A small business owner has been recognised as one of the state's most sustainable businesses after being named the 2021 Tasmanian Sustainable Business Of The Year.
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South Launceston hair salon Aspen Hair won the award for their pioneering work with Sustainable Salons by reducing, reusing and recycling waste produced by the business.
Salon owner Samantha Crawford said she was shocked and surprised her business won after reading up on her competition.
"I was up against some absolutely amazing businesses doing wonderful sustainable work in the community, so I was very surprised and very honoured," she said.
Mrs Crawford's salon follows the principles of the circular economy which focuses on upcycling and redeploying waste to give it a second life as a new product while reducing landfill.
She said to win against large and established businesses showed that everyone had a role to play in driving sustainability, and said she was grateful the award acknowledged the hard work of her staff.
"I think it was such a great thing for the business and for the team to be recognised for what we continue to do with our sustainability practices," she said.
"It was really rewarding for the staff to be recognised with the award."
The awards were judged by Planet Ark co-founder Jon Dee who selected Aspen Hair as the winner based on the innovative solutions the salon had employed in order to become sustainable.
Launceston base recycling business Environex was named as the runner up for their work in recycling plastic waste into commercial and industrial materials.
Award co-ordinator Sandy Astill said the variety of nominations for the awards showed running a sustainable business was possible - regardless of the industry.
"The actual variety of nominations that we received was quite staggering," she said.
"There was such diversity, we had everything from dry cleaning to the tourism industry and the building industry."
The awards were announced on Friday night as part of the Sustainable Living Festival.
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