Entries now open for the 2017 Meadow Fresh New Zealand Café of the Year Awards

Is your local coffee spot the next New Zealand Café of the Year? It's time to let them know...

If you think your favourite café might just be the best in the land, be sure to let them know that registrations are now open for the 2017 Meadow Fresh New Zealand Café of the Year competition.

For the fifth year running, the awards seek to highlight the very best of our great café culture, shining a light on outstanding cafes across the nation.

Whether your favourite café is in a major city, small town, holiday spot or the tiniest of places on the map, there's a category for them to enter.

This year's six categories are:

• Hellers Classic Kiwi

• Hellmann’s Best Suburban

• Puhoi Valley People’s Choice

• Tuckers Ridge Pies Best Rural

• Tararua Best Metro/CBD

• Goodman Fielder & Unilever Food Solutions Award for Innovation 

The 2016 NZ Café of the Year Supreme Winner was Queenstown's Bespoke Kitchen. Co-owner Rae Ellis says the win provided "a huge boost to [the] business", which still exists today.

"I would highly recommend other café operators enter this competition," Rae says. "It helped us to identify the elements in our operations that are unique and important to us, encouraged us to operate at the highest level possible then gave us a greater sense of belief in our products and operations... The prizes were a delight too!”

The 2017 NZ Café of the Year Supreme Winner will gain the NZ Café of the Year title, a ‘Melbourne Cafes Tour’ valued at $7,500 and a $20,000 editorial package in Dish magazine.

Registrations close on September 16. For more information on the 2017 Meadow Fresh New Zealand Café of the Year competition visit www.nzcafeoftheyear.co.nz.