National award for business
The owner of a pest-control business that has clinched a national award believes the Wimmera community and his team are the primary reasons for the accolade.
Steve Olver, who runs Bugroff Pest Busters, said being named Australia’s pest manager of the year for a company employing between three and 10 people, was also a win for the region.
“To be named the best in Australia is huge for us. We’re very humbled,” he said.
“The award is very much about the community that supports us and I also have an awesome team around me.”
Bugroff’s Australian Environmental Pest Managers Association win is also a key milestone for Mr Olver and his businesses, which has its headquarters in Horsham providing customer services in a 200-kilometre radius and now includes spin-off franchises.
“Starting as a one-person operation, this was the final goal I wanted to achieve when I started in pest control – I wanted to become the best in Australia – it’s awesome that we’ve been able to do that in 13 years,” he said.
“That’s something you can’t do without local community support and it is as much a reward for the Wimmera as anyone.”
Bugroff broke relatively new ground in the industry in its infancy by adopting the use of detection dogs to sniff out termites in target areas.
With the business’s original dogs Buster and Bella now retired and at new homes, Bugroff continues to tap into canine skills, using the sensitive nose of an English springer spaniel called Sherlock.
Mr Olver said the process of being nominated and assessed was in depth with a four-person panel of industry leaders interviewing and scoring businesses on various aspects of their nomination.
“They do interviews across three days and they can go for 10 minutes to an hour and an overall process of scoring is good because it shows you areas of where you can improve,” he said.
“They commended us on our backend systems, loving the fact that we stick to Australian standards in all that we do.
“They also loved our point of difference such as employing female technicians and also using detection dogs and were impressed with our customer relations.
“We won the Victorian award last year, but this is the first time we’ve been national winners.
“When you think of all the pest-control businesses in Australia it is absolutely fantastic.
“It usually gets announced at a gala dinner and conference, which couldn’t happen this year, and we usually have to wait until the end of August for results. But it all happened really quickly.
“We found out last week with a call from one of the judges and then we let the whole team know. As a huge part of winning the award they were absolutely stoked.”