Best of your town.
Earned, not bought.
The Centurion Awards verify local businesses against published criteria: years of real operation and a genuine customer track record, backed by a community that’s glad they exist.
Free to nominate·Free to be evaluated
You know a place that deserves this.
Hand a favorite spot the recognition it already earned. Nominating is free, takes about a minute, and it can only ever help the business. Or browse the winners already named in your town.
You run a place like that.
Heard from us, or from a customer who nominated you? See where your business stands. The check is free and private.
Just your business name · Evaluated against the published criteria
Verified best of their town.
Every winner met the same standard: years in operation and a customer track record their neighbors vouch for. Find yours, or discover a new favorite.
Dragoon Brewing Company
Best Brewery Tucson, AZ 2025Beaver Street Brewery
Best Brewpub Flagstaff, AZ 2025El Charro Café
Best Mexican Restaurant Tucson, AZ 2025Club Congress
Best Live Music Venue Tucson, AZ 2025Best of Flagstaff
All categories · Arizona
View the market →Best of Tucson
All categories · Arizona
View the market →Your town next
Rolling out across 2026 and 2027
More cities comingThe evidence does
the deciding.
There’s nothing to enter and no panel to win over. We read years of public evidence on businesses in each market against five criteria we publish in plain language. Nick Jones and Brendan Tobin run the program, and their names are on it.
The full-market scan
We don’t wait for entries. Public signals across listings, reviews, local press, and the open web are part of the review. If you’ve been doing the work, you may already be in scope.
The bar
Five published criteria: longevity, sustained presence, customer track record, community sentiment, local recognition. Evidence that takes years to build, and can’t be bought, botted, or campaigned for.
The verdict, in private
Your verdict stays private either way. Fall short and nothing publishes: you won’t turn up on a ranking or a runner-up list, and we never publish a negative verdict.
The award, on the record
The award goes on the record: a dated winner page anyone can look up, typically live within a business day. Putting it on the record is optional and comes after the verdict, never before, and it can’t sway one. Each year’s award is re-earned in the January re-evaluation, and we revoke it if the evidence ever stops holding up.
Most “Best of” awards
are sales funnels.
The Better Business Bureau formally warns business owners about vanity-award schemes. Here’s how the usual suspects compare.
| Vote-drive contests | Pay-to-play badges | The Centurion Awards | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who wins | Whoever mobilizes the biggest mailing list | Whoever pays the fee | ✓ Whoever clears the published criteria |
| Fee to be considered | None | Fees to enter, more for an “edge” | ✓ None. We never charge a business we don’t list |
| Cost of selection | Weeks of vote-chasing | $300–$3,000+ | ✓ Selection can’t be bought at any price |
| Proof behind it | Unaudited vote counts | None | ✓ Published criteria and a public, dated award page |
Each award is a dated title held by one business, and no business holds more than one award in a year. No tiers, and no way to pay for placement or selection. How we make money is a fair question. The straight answer is on the About page. See the full owner comparison. Source: BBB Business Tip, “How to spot and avoid vanity awards” (2022).
A credential that works
as hard as you do.
Customers check the evidence before they choose. The difference is whether the award behind the badge survives a second look. A Centurion Award is built to survive one. That’s the whole point.
of consumers will only use a local business rated four stars or better (BrightLocal, 2026)
higher five-year sales growth for quality-award winners than for matched peer firms (Hendricks & Singhal)
more revenue for an independent restaurant with each added star of Yelp rating (Luca, Harvard Business School)
The announcement writes itself.
Qualify, and it all arrives ready to run. You get a dated winner page anyone can look up, plus a badge and social kit sized for feed and story. And the published criteria sit behind all of it, for anyone who asks “is this real?” Owners who choose to publish pay a flat $199 processing fee, charged only after they’ve already won. Pay once, and auto-renewal is optional at checkout. Cancel anytime and your page stays live. A framed plaque is available on request as a separate add-on, quoted before you order.
in Tucson
Sources: BrightLocal, “Local Consumer Review Survey” (2026); Hendricks & Singhal, “Evidence from Quality Award Winners” (2000), about 600 publicly traded award winners against matched peers; Michael Luca, “Reviews, Reputation, and Revenue: The Case of Yelp.com” (Harvard Business School, 2011).
Know a place that deserves this? Say so.
Nominating takes a minute or two, and neither you nor the business pays anything to be considered. It’s the easiest way to hand a beloved local spot the recognition it already earned.
We’ll evaluate the business against the criteria. If it qualifies, we take the result straight to the owner. If it doesn’t, the evaluation stays private.
Categories we award
Live categories are being awarded now in Flagstaff and Tucson. More categories launch with each new city.
“A town’s best businesses deserve a signal decided by evidence alone.” — Nick Jones & Brendan Tobin, Founders