Ballots for the 2021 Best of SLC Awards are in, and you folks knocked it out of the park. Both the number of votes and the number of unique voters appear to be records for the whole state!

The businesses and attractions that were up for voting in their respective categories were nominated by Salt Lake residents in March. Those that received enough nominations earned their spots on the ballot.

Tens of thousands of votes were cast to show support for businesses and attractions in our community. We were overwhelmed with the enthusiastic response and can’t wait to share the finalists of each category.

What Happens Now

We want the Best of SLC Awards to be as fair as possible, so our team is working hard to calculate the results and verify the findings. We use a scoring system that relies on a combination of votes from Salt Lake area residents and reviews from Google.

Count Votes

Who had the most votes? Most business awards are prone to spamming, duplicate votes, or cheating. Best of SLC only counts unique votes for each category, and we use text message verification for each ballot. While technology makes counting easy, we still need to verify the results.

BBB Review

The Best of SLC has partnered with the Better Business Bureau to certify our finalists. The top vote-getters must also have a passing grade with the BBB in order to become a finalist. Their rating system utilizes a grading scale just like you used in school, going from an A+ down to an F, graded on 17 different factors. This rating represents a business’s overall trustworthiness and their good-faith efforts to address customer concerns.

Count Reviews

The Best of SLC isn’t like most “Best of” contests, which simply count votes. We realize that the community has already been showing their support for the “best” by leaving reviews all year long, so we’re going to count every 5-star review published on Google within the last 12 months.

Calculate Score

While votes and reviews signify great work in the last year, overall ratings tell us how nominees have done long term. The mean rating from these platforms will be used in conjunction with 5-star reviews and votes to determine the winners.

Number of Votes + (Number of 5-star Reviews x Average Rating) = Score

Announce Finalists

The top nominees of each category will be publicly announced next week once we’ve verified our results. Finalists will also be notified by letter and email as soon as possible.

Announce Winners

Winners will be announced at the Best of SLC Awards Banquet* on June 15th-16th, 2021. Finalists will be invited to purchase tickets for the celebration. The banquet includes a red carpet entrance, a fancy dinner, photos, and other special prizes and opportunities.

*Banquet details might change because of COVID and all of that.

Thank You

We’re grateful to everyone for the support and participation in this year’s Best of SLC Awards. It’s been a lot of fun, and we’re already looking forward to next year’s contest!