'Best of North Idaho' is back, better than ever

The team at the Coeur d'Alene Press would like to once again invite the community to participate in the annual Best of North Idaho community competition.

"We love the community's enthusiasm in recognizing the best businesses of North Idaho," said Kari Packer, Press advertising director.

The contest is intended to give the community a voice showing their support for their favorite businesses.

"Every year we modify the competition to protect its validity and ensuring that winners are selected by the community," Packer said.

This year, the nomination period allows individuals to nominate their favorite business one time. In years past, The Press allowed nominations once per day. The voting period will also only allow for one vote per person.

"We want the winner to be the best business in their industry," Packer said.

Packer said The Press is working on new plans of how to leverage this year's competition to help local businesses. She said 2020 was tough for locally owned businesses, and "We want to aid in their recovery."

Facilitating the 60-day competition requires a great deal of time and work, she said.

"We take the outcome very seriously. It is hard to balance the hundreds of requests we get every year to add categories with not overwhelming voters with a ballot that takes an hour to fill out," she said. "We really do our best to make this competition the best it can be."

Here are the 2021 dates:

Nomination period, Jan. 10-31

Voting period, Feb. 7-14