How It Works
The best local businesses aren’t always the ones with the biggest ad budgets. Canberra Shortlist is the place where you can find the standout businesses in our community.
Our listings are free, but invitation-only. This means you aren't seeing who paid the most to be here. You are seeing business owners who earned their place because they are proud of what they do and willing to stand behind their work.
Knowing the people behind a business matters. When you connect with a local who puts their heart into their work, you build greater trust and accountability.
We also like having fun. So, we regularly run giveaways, raffles, and scavenger hunts to help you discover the best local businesses in Canberra.
Recently Added Local Businesses
Check out these hometown favorites!
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Figures Matter
For many small business owners, bookkeeping is last thing they want to think about and the first thing that causes them grief. Finding a bookkeeper who actually understands your business, not just your ledger, is rarer than most people expect. Figures Matter, a Fyshwick-based bookkeeping and advisory firm, was built around exactly that gap. Founders…
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Artful Dentistry
A Dental Practice That Actually Changes How You Feel About Going to the Dentist Let’s be honest: most people do not look forward to visiting the dentist. Whether it’s the anxiety carried over from a bad experience, the clinical coldness of most waiting rooms, or just the general dread of someone poking around in your…
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Dream City Cleaning
Finding a cleaner you’d trust with the keys to your home is harder than it sounds. Around 90% of Lee Jackson’s clients hand her one anyway, and most have been doing it for years. Lee has been running Dream City Cleaning since she registered the business in 2013, and the trust the business is built…
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Quintessence Nail & Beauty
Some clients have been seeing the same therapist at Quintessence Nail & Beauty for ten years. That kind of loyalty isn’t built on treatments alone, and owner Alicia Fragopoulos knows it. Finding a beauty salon in Belconnen that feels like a genuine retreat takes some doing. Quintessence, tucked into the Page Shopping Centre, has been…
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Harrison Veterinary Clinic
A Local Vet Clinic in Harrison Built on Real Relationships There are vets, and then there are veterinary clinics that genuinely feel like part of the neighbourhood. Harrison Veterinary Clinic is firmly in the second category. Founded by Dr Karina Harding, a Canberra local who grew up in Gungahlin and spent over two decades working…
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SOLVit Network Support
When something goes wrong with your technology, the last thing you want is to be passed around a call centre, retelling your problem to five different people before someone finally picks up who can actually help. Damien Samios built SOLVit Network Support on the exact opposite of that experience, and after nearly 20 years in…
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Sergio Porfirio
Sergio is a Senior Investment Adviser at Shaw and Partners in Canberra, working with high-net-worth individuals, self-managed super funds, and inheritances. He’s been advising clients since October 1999, with a career spent navigating the tech bubble, 9/11, the Global Financial Crisis of 2008 and COVID. “I’ve lived through it all,” he recalls. “One thing that…
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Her Matters
Georgia Houston had one fixed idea when she designed her clinic in Griffith: that no woman who walked through the door should feel like she was about to be rushed. The waiting room at 30 Bougainville Street has fresh flowers on the front desk, a diffuser running, relaxing music playing, and coffee on offer for…
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Pixelwise Creative Media
For two decades, Pixelwise Creative Media has been making things watchable. The Canberra-based production company works with some of Australia’s most recognisable organisations, turning corporate briefs, government communications, and dry statistical data into engaging video and animation that tells a compelling story. Canberra born-and-bred Nick Johnson studied film and spent the early years of the…
