Survey Results: What do people think of our Kingdom A&S Competitions?
Lochac’s Kingdom A&S Competitions are our main Kingdom-level A&S activity, but they usually get less than ten entries each, and often less than five. Lochac has a large A&S community, and this doesn’t seem like enough entries to celebrate our artisans. We ran a survey because we wanted to understand how people feel about our competitions, what they get out of them, and what might work better.
Our survey got responses from 133 people, which is equivalent to about 10% of Lochac’s paid members, so we believe it’s enough to give us a good understanding of the different opinions present in Lochac’s A&S community. Here’s what they told us.
Should we keep holding our Kingdom Competitions? Yes.
Almost three-quarters of people who answered this survey agreed that we should keep holding our Kingdom A&S Competitions, and most of the rest were neutral.
Should they stay our main Kingdom-level A&S activity? Maybe.
About a third of people said that competitions should remain our primary celebration of A&S at Kingdom level, about a third disagreed, and a bit over a third were neutral.
What other ways do people share their work?
About half the people who answered this survey had entered a Kingdom A&S Competition, and a similar number had judged an A&S competition of some kind. 90% look at A&S competition entries at least sometimes when they’re at events.
A large number also engage with local competitions, A&S displays, social media, or personal websites, with a smaller number entering or looking at Laurel Prize, guild rankings, or Cockatrice.
Social media, seeing items at events, and word of mouth were the most common ways people found out about others doing wonderful A&S work.
What do people like and dislike about competitions?
When we asked what people like about our competitions, why they engage, what they enjoy, what could change, and what they liked about other ways of sharing their work, the following themes emerged:
- People love seeing other people’s work, and showing their own
- People love talking about A&S
- Many people enter competitions to seek feedback; some find feedback uncomfortable
- Some people like competing; some don’t
- Competitions can be intimidating; some people prefer something low pressure
- Competition themes are sometimes a barrier to entry
- People would like competitions to be more visible and celebrated.
Should we change our A&S Championship system? No.
59% of people believed we should have a Kingdom A&S Champion, and only 10% of people believed we shouldn’t. Most people thought we should keep the current system for choosing one, or didn’t have any changes to suggest.
People had different opinions about whether it’s better to reward someone who enters many times (as we currently do) or someone who enters the best item. Some people suggested giving out a prize for each.
Many people thought our A&S Champion needed to be more visibly celebrated, and should have some kind of recognisable token to wear. There wasn’t strong support for the idea of a champion having any particular duties, outside encouraging A&S.
What are we going to do?
Some people like competitions the way they are. Some people are looking for something different. So we are going to keep our Kingdom Competitions, and trial adding a second option. The Spring Crown stewarding team in Innilgard have agreed to host our first Kingdom A&S Showcase, which will be open to all entries (no minimum standard, no themes, no documentation required) and will not be judged, although there will be a populace-choice prize.
If the trial goes well, we will consider making a Kingdom A&S Showcase a regular part of our Crown Events, and look into possibilities for local or online entries.
We will also be considering adding a second prize in our A&S Championships for the highest-scoring entry of the year.
For more detailed statistics and analysis of the survey results, see: Kingdom Arts and Sciences Competitions – Survey Results