Postal Peacocks? What’s that?

That my friends, is what your decorated envelopes are going to be. Have you ever seen a majestic peacock spread its massive feathers to show off? Who can walk by such a beautiful bird and not STOP and look at it. That is what your decorated envelopes are meant to do, STOP the recipient.

The goal is to make your envelopes and postcards so humorous, gorgeous and ingenious that you will have the postman laughing, the recipient crying, and the judges in awe. You want everyone to be unable to resist taking a second to look at your entry. When we see something different, it is human nature to want to stop and look, feel, read or smell it. When you sweep, never forget you are dealing with people. Those intimidating words like “sponsor” and “judging agency” tend to make us forget these are companies comprised of real people. Let’s use that to our advantage.

Are you in this to win, or are you just hoping to win? Are you going to give this your all, or are you going to slack off and wait for that illusive thing called fate, to cross your path?

One contest I entered really stands out in my mind. It was a turnkey contest put on by a radio station, to win a car. I had won one of the 80 keys they were awarding. If you are not familiar with turnkey contests, they are generally promotions put on by the sponsor to award one prize, but multiple people are chosen as winners to vie for that prize. In this case, whoever’s key fit in the ignition, won the vehicle.

When I arrived at the site, they all identified me by my ENTRY! They said they had been waiting for me to show up because they wanted to see the face, behind the entry. Then they asked if they could use the envelope in their newsletter. Now that’s some kind of peacock. Unfortunately, I did not win the car, but I considered it quite a learning experience.

To catch the judge’s attention I made a #10 envelope out of colorful construction paper. I cut out some cartoon characters riding in a fat, bubbly little car, which I found in the Sunday funnies paper. Then I drew a caption bubble and wrote in it something like, “I just love driving to those 95.6 Oldie Goldie’s.” I inserted the station numbers in the cartoon.

Everyone thought the envelope was hysterical. Now it did not cost me any additional money, but it did require time. When you begin to decorate your envelopes you are getting into a whole new realm of sweepstaking.

But, you are in this to win, right? So get out your scissors, crayons, coloring books and glue. And no, this is not back to school…it’s onward to winning!

I want to hear from you. Do you have some creative ideas for sweeping? Share your thoughts on the Contests and Sweepstakes forum.

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To find out more about Editor and Author Sandy Lovern, please visit www.engaged-devotional.com