practitioner in Miami-Dade County at The Beacon Council, Corbin’s experience spans communities of a variety of sizes and dynamics. Clayton County is home to 300,000 people while Norcross and Duluth have populations of 18,000 and 32,000, respectively, showing Corbin’s skills shaping projects to fit the characters and personalities of each unique setting.In Duluth, he helped guide the planning and development of Parsons Alley, a 2-acre downtown redevelopment site featuring commercial and retail investments that won awards for its design, functionality and impact. In Norcross, Corbin’s leadership helped attract more than $500 million in total investment. He also helped increase the city’s communication and engagement with its small business and entrepreneur community through initiatives such as grant programs and partnerships with local organizations that provide access to capital and technical assistance services.
Further, Corbin led a workforce development project, among other achievements, that bridged connections between businesses and job seekers during the pandemic, strengthening the labor market. “The resume of achievements that William has built up is impressive by any standard but even more so considering that he’s relatively early in his career,” says Dan Hudson, interim executive director who came aboard to helm the organization through a leadership transition. “His experience working with communities of all sizes and the approach he brings to each environment speaks to how attentive he is to public involvement and finding solutions that are rightsized for each location.”
Martin County’s distinctive quality of life appealed to Corbin, 40, and his family. While considering other opportunities across South Florida, he and his wife, Jonide, researched and even visited the area on vacation with their two girls, ages 5 and 7, and two-year-old son. They appreciated that Martin County offered a peaceful respite from a big city pace yet easy access to major metropolitan areas to the north and south. “There’s a definite quality of life on display here and it comes with a community and leadership that has embraced managed growth in a fashion that’s responsible, responsive to the residents and protective of such a beautiful place,” he says. “I like the laidback nature of the community and the fact that there are a lot of opportunities to enjoy the outdoors. I like how things are a little bit slower. It’s a great place to raise a family and grow roots.”
