More than 600 nominations were received for the Awards for Excellence this year across 50 categories.

The Oxford has dominated the country sections of the awards, winning nominations for hotel of the year country, best burger country, best retail liquor outlet, best social media activity and best restaurant country.

Ashwin Lyons also received a nomination for individual hotel operator of the year. After running the hotel for 15 years, Mr Lyons is honoured to be nominated again.

“Receiving an AHA was always a goal for me from a young age because these are like the Academy Awards for hotels,” Mr Lyons said.

Mr Lyons believes the most rewarding part of running a hotel is being able to come up with the solutions on how to overcome the challenges they face.

“I’ve sacrificed quite a bit over the years to make this work,” he said.

Over the past year phase one out of five commenced with the construction of the B Town BBQ, one of their hardest challenges to date.

After spending copious amounts of time coming up with designing a dining spot that wasn’t a hall and yet still had plenty of heart and soul was creatively difficult.

Mr Lyons did all the design work himself along with Lisa Robinson, and then they built it themselves over a three-week period.

“I didn’t really want B Town BBQ to be judged as quickly as it was, but I am pleased we got nominated so I am sure the judges had a lovely experience,” he said.

Ten years ago the Oxford Hotel won seven Australian Hotel Awards and they are hoping to do well again this time around.

“I have my fingers crossed we do well at the awards,” he said.

The winners will be announced at The Star on Tuesday, November 21.