Show Awards

Our county 4H and FFA kids are hosting a junior livestock show and I am working on awards. Please tell me what your favorites are. Last year we did trophies and rosettes and also gave clippers to the top showman in each age group. This year I was thinking about chairs, blankets garmet bags and such. Tell me what you like. Thanks for the help

We were awarded laundry bags last year with the name of the show on them.  Thought that was a cool idea, we show 20+ shows a year so the bags are great to take on the road with us.

Our Livestock Association awards directors chairs with the show and award embroidered on them to the herdsman award winners at out junior livestock show.  They seem to really like them. Plus they bring them back to the show the next year and other kids see them and want to win one.

One year we got monogramed towels for class winners and insulated cups. I also like chairs and windbreakers.

this year we gave out smart combs. all where the fluffer with the wooden shaped handle.

I always loved the chairs we got. When I was in Junior Simmental we tried to give prizes geared towards the age group. For example when I was a senior I got a BBQ, towels, artwork, all great stuff for college. The young kids got a lot of stuff they would need for showing.

My personal favorite things to win are things that I'll be able to use: combs, brushes, showsticks, showhalters, leathermans, gift cards for farm supply stores. Useful keepsakes are also nice: embroidered chairs, buckles, towels, duffel bags, garmet bags, flashlights. Clothing is nice, it is just more work because you have to size it, get it embroidered, and then get it back to the kid. At our 4-H Heifer Show we give out: jackets, sweaters, fitting pants, splasher pants and muck boots.  Good luck!

I was talking to the Mom of one of the herdsman winners after the awards banquet this year.  She and her daughter were very excited about the chair her daughter won this year and she was telling me that her daughter had won an embroidered duffel  bag a couple of years before at the jr. livestock show that they take with them everywhere.  Until a few years ago, the livestock association awarded the herdsman winners an embroidered jacket.  But the problems with that were (1) we didn't have it at the banquet to hand out and for everyone to see because it had to be sized and ordered (2) sometimes the kid never went to the extension office to get it sized (so they never got it) and (3) no chance of them wearing it to the county fair the next year for other exhibitors to see (August in Tennessee is definitely NOT jacket weather!).  So, we opted for a chair.  They bring them back to the fair and other exhibitors want to know what they have to do to win one.

Useful things!  Depending on how many people show how many head.  You might also want to think about doing different awards for classes.  Like, fall heifer calves get a comb, January yearlings get a bucket...that sort of deal.  Then one kid that has a good almost full string of a certain breed won't get 20 of the same thing.  Another thing, idk if you are giving stuff to more than first, but give your first place their deal, then have a table of other things(smaller obviously) for the other placings to come get whatever from.  I went to a horse show like that and it was really nice, we could get what we wanted...what 8 year old has a use for a can koozie

At our junior show this summer we gave monogramed rolling duffle bags.
Everyone loved them. The boy that won the reserve went back to their his trailer house, dumped all his clothes out of the clothes bag he came with and repacked with the new one, lol

I love getting buckles and chairs, but the problem with them is the big show kids who go to show after show and win big generally already have quite a few.  But even still, I think they are great.  Jackets are also nice.

For class winners, I find that rosettes are nice for the day, to hang up in your stall, but most people just end up throwing out the small ones (1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc in class), so I really like to win supplies. 
For example, I was at a show where 1st and 2nd got cash prizes, 3rd got a can of glue, 4th got a can of show sheen, 5th got a rope halter, 6th got a neck rope. 
I find that awesome, because you can never have too much glue. 

So things like glue, show sheen, final bloom, show foam, clear choice, etc.

And for division/champion titles, stuff like show combs, show halters, show sticks, clippers, blades, etc.

Last year at the MO State fair and NW MO State fair we went to Burrows Metal Works and she created metal cut out trophies and put them on an oak base.  Considering how big and heavy they are, and they are "works of art" we didn't think $45 each was bad for them.  The kids went nuts for them.

Don't do jackets for a show in the summer...still nice, but you won't be able to use it for months and kinda takes the fun out of it.