2015 Murray / Riverina NSW Business Chamber "Excellence In Small Business" Award

THE Riverina’s solar experts have earned themselves a coveted NSW Business Chamber regional Excellence in Small Business award, presented at a gala event held at the Albury Entertainment Centre on Friday 2nd October.

"We are ecstatic to win the NSW Business Chamber Excellence in Small Business award,” Solar Professionals Managing Director Andrew Meurant said. "Our business has seen enormous growth particularly in the commercial solar sector over the past two years and that is reward enough" he said. "This accolade is icing on the cake for us, we're thrilled".

55 finalists and over 220 guests from as far away as Gundagai, Cootamundra, Griffith & Deniliquin were in attendance, vying for the chance to win one of the 11 categories on the night. 

Solar Professionals are passionate about the huge advantages renewable energy presents to business and industry. Their push to offer innovative products such as their Electricity Supply Agreement, which enables them to sell energy to businesses at a much lower, fixed rate than the major energy providers, has afforded their business huge growth in terms of commercial business partnerships and solar installations throughout NSW over the past two years.

The Agreement sees Solar Professionals fund, build, own, operate and maintain a solar asset at a business premises. Solar Professionals then sells the solar power generated by the solar system back to the business owner for an agreed period of time at a fixed rate, which is lower than charged by energy providers. At the end of the contract period, the ownership of the fully operational solar system is transferred to the business owner without any payout cost, so they can enjoy many more years of solar energy and reduced power costs.

Mr Meurant said the Solar Professionals Electricity Supply Agreement has allowed his business to push into metropolitan areas. "It generally goes the other way" he said. " My advice to aspiring business owners is to plan, look for the white space, know your market and back yourself all the way".

Its been a very successful year for Solar Professionals, having been awarded an Excellence in Innovation award at the CROW awards earlier this year.