Dwyer-Owens Named A Top 100 Champion In The 2012 Small Business Influencer Awards

WACO, Texas — August 17, 2012 – Dina Dwyer-Owens, Chairwoman and CEO of Neighborly, formerly Dwyer Group, has been named a Top 100 Champion in the 2012 Small Business Influencer Awards.

The awards honor those who have impacted small businesses across North America, through the products, services, knowledge, information or support they provide to the market. Dwyer-Owens, who has been an advocate for franchising as a business format, is a past chairwoman of the International Franchise Association, and is the leader of a successful parent company with more than 1,600 locations in Neighborly franchise family, called the award a huge honor.

“Small business ownership is at the very heart of what we champion at Neighborly. It’s the reason we have been successful for 31 years and counting,” Dwyer-Owens said of The Neighborly. “Franchising is about being in business for yourself, not by yourself. And across our service brands, we get to see the America Dream come alive. Having a part in that and receiving this award is an honor I share an incredible team of people I work with every day.”

The Awards are designed to recognize the unsung heroes of small businesses – those who support and encourage entrepreneurs and small business owners, and help them achieve success and stay successful. The Champions are chosen based on a combination of voting by the small business community and a panel of judges steeped in the small business market, who considered the contributions of the nominees over the past year toward:

• advocating on behalf of small businesses,
• providing products or services that address the unique challenges faced by small businesses,
• revolutionizing how small businesses do business or how they solve business challenges,
• helping small businesses grow,
• or otherwise impacting small businesses in a significant way.

Says Anita Campbell, CEO of Small Business Trends and one of the co-founders of the Awards, said, “Influencers are those who play crucial roles in the small business ecosystem, but who often are in the background. The Top 100 Champions have distinguished themselves in some way. We’re delighted to see the wide range of Champions and Honorable Mentions this year – including non-profits, academia, journalists who’ve spent decades covering small business issues, corporate leaders whose names may not be widely recognized but who impact small businesses by influencing the offerings within their companies , vendors large and small that support small businesses, analysts who aid our understanding of this market, and entrepreneurs who have a strong voice among their small business peers.”

BlackBerry is the title sponsor of the 2012 Small Business Influencer Awards.

About the Small Business Influencer Awards
The Small Business Influencer Awards, now in their second year, enable the small business community to nominate and show their support for those that influence and support them. The Awards have an open nomination period, followed by community voting, and then a judging period by a group of industry-knowledgeable judges.
The Small Business Influencer Awards initiative is produced by Small Business Trends, an award-winning online publication, serving over 4,000,000 small business owners, stakeholders and entrepreneurs annually, and SmallBizTechnology.com, a media company that produces online content and live events educating small and mid-sized companies on how to strategically use technology as a tool to grow their businesses. The Awards can be found on the Web at: SMBInfluencers.com.

About Neighborly®:
Neighborly, based in Waco, Texas, is a holding company of seven franchise businesses, each selling and supporting a different franchise under the following service marks: Aire Serv®, Glass Doctor®, The Grounds Guys™, Mr. Appliance®, Mr. Electric®, Mr. Rooter® (Drain Doctor in the UK and Portugal), and Rainbow International®. Collectively, these independent franchise concepts offer customers world-wide a broad base of residential and commercial services. In addition, Dwyer operates glass shops in New England under the Portland Glass brand name. Neighborly is a portfolio company of TZP Group LLC, a private equity firm based in New York that focuses on control investments in business and consumer services companies with enterprise values generally up to $200 million. More information on The Neighborly, or its franchise concepts, is available at www.dwyergroup.com.

Dina Dwyer-Owens and Neighborly are also on Twitter at @DinaDwyerOwens and @DwyerGroup.