Stephen Stares is a successful business entrepreneur with more than 25 years of experience in mineral exploration. Stephen’s first seven years were spent with Noranda Exploration on such projects as the Hemlo gold mines, Eagle River gold deposit and the Geco and Mattabi base metal camps. The next ten years of Stephen’s career were spent managing the operations of Stares Contracting Corp., a successful mineral exploration services company in Thunder Bay, Ontario.

Since founding the company in 2004, Stephen has been president of Benton Resources Inc.  He has been directly involved in the start-up of ten publicly traded companies on the TSX Venture Exchange by assembling projects of merit and raising millions of dollars for these junior exploration companies. Throughout his career, Mr. Stares has discovered several major mineral occurrences in Canada that have been the subject of extensive exploration programs.

In March of 2007, Stephen and Michael Stares, along with the rest of the Stares, Keats, Crocker and Barrett families, were the proud recipients of the Prospectors and Developers Association (PDAC) Bill Dennis Prospector of the Year Award. This award was given to recognize the families’ contributions to the industry for the past 40 years.