| | Below is a list of UK competitions whose prizes are awarded to the most skillful entrants (skill comps). With practice you can improve your skills in slogan competitions and the like, but there is nothing you can do to make
yourself luckier - hence my dislike of draws. Draws are for the slave to fortune - and that goes double for Internet draws where you have no envelopes on which to deploy lurid inks, pathetic pleas or salacious drawings in an effort to stand out from the crowd. I’ve won a veritable warehouseful of prizes plus the 7 cars, and I’ve sweated for every one. If I’d wasted my time on draws, this site would be devoted to the story of how I won a T-shirt and a voucher for £50 off my next
world cruise. Of course, if you’re prepared to enter draws by the thousand, you can narrow the odds a bit, but your time would be better spent developing skills with slogan and other tiebreaker competitions (see Be a Winner).
Mind you, I don’t recommend that you become obsessed with competitions in the way I have in the past, nor should you employ the sort of extreme (and often dishonest) tactics used by the compers in my novel. Keep comping as a hobby. But when you do it, do it like a
competitions pro rather than a dabbler.
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| | UK Slogan & Other Competitions | |
| | Swizzels Sweets Competition.
Prize: £100 in Toys R Us vouchers.
Closing: Monthly.
Task: Regsiter and take the Sweet Factory Challenge.
I include this one for reasons of nostalgia. My grandfather used to live in New Mills not far from the Swizzels factory, and when I visited him as a child I could smell the exotic aromas of the sweets cooking in the vats. When Granddad saw the faraway look in my eye he said I must be thinking great thoughts, and he was right: I was thinking about Fruit Fizzers. If you come up with a wonderful new sweet, you will be doing a service to ... well, if not man
kind, then at least boy and girl kind.
Website: www.swizzels-matlow.com |
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| | Cutest Pet Contest. This
competition comes from the International Pet Owners Club in the USA. It is open worldwide. Any kind of pet is eligible, they say. I can rememeber the days when pet rocks were all the rage. I wonder what the contest judges would make of a picture of one of those? Or a cyber pet? Entry is free, but you can only send in one entry every eight months.
Closing: At regular intervals.
Prize: $1,000.
Task: Take a photograph of your cute pet.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| | | But first a word from our sponsor. Hi. I’m Michael Shenton, creator of this website and author of
Stiff Competition, the comping story that won the Peter Pook Humorous Novel Competition. People who are looking for me through search engines can
remember just about everything about the website save its name and, more distressingly for me, my name. They search for ‘Peter Pook author’, ’the man who wrote Peter Pook’, that bloke who won the cars’ and all manner of other odd things, but never
‘Michael Shenton’. The sole purpose of this site is to get my name known in the hope that one day dozens of people will buy my current novel and any others I manage to get published. So would you all kindly make a note of it. Michael Shenton. Thank you. |
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| | Evans Shopping Spree Competition.
Closing: 14.3.10.
Prize
: An Evans shopping Spree and hairstyle voucher worth £600.
Task: Say in up to 100 words why you would like to win.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| Staples Boxed Office Competition.
Closing: 17.3.10.
Prize: A boxed office containing a laptop computer, printer and other items.
Task
: Imagine you could be a piece of office equipment, then say in up to 20 words what you would be and why.
Website: Click Here. |
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| | DK Travel Guides Camcorder Competition.
Closing: 18.3.10.
Prize: Sony Handycam Camcorder.
Task: Recount your earliest travel memory.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| | Classic FM Conservatory Competition.
Closing: 21.3.10.
Prize
: An Anglian Conservatory worth £20,000.
Task: Say in up to 100 words how and why an Anglian Conservatory would enhance your home.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| | BA Highlife Competition.
Closing: 31.3.10.
Prize: A weekend at any Hyatt Hotel, worth over £500.
Task: Describe the most romantic trip you’ve been on, using between 100 and 300 words.
Comp Page: Click Here.
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Great British Life Balloon Flight Competition.
Closing: 31.3.10.
Prize: A Virgin champagne hot air balloon flght.
Task: Say in up to 20 words why you love Great Britain.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| | Tyrrells Best of British Competition
.
Closing: 31.3.10.
Prize: The hire of an E-type Jag for two days and a night’s accommodation for two people.
Task: Say what puts the Great in Great Britain for you.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| | Penguin Books Competition.
Closing: 31.3.10.
Prize
: A selection of Penguin books.
Task: Say which Penguin Book you would pass on to the next generation.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| | All Work No Play Competition.
Closing: 31.3.10.
Prizes: Amazon vouchers worth £20 and £5.
Task: Submit a humorous caption for the picture.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| | Car Rentals Strictly Competition.
Closing: 15.4.10.
Prizes: Five pairs of tickes for Strictly Come Dancing -The Professionals at the The Brighton Centre.
Task: Answer questions and say in up to 15 words what you would do if you won the tickets.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| | Simply Beef & Lamb iFillet Competition.
Closing: 30.4.10.
Prize: An MP3 player with the iFillet application.
Task: Describe in up to 100 words your favourite way to cook and serve steak.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| Susman’s Caption Competition.
Closing: 30.10.10.
Prize: A case of wine.
Task: Supplky a caption for the picture.
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| | Yzen Caption Competition. This is a simple monthly comp you might like to take a shot at now and again, just to help sharpen your wit.
Closing: End of each month.
Prize: A bottle of bubbly.
Task: Supply a caption for the picture (changes each month).
Comp Page: Click Here. |
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| | Special Offer: Ink Club is offering a free compatible ink cartridge for Epson or Canon printers (P&P not free), plus big savings on all cartridges, original and compatible. |
| | You can find more comps on the sites listed on Comps Links. Most will be draws, but keep digging and you should unearth a few skillcomps. Remember: the harder they are to find, the fewer entries there will be. |
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| | | Note:
In slogan comps with a word limit, there is some disagreement over how to count contractions such as ‘can’t’. Some say they count as one word, others that they count as two. Logically, when two words have been glued together you then have only one word, but logic doesn’t always come into it as comps are often run by women. Therefore you might like to err on the safe side.
[Joke Alert: Only kidding about women, ladies. Please
don’t send me any more severed horses’ heads - there’s no room left in my freezer.] |
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