This is no beauty pageant - it’s an ugly T-shirt competition! Every year, churches, corporate departments, businesses and non-profit organizations hold ugly shirt competitions for fun or fundraising. While this activity is unattractive, it is full of spirit no matter the time of year. And designing funny custom tees for ugly shirt competitions is the best way to win! Whether you are looking for office bragging rights or are trying to raise money for a good cause here are some tips to help you with your ugly T-shirt competition.
What is an ugly T-shirt competition?
An ugly shirt competition is a contest in which participants attempt to make a t-shirt as ugly as possible, usually a throwback to a retro style, or poor color and pattern combinations. The winner of an ugly T-shirt competition generally receives a prize of varying value, but predominately the pride of knowing they are the ugliest. One of the most popular type of ugly shirt competition is the ugly Christmas sweater contest.
Where to host your ugly T-shirt contest
One of the best ways to hold an ugly T-shirt competition is to include within another event - a business after hours, a street festival, a 5k event, a church function or even just an evening out on the town. Hosting your ugly shirt competition as a part of another event can add to your already fun and engaging activities. You can even uglify the competition area with ugly foods and decorations. And the clearance section of a craft or retail store is a great place to find gaudy decorations for the event.
Seeking inspiration
Your goal is to win, and to do that you must seek out inspiration all around you. When designing funny custom tees for ugly shirt competitions, check out websites that sell ugly shirts and ugly sweaters, look at resell websites like eBay, take a trip to a local thrift store or even raid your closet to help you find the best, and ugliest, materials for your upcoming contest.
Defining the rules
When choosing the rules and regulations for ugly shirt competitions, you can look to the plethora of existing social games as a guide. The most important guideline for defining and designing your contest is to keep it simple. You can establish criteria, collect votes on ballot sheets or simply select a winner based on applause. A smart way to do it is to establish five sets of criteria for your judges including humor, creativity, crafting skill, presentation and uniqueness. These criteria provide a sound set of qualitative judgment to help you run a fair competition.
Incorporating fundraising
If you wish to include fundraising in your ugly shirt competition, one of the best ways to do so is to have team sponsor one shirt. The team will get support from friends and family to help create the ugliest sweater. Each team member is responsible for supporting the fundraising for their team overall. In the case of fundraising, you may want to add a sixth category to your competition to include their success at raising money. All proceeds raised by each team will support the non-profit or other cause. The winning team overall gets special recognition for their efforts. Take it to the next level by ordering custom-designed ugly T-shirts for your team.
The ugliest runway of the year
Step aside New York Fashion Week, ugly shirt competitions are taking over the runway at an upcoming special event! Set up an ugly runway lined with the participants adoring fans and end at a table for the judges. Once you have all of your participants prepared, let each one walk the runway showing as much personality as possible - presentation is important in an ugly shirt competition and the attendees will love it. Take it to the limit by creating a real runway with lighting to showcase your ugly T-shirts and ugly T-shirt models.
Awarding the ugliest
After you have determined your winner based on the criteria established for the competition, it is time to hand out prizes. You can honor the winners with ugly necklaces on top of an Olympic-style podium. You can give them custom certificate so they can place this great honor in a frame to cherish forever. You can also give away ugly-themed prizes. Your awards do not need to be expensive, just memorable and fun.
Designing funny custom tees for ugly shirt competitions is easy
Design t-shirts with a basic event theme, and leave space for your participants to design. Then they can find materials online, in stores, at home, or at thrift shop or rummage sales to help them build the ugliest t-shirt ever. All of your participants will have a memorable t-shirt to keep.
Thank you for reading our blog. How can we help you? Contact us today to prepare for your upcoming ugly shirt competition!