Bauer Retailer of the Year Award 2014

It's not in our store's DNA to brag but we just had to take a moment to acknowledge something great that happened to our store recently.

Every year Bauer invites all the top hockey retailers world wide to a sunny destination for an event known as BauerWorld to unveil their latest and greatest products. This year's event was actually rebranded Momentum as the company's portfolio has expanded to include brands like Mission, Easton baseball, Cascade, Mission, Combat, Inaria and Maverik lacrosse. But it'll always be BauerWorld to us.

This year's BauerWorld event took place in Jacksonville Florida at the amazing Omni Amelia Island Plantation resort.

not too shabby, eh? view the hotel site

The entire event is a first class. Bauer gives us the first look at the new products for the upcoming season and next year's 2015 line up does not disappoint. Unfortunately players and goalies will have to wait a bit longer before seeing these new designs hit the shelves...but let's say that something very exciting is on it's way for the Vapor skates and stick families.

Beyond the focus on gear, Bauer also brings in industry experts to educate retailers on topics like concussion safety awareness, better in store merchandising, and grow the game initiatives like their aggressive goal to introduce 1,000,000 new players to the game over the next 10 years.

Our store has been invited to the BauerWorld events since their inception and over the year's we've had the pleasure of getting to know the entire Bauer team well. In fact, we're proud to say many friendships have been built over a drink or two by the pool.

Last year, The Hockey Shop was chosen as the Bauer Canadian Retailer of the Year. It might sound a bit cliche but it was a great honour and very humbling to win that award in front of all of our peers.

So we were more than a little surprised when our store was announced as the winner of this year's award again. Like really surprised. When the news was sent back to the shop after getting off the stage it took a multiple Bauer employees to verify the win for the boys back home to believe it happened.

I'm extremely proud of our team. We couldn't deliver exceptional customer service if it wasn't for having the best team in the business. And ultimately, we view this as a customer service award. If we're not doing our best to provide the best possible in store experience for our customers then awards like these don't happen.

Wrapping up, winning the Bauer Canadian Retailer of the Year two years in a row is an achievement that our team is really proud of...and we'll need to be even better in 2015 if we expect to three-peat.