Grand County residents have been voting for their favorite local businesses, organizations and attractions in Sky-Hi News’ annual readers choice awards contest for years. It’s the biggest contest of its kind in Grand County, with thousands of votes cast annually across hundreds of categories.
What’s new for 2022?
Best of Grand is mixing things up by adding new groups and categories to the contest, including Health & Wellness and Home. We’ve also added an additional round so that all nominees make it to the initial voting period.
In addition, we’ll have a new print publication to tout those who have made the final ballot. We’ve also added new promotional opportunities for advertisers as well as fun items for voters — like Best of Grand swag!
Also, new this year: Voters can vote once per day in each category, so keep those votes rolling in for your favorite businesses, organizations and people.
How does Best of Grand work?
The contest proceeds in three phases: a nomination period, the first round of voting, and a final round of voting.
Nomination period: The contest starts with a nomination round, where readers can propose businesses, organizations and people for all of the categories. It takes only one qualified nomination for a business to move to the first voting round. Last year’s top three will automatically be nominated in each category.
First voting round: In the first voting round, all of the nominated businesses are listed. Readers vote to narrow the big list of nominated businesses, organizations and people down to the top 10 in each category. Readers can vote once per day in each category.
Final voting round: This is the final voting round. The top 10 voted businesses from the first round of voting will be voted on again. The businesses, organizations and people with the most votes in each category will be crowned Best of Grand. Readers can vote once per day in each category.
What are the key dates for 2022?
- Nomination period: July 21-28
- First voting round: Aug. 4-11
- Final voting round: Aug. 25 to Sept. 1
- Best of Grand winners publication on newsstands: Oct. 28
I nominated my business, but I don’t see it showing up on the website. Why is that?
If you’re looking at the site during the nomination period and don’t see a business you nominated, fear not! All valid entries are considered and reviewed. But in order for a nomination to show up on the site, we have to approve it manually. Because we receive thousands of nominations, we may get backlogged.
The good news is your business has to be nominated only once to make it to the first voting round.
How are nominations moderated?
Each nomination will be vetted for accuracy, including whether the business, organization or person is based in Grand County and whether the nominee is an appropriate fit for the category. Incomplete nominations will be removed.
Some categories may be removed after the nomination period due to a low number of nominees.
The contest is intended for locally owned and operated businesses. National chains will be considered on a case-by-case basis.
How are the winners selected?
Winners are those who receive the most votes in their category. Finalists are those who receive the second and third-most votes in their category. If there is a tie, we will announce both as winners or finalists.
How often can I vote?
The Best of Grand contest allows daily voting and nominations — once per person per day per category — because daily voting rewards those entrants with passionate supporters. With a single vote per person, entrants with the best name recognition have a distinct advantage. That kind of popularity is an important part of finding the Best of Grand, but we also want to reward the sense of passion some people have for their local favorites, which can be captured in daily voting.
This contest is fundamentally about celebrating and supporting great Grand County institutions by raising their profile and helping them gain new fans. With daily voting, the contest raises the visibility of those businesses and organizations that use it to reach out to new and existing customers to ask for their support, through advertising and through their own channels.
Can I vote from multiple email accounts?
Voting is limited to one vote per person per day per category. Even though we require signups, we recognize that some people may be tempted to vote several times using different email accounts. We do have systems in place to detect fraudulent voting. When we see evidence of fraudulent voting, we may eliminate all the votes cast by those voters. In extreme cases, we will remove entrants, as well.