This year, Beyond Blue Media was honored to be named a 2026 Colorado Companies to Watch winner, recognizing our agency as one of Colorado's outstanding second-stage businesses.
Picture this: hundreds of guests, and a shockingly low turnout of actual cowboy hats given the "modern western chic" dress code. The setting? Under the metal roof of the Wings Over the Rockies Air and Space Museum in Denver. Among the crowd: 50 winning companies, including us; Beyond Blue Media. In attendance from BBM were 5 pretty awesome team members: the CEO, the sales executive, the finance and payroll manager, the client manager, and the SEO…with her chicken bag. You can’t go to a western-themed award ceremony and not bring a chicken bag. These are their stories, or one story, since I am the one writing this piece.
What Even is (are?) Colorado Companies to Watch?
So what actually is Colorado Companies to Watch? Glad you asked. Colorado Companies to Watch is an annual awards program recognizing second-stage businesses that have demonstrated sustainable growth, innovation, and the ability to scale while continuing to make an impact in Colorado's economy.
Colorado Companies to Watch winners are chosen based on a mix of strict financial health and high-growth performance. Independent judges evaluate second-stage businesses that generate between $750,000 and $100 million in revenue, employ 6 to 150 people, and demonstrate sustainable competitive advantages, impactful community contributions, and strong entrepreneurial leadership.
This year, Beyond Blue Media was selected as one of just 50 companies to receive the honor for our financial growth and a business model that scales without falling apart, which, if you've ever tried to scale anything, you know is not nothing.
For us, that recognition reflects years spent helping businesses grow through thoughtful marketing strategies, websites that actually convert, SEO that drives measurable traffic, and partnerships that last far longer than a single project.
Getting to the CCTW Awards (Physically, like the ride down to Denver)
Paired with a solid avoidance of I-25 traffic and the critically acclaimed Riot album by Paramore, the group was on our way to the event. Marcos, our CEO, was flying in from North Carolina to meet us in Denver, but we did, in fact, make it all in one piece.
The line for getting in the front door was already forming by the time we donned our boots and dusters, and once Baily, our finance manager, was able to find and secure our tickets, we were ready to flip off the fasten seatbelt sign and move about the cabin. This is your captain speaking, and the airplane commentary is 100% necessary.
If you have never been to Wings Over the Rockies, it is an air and space museum with close to 60 aircraft housed in the hangar for people to see. So naturally, the best place for a bunch of business owners to get together, get a little loose, and place bets on who is flying the Grumman F-14A Tomcat outta that place and into the sunset. Talk to me, Goose.
Fun fact I definitely didn't know until I looked it up later: the museum sits on what used to be Lowry Air Force Base, which shut down back in 1994. Most of the base eventually became a regular neighborhood, houses, streets, the whole master-planned situation, but somebody had the good sense to save the original 1939 aircraft hangar and turn it into a museum instead of, I don't know, a Trader Joe's. So really, we accepted our award in a decommissioned military hangar, which feels like it should mean something symbolic about celebrating Beyond Blue Media's growth trajectory, but I'm not going to be the one to figure that out.
Each nominated company and past winners shared tables inside the hangar, dressed like it was rodeo night, despite being surrounded by aircraft the size of small buildings. Beyond Blue was lucky enough to share a table with the folks from Ball® (yes, the MASON JAR company?!) as well as a Vida HR.
Actually Accepting the CCTW Award
Before the winners in the Growing Colorado category were called up, they played a video summing up what the category is actually about: Growth doesn't happen by accident; it takes strategy, execution, and companies willing to show up every day (not including those vacations we took, but you get the point) to get them where they are today.
When our CEO, Marcos, went up to accept our award as one of the 50 winners for 2026 (photo op and all), Crey, one of our brave and loyal client managers, and I had… let’s call it more than enthusiastic support. Some people clap, some people whistle. Us? We started barking like dogs. That's not even weird, ok? Beyond Blue Media is made up of an eclectic group, with most of us in our 20s and 30s, so the millennial energy was just seeping out of our pores. I was asked later that evening if I was one of the folks yelling earlier. In my defense, I'd made a beeline for the complimentary champagne the second I walked in, but honestly, the champagne isn't even the reason. I'm just like this. I feel passionately about the work BBM is doing within our community and even more passionately about the folks I get to do the work with.
After we got our group photos and the hand-shaking and general networking with other business owners out of the way, it was time to saddle the ponies and head out on the dusty trail: Crey with his now lukewarm Monster Energy drink, Katie with an empty business card holder, and Baily with her excitement to be able to finally take off her cowboy boots.
"Being recognized as a Colorado Companies to Watch winner is an incredible honor because it reflects the work our team has done alongside our clients. Their trust has allowed us to build something we're incredibly proud of, and we're just getting started." - Marcos Diaz-Perera, CEO of Beyond Blue Media
Turns Out We're Award-Winning Now, No Big Deal
Winning this award certainly makes us feel good; let's not forget all of the business owners (we’re talking to you) who helped us get here. Oh, and we can’t forget the team, who made this possible. As if one trophy wasn't enough main-character energy for one year, we also picked up the Agency Workplace Award of 2026, which is basically the internet's way of confirming that yes, we do in fact care about our employees not being miserable along the way.
Anyway, all this is to say that we clean up nice, we know how to grow a business without breaking it, and apparently we're fun to be around (re-read the barking above). If you're a Colorado company trying to make your own leap from scrappy startup to award-winning enterprise, we happen to know how to do that really well, mostly because we've done it ourselves, champagne, barking, and all.
Whether you need a full marketing strategy, a WordPress website that doesn't make people wince, or an SEO/AEO game plan that actually moves the needle, Beyond Blue Media is ready to help you get there. No cowboy hat required.
