Qualifying nominations will be hosted on the awards web site and visible to visitors to the site. Judges will be provided a user name and password to access a secure judging site.

Each judge will be asked to judge select categories. If a category contains a nomination for a nightclub or bar that an individual judge is involved with as an owner, operator, employee or consultant, that judge will not participate in reviewing that category’s nominations or be permitted to cast a ballot in that category.

Judges select a first, second and third place entry for each category; each place is assigned a numeric point value. After all ballots are cast, finalists in each category are identified by calculating the total number of points each entry receives. The winner is the entry receiving the most points for that category.