LAST week, Permewans Mitre 10 store in Hamilton won the Mitre 10 National Store of the Year Large Format, at the annual National Mitre 10 Awards held at the Broadbeach Convention Centre, Queensland.

Owners, Paul and Denise Bast said they were overwhelmed and grateful to win and were present on the night to accept the award in person.

“We are just blown away,” Mr Bast said.

“How we can win that type of national award in a small country town like Hamilton compared to stores like Bendigo, Geelong and other stores in Melbourne, is just amazing.

“Thank you to our staff, family, friends, our loyal customers and the Danks (buying chain) and Mitre 10 that have helped us and guided us over the past 22 years.”

“Last year we won our region around this area - that put us up to represent the region at state level - that was a dinner in Melbourne, and we won a state award.

“That led to last week where we represented Victoria and Tasmania, and we ended up winning the national award.”

Mr Bast said there were around 1000 people in attendance at the awards ceremony representing more than 600 stores Australia wide.

“There’s 631 stores in the group and they’re split into small medium and large (categories) - the large group is the most competitive,” he said.

“We trade in the large up against the big stores - it’s stiff competition - everyone aims to win the large.

“It’s a very big feather in the cap for Hamilton and the community - to be named up there with those other stores is somewhat of an achievement - thanks to the regular patrons who have let us achieve this by attending our business.”

Mr Bast said there were several different modules they had to achieve to be eligible for the award.

“That includes staffing and store size, a whole lot of criteria we had to get through to compete,” he said.

“We are just very excited.

“Suppliers are now coming to us which is good for the community - our range of products will increase as we receive more specials to offer.”

Mr Bast was pleased to announce that in May, the chief executive of Mitre 10, accompanied by a number of delegates, will be coming to visit their store.

“There will be a lot of people coming to Hamilton to have a look at what we’re doing,” he said.

“A lot of those people don’t leave the city normally so it will be great to have them come out and visit.”

He said the national award was well received recognition despite recent challenges having to adapt their business to the on again, off again closure of Cox Street.

While the road works are being undertaken in Cox Street, Permewans have created extra parks around the back of the store with the current entrance via French Street.

“It’s business as usual at Permewans,” Mr Bast said.