What are the Spirit of Innovation Awards?
The Spirit of Innovation Awards are a unique opportunity to acknowledge your outstanding product development team, while providing your product and company with priceless worldwide exposure.
It is designed to recognize innovative new products introduced during 2008-2009 and the inspirational teamwork and creativity that made these new products possible. The Spirit of Innovation Awards were conceived by Ventura Foods and Prepared Foods.
How many Categories?
There are two Spirit of Innovation Award categories, Retail and Foodservice. The winners of these two categories will be presented with an Award at Prepared Foods' New Products Conference 2009.
How to Submit a Nomination
To submit your nomination for the 2009 Spirit of Innovation Contest, please click on the appropriate category (Retail or Foodservice) ballot bar at the top of the next column. The ballot provides text boxes in which you can summarize both your new product and the product development team.
You may submit more than one nomination per company. However, submit only one product per ballot.
Scholarship Donations
Ventura Foods has graciously agreed to make a $2,500 scholarship contribution on behalf of each of the two 1st place Retail and 1st place Foodservice Spirit of Innovation Award winning teams.
Confidentiality
Your Spirit of Innovation nomination is not intended to divulge any proprietary or confidential company or product information. The information you provide is only intended to allow the judges enough description to differentiate between many innovative product development teams and their exciting new products.
Award Ceremony
The two 1st Place teams are asked to receive their Spirit of Innovation Awards at the prestigious 27th annual New Products Conference. The Spirit of Innovation Awards ceremony will precede the Awards reception on Monday evening, September 10th, 2009, at The Ritz-Carlton in Palm Beach, Florida.
The 1st place Retail & 1st place Foodservice Spirit of Innovation Teams will need to prepare a brief 3-4 minute group presentation. This visual presentation should highlight the teams' major accomplishments and innovative aspects of the product. This presentation will be Monday evening, at the New Product Conference. [click for NPC details]
The two 1st Place Teams are strongly encouraged to provide samples so that the 250 attendees of New Products Conference are given the opportunity to taste your new product.
The retail winner will be asked to assist Prepared Foods’ editors in an article for the October 2009 issue.
The foodservice winner will be asked to assist Prepared Foods’ editors in an article for the November 2009 issue.
Important Deadlines
The deadline for entering your Spirit of Innovation Awards nomination is June 30, 2009. Submit your nomination today! Winners will be notified in August 2009.
Click here to view the 2007 Spirit of Innovation Awards ceremony. |