The three businessmen are the president, vice president and secretary/treasurer, respectively, of Savvy Shopper.

Described by Ernst & Young as "the business community's equivalent of the Academy Awards," the Entrepreneur of the Year award honors outstanding owners and leaders of companies. By winning on the regional level, Savvy Shopper co-founders automatically become eligible to compete in the National Entrepreneur of the Year competition.

They had previously been announced as finalists in the "Information Services/Advertising" category, along with Steven H. Nieman, CEO of The Neiman Group, an integrated marketing firm, and Michael R. Pavone, president of Knezic/Pavone advertising, a full-service advertising agency.

In addition to Ernst & Young LLP, the award program is sponsored nationally by the Entrepreneur of the Year Institute, the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership, Inc., USA Today, CNNfn, CNN, and the NASDAQ-AMEX Market Group. Regional sponsors included the Central Penn Business Journal, Clear Channel Broadcasting, The Technology Council, Hershey Foods Corporation and Sprint.

Savvy Shopper was born in 1983 when Steve Zuckerman and Ian Ruzow, then college juniors at Franklin & Marshall College, Lancaster, parlayed the concept of Sunday newspaper coupon inserts into a coupon flyer. Steve's brother, Bob Zuckerman, joined immediately and the three published Campus Coupon Savvys at various colleges and universities for the next two years.

Upon graduation, they established a company and expanded to more college towns on the East Coast, selling by day and creating ads by night. Growing slowly into the general consumer market, they ran all facets of the business themselves before hiring their first artists and salespeople in 1989. They describe their biggest challenge as "teaching ourselves how to build every facet of a corporation while simultaneously creating what amounted to a new industry."

Over the last ten years, Savvy Shopper has been growing at a rate averaging over 30% annually. Today, it publishes full color advertising magazines, in approximately 300 markets nation wide. To support this effort, its current workforce numbers over 600 employees. In addition, Savvy also publishes high-end niche advertising magazines, operates a new internet company, CouponClipper.com, and owns three sister businesses: SpencerMedia, a full-service ad agency; Jaxxon Promotions, a specialty advertising company; and Savvy Outdoor, a billboard company.

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