JUDGES

JUDGES

Thank you for agreeing to judge the Vendor Microgrant Competition at Black & Bronze! 

We have nearly 40 businesses participating in the festival and competition across food and beverage, beauty & self care, apparel, household essentials and more. In order to effectively manage the judge-based micro grant, we are going to divide the businesses up amongst 4 judges:

Jason, Grace, Daryl (DJ), and Shanikky. 

The schedule and process will go as follows: 

Parking: 

We encourage rideshare, carpooling, or public transit as parking will be scarce. If you drive to the park, the best area to park in will be near 45th and St Lawrence. 

Call Time: 12:45pm.
Judges will arrive on site at 12:45pm and report to the festival green room located at Morning View Word Church 613 E 45th St, Chicago, IL 60653. Stefanie Moore will be your designated point of contact for the day. 

Stefanie will give each judge a vendor badge for easy entry into and out of the park. 

Park Entrance

In order to bypass security, your designated entrance will be at the corner of 45th and St Lawrence. Look for signs saying Talent & Media Only 

Judging will take place from 1pm to 3pm. 

Vendor Locations

Vendors will be in one of two areas: on the north side of the park most non-consumable product based vendors will be located in our primary vendor marketplace. Food & Drink vendors will reside in the food court beyond the park fencing to the east of the park. 

Please see the site map for more details for each primary location and the subsequent assignment maps for where specific vendors will be located within each region. 

Judging Process | FORM

We have developed an electronic judging rubric form to allow for easy submissions of your scores for each vendor. For each vendor you are assigned to judge, you will submit your scores on THIS FORM. 

DJ

Amore Rings

Diamond Ooll Collection

Eyerock Eyewear Collection

Hugh Luxury Boutique

Nene’s Custom Creations

Afro Funk Wear

Chicago Culture

Church Boy Apparel

Pier’s Emporium

The Watermelon Man

Grace

Bixa Beauty

411 Immuni-Tea

Limitless Bartending Services

Little Squeeze

LVL UP SQUEEZE

Paris Ice Bar

Ruby Fine Hibiscus Tea

Boogie Cakes & Catering

Cosmic Creole

Ade’ja Creations

Jason

Art by Ebony T

Wilde Man Publishing

Lona Mae’s PPound Cakes

Blingg it 2 me Creation

Moonstone Chandlery

Raksha

Jascenta Candles

InHeirit, Inc.

Stoviink Creatives

Shanikky

Just’So Delicious Food, LLC

Rendezvous Culinary Group

Rubmabelly

Taste Of Jay

Tastes of Bri

VEG-CURIOUS

C&C CATERING

Rockin Robbin Bbq Kitchen

Wanna Pickle Gourmet Foods LLC

You will have approximately 2 hours to submit scores for 8-10 vendors. So approximately 4-5 vendors per hour, or 12-15 minutes per business. 

The rubric asks you to rate each business in several areas on a scale of 1 to 5 including: 

  1. Professionalism– Is the vendor organized, punctual, respectful, and courteous? 

  2. Customer Service – Is the vendor friendly, engaging, and attentive? Do they make customers feel welcome? Are they able to answer all questions effectively and troubleshoot?

  3. Booth Presentation – Is the vendor booth clean, visually appealing, well-arranged, with prices visible?

  4. Brand Cohesion & Identity – Is there a clear story and consistent look & feel across the booth/truck, signage, and product/service?

  5. Product/Service Quality – Is the vendor offering of high quality and unique? Doe it meet vs exceed expectations? 

Due to the volume of vendors, we encourage high reservation and scrutiny when issuing scores of 5 in each respective category. Consider the following scoring framework: 

1= Very Poor / Criteria is not met 

2= Poor / Criteria is barely met

3= Ok / Criteria is met

4 = Good / Criteria is well met 

5 = Excellent / Vendor far surpasses the criteria

We strongly encourage taking notes in the final comments section of the form to help retain information that will aid the deliberation discussion and justify your choice. 

Food & beverage vendors will set aside one sample for judges. Feel free to ask for the sample upon approach. 

Deliberation: 3:30pm Green Room (Morning View Word Church)

At 3:30pm please meet Stefanie Moore in the green room to deliberate and discuss scores. Stefanie will review the results of your scoring, focusing on any businesses that tie for the highest score. If there is one clear winner, then the deliberation time will solely focus on sharing the winner. If there is a tie, then a discussion will be held where the judges who submitted those scores will share more about the businesses. After providing more details the judges will have the opportunity to then vote once more. In the event of another tie, Stefanie will cast the determining vote. 

Following deliberation, judges are encouraged to enjoy the festival and relax. 

Announcing the Winner

The winner of the microgrant competition will be announced at the end of the Soul Tribute on the MainStage at approximately 6:30pm. If the judges are able to stay until then, we would love to have you join us onstage for this announcement. Our festival producer, Jessica Lá Rel Anderson will invite judges onstage and then announce the winner.