The paper pulp and timber company is one of the largest employers in Hawke's Bay and Napier Port's biggest customer.
Mr Ducker said Hawke's Bay had magnificent resources and people, but regional growth required ongoing co-operation and collaboration.
Chamber CEO Wayne Walford said judges were impressed with the quality of businesses that put themselves forward.
"This is a great way for businesses to identify opportunities for growth," he said.
"One of the benefits of entering the awards is that the finalists all receive feedback from the judges, a free business performance analysis for their business.
"Past entrants who have made the suggested changes from the judges' feedback have shown increased vitality and profitability in their business."
More than 300 celebrated the awards at a glittering Hawke's Bay Showgrounds Exhibition Hall, with entertainment provided by the Hicksville Stompers and Lost 45s.
Westpac Hawke's Bay Chamber of Commerce Business Awards Winners
Presbyterian Support East Coast
-Westpac Supreme Business of the Year Award and Pan Pac Large Business Award
Presbyterian Support East Coast (PSEC) is a not-for-profit organisation well regarded for its innovations, expertise and business development. PSEC was formed in 1946, employs 300 staff, delivers $17 million worth of social services annually and operates through four main business divisions:
Family Works - social services for children and their families (social work, counselling, parenting programmes)
Cranford Hospice - palliative care services
Enliven Positive Ageing Service - enable older people to stay in their own homes
Real People - residential and community services to people with disabilities and neurological illnesses (Rowan, Mosaic, and The Beacon)
PSEC's organisational systems, heritage and purpose contribute to the regional advancements in the business area by investing resources where traditional commercial organisation does not have an ability to operate.
By providing essential services to local people in the East Coast community, and increasing their resilience and workforce capabilities, it supports commercial organisations in Hawke's Bay to operate, and to create strong value for their shareholders.
PSEC's contribution to commercial business innovations is not readily recognised by those with lack of understanding of the economy, its forces and commercial sector operations. Clients are also often not in the position to promote its achievements, so PSEC is delighted to be recognised by the business community for its contributions.
Centralines
-ACC Work Place Safety Award
Centralines is a community-owned and operated electricity distribution business in Central Hawke's Bay. It is also the third-smallest electricity distribution business (EDB) in New Zealand and covers about 333,400 hectares of easy to steep, rugged terrain.
With a team of dedicated and highly skilled people, Centralines works to deliver a reliable electricity service through achieving high standards of quality, and efficiency to meet the expectations of its customers.
Centralines is committed to the health and safety of its employees, contractors, customers and community. Its objective is to achieve an incident-free workplace by creating a culture where each person truly believes that safety first is a core value and that working safely is part of all employees' everyday activities.
Similarly to other EDBs in New Zealand, Centralines' lines crew face challenging conditions on a daily basis - conditions which are intrinsic to the industry they work in - often working in extreme weather, in rough and inhospitable terrain.
Through its safety programme, it has learnt that it is important to involve staff in making safety an issue that extends beyond the working environment. This holistic approach improved not only safety performance but also quality and productivity.
Architecture HDT Hawke's Bay
-NZME. Small Business Award
Architecture HDT, a New Zealand Institute of Architects practice, is located in the seaside village of Ahuriri.
It was established in 2008 and its talented team have been involved in the design of award winning buildings, including the Portside Chambers office building, located beside the historic Crown Hotel in Ahuriri, and the Maryknoll Chapel redevelopment in Taradale.
"Our passion is the design of your built environment, from individual furniture pieces to complex multi-million dollar commercial developments," partner Shaun Thompson-Gray said. "Our philosophy is to add value through design. We do not have a signature style but seek to provide design responses co-operatively that are driven by the aspirations and constraints of our clients.
"We expect to challenge our clients and for them to challenge us. It is critical that this process is robust and results in a design solution that we can all be proud of.
"We pursue design excellence through allowing time for creativity to flow, collaboration, and allowing time to listen and challenge ideas and assumptions, investing in creative, articulate, passionate people and investing in the latest technology to implement our design solutions."
Catalyst Fuel Refunds
-EIT Small to Medium Business Award
Catalyst Fuel Refunds was born out of chance conversations in early 2013 with friends and family who were farming.
They shared how hard but worthwhile it was to claim back petrol tax, commenting that they found the claim process complicated and time-consuming or were unaware they could even claim. Catalyst set about seeing what it could do to help by building a cloud-based system that made it easy.
All petrol has .66 per litre of Petrol Excise Tax included in the pump price and any business is eligible to claim this back as long as it is used for off-road purposes (farmers, orchardists, forestry businesses, commercial boats etc).
With more than $100 million left unclaimed every year, it created an online and automated process that takes the grunt work away from customers.
First-time claimants can claim back retrospectively up to two years of eligible use, resulting in an average return of $3200 for a typical farmer. After their initial claim, they can lodge quarterly claims worth on average $1600 per year. Since launching, it has registered more than 3000 customers and claimed back more than $5 million in petrol tax refunds.
Isaac's Pumping and Electrical
-Hawke's Bay Regional Council Medium Business Award
Shane Heaton and Gavin Streeter purchased Isaac's Electrical in 2013, an already successful company with good client relationships through the previous owner of 20 years. The firm provides electrical and pumping services to Central Hawke's Bay and electrical services to the Hawke's Bay region.
"We are focused on having strong corporate governance and feel that having a robust structure is paramount," Mr Heaton said.
"This is in the back office and in front of the clients, as a uniform approach to this business is essential to its longevity and the sustainability. We have both undertaken Icehouse management courses and engaged the services of The Icehouse as business mentors in 2014, to aid with making decisions to ensure sustainable growth."
Isaacs has rebranded over the past 12 months. "We don't aim to be the largest firm, we aim to be the best. We will operate with the latest technology and the best technicians available. Our clients come first and we strive to deliver a service second to none."
