Radar nominates the most bogus awards in America

Sure, it's a great idea, but did your new invention win Strunk and White's 2007 Technology Innovation of the Year award? Didn't think so. There's no such thing—yet. Send us $50 and we can work something out.

In the rapidly expanding world of awards marketing, winning is rarely free. In fact, the dirty little secret is that it just might be better to give an award than to receive one, thanks to an ingenious pay-to-play model that involves perfunctory judging, zero accountability, and very little overhead—not to mention an extremely gullible public. Such prizes are now given out in the thousands every year. And some people have actually started making money compiling them into lists, people like Lynne Marcus, who charges $595 for her reference tome, Marketing with Honors. She also consults for companies seeking to give out awards, while at the same time collecting fees from companies hoping to win them. (No conflict here, she says: "If I'm running a competition, I try not to help people win it, too.")

Marcus admits that most corporate honors are far from scientific, or even reliable, because the vast majority are bestowed by for-profit enterprises. Many don't even pretend to be impartial; they just want the entry fee. In exchange, recipients can use their spurious accolades to convince the public to buy what they're selling. The system works, says Marcus, because "if you've won lots and lots of awards, consumers will believe you know what you're doing." That explains, for example, why Dell dedicates a major part of its website to the dozens of awards its won, including the prestigious Buyers Laboratory Inc. Outstanding Small Workgroup Color Printer Award. And why ExxonMobil, the world's largest oil company, crows online about the 54 awards its garnered in the categories of Health and Safety, Environment, and Social Responsibility.

In the spirit of competition, we took a closer look at some of the most grievous offenders in the field. The envelope, please ...

THE STEVIES
Winner of the 2006 Bogie for Best Pretend Business Awards

Given in four categories—
American Business, International Business, Women in Business, and Selling Power Sales Excellence—the Stevie Awards are the brainchild of Michael Gallagher who, after years in the media and tech industries, saw an opportunity to fill a desperate need for "the Oscars of business." He takes care of his own needs by charging entry fees up to $425 for consideration in 300 separate categories. Nominees have the option to buy $355 tickets to the gala, $1,200 ads in the banquet program, and $500 for the trophy if they happen to win. Gallagher gets companies like Pitney Bowes to sponsor the ceremony, offsetting his overhead costs. And since the awards are based on unverified applications filled out by entrants, you can cross off judging expenditures too.

The Big Kahuna, Power & Assoc. dates back to 1968, when it was essentially an industry shill for Japanese carmakers hoping to make inroads into the tough American marketplace. Detroit soon took notice and adopted J.D. Power as its own. Since then, the company has figured out all kinds of clever ways to shine the Big Three's lemons. When the 1989 Buick LeSabre lost big to Nissan in an overall quality survey, J.D. simply created a new category: Best Rated American-made Car. Buick then proudly announced in national ads that the LeSabre had won the best-rated car of the year. J.D. went on to rate cell phone providers, speedboats, mortgage lenders, opticians, homebuilders, digital cameras—name the category, there's probably a prize. And they give them out in 17 countries.

The awards juggernaut was started by James David Power III and eventually bought out by McGraw Hill, owners of Businessweek, Standard & Poor's, and all manner of text books and maps. But the original business model has never changed:

1. Conduct a random direct-mail survey on a product, enticing people to participate with $1 bills.
2. Charge the surveyed companies significant amounts of money for the results.
3. Re-charge survey winners a hefty licensing fee for the right to use the J.D. Power Logo in advertisements. (Power himself has admitted that fees can run anywhere from $25,000 to $300,000 a year.)
4. Reap the benefits of free advertising, without having to do any marketing of your own.

The real genius lay in segmenting the awards to garner as many winners as possible. Cars, for example, are judged in literally dozens of categories, from size to price point, to ensure that nearly every model wins a prize. And J.D. Power only ranks the top five in any category, saving their clients contestants from the humiliation of not being the best. Because losers don't pay licensing fees.

The local TV meteorologist said sunny skies, but you're stuck in a downpour. That guy is wrong way too often. Wouldn't it be nice if there were a way to find a weatherman you could trust? WeatheRate, an outfit that certifies, monitors, and gives prizes to the best weather forecasters in the nation, purports to do just that.

Based out of Phoenix, Arizona (do they even have weather in Arizona?), WeatheRate conducts super-secret tests using their Weather Tracker II software to compare local weather forecasts to the actual weather. (Upon closer inspection, the tests seem to be pulling data posted by local stations on their websites, which is often taken directly from the National Weather Service.) The winners in any given market then earn the right to brag to their viewing audience that they are the best forecasters in town. At a recent WeatheRate awards ceremony, KJRH Channel 2 of Tulsa, Oklahoma, took home first place and a custom-crafted ice sculpture in the shape of the Channel 2 logo, made by culinary-arts students from OSU-Okmulgee. Congratulations! That will be $1,000 per month. Cash or charge?

What happens if the station doesn't want to pay? In Nashville, Tennessee, after WKRN-2 was named the winner but balked at ponying up the monthly fee, WeatheRate turned around and sold the distinction to their bitter rival, WTVF-5. When one losing station in St. Louis, Missouri, complained about WeatheRate's practices, founder Bruce Fixman stood his ground. "Our policy is just to announce who the most accurate is, it's not to damage the reputation of other TV stations," Fixman told the Kansas City Star, adding, "We operate just like J.D. Power."

AAA gives out five diamonds. Mobil gives out five stars. But the American Academy of Hospitality Sciences combines stars and diamonds in a package that's downright irresistable: the Five Star Diamond Award.

The official looking plaques make for an impressive display in a hotel lobby, but it doesn't take much digging to discover that the American Academy of Hospitality Sciences (AAHS) is neither an academy, nor a practitioner of the sciences, hospitality or otherwise. The awards, which have been around since 1989, are given out by Joseph Cinque from his Columbus Circle apartment, and appear largely to be a vehicle for accumulating free lunches. An alleged ex-con, Cinque stacked the AAHS board with friends who always seem to have something to gain when it comes to tallying up the vote. Take trustee Roger Dubin, owner of a tourism marketing consultancy that lists the AAHS as a paying client. Curiously enough, one of his other clients, Blue Hawaiian Helicopters, wins a Five Star Diamond Award every year.

Criteria for the awards are transparently vague. The Academy's "valuable sources" submit nominations throughout the year, which are then considered by the board based on standards that require, for example, "petits fours [to be] served after meal." Unlike AAA and Mobil, there are no four, three, two or one star designations—everyone's a big winner. And when it comes to trophies, they seem to be of the "you won it, you bought it" variety. In addition to lobby plaques, lucky winners can also buy tacky looking cufflinks and lapel pins. Twice a year, the AAHS puts out a travel directory filled with promotional photo spreads of Five Star Diamond winners and "a selection of Elite products" for $39.95. Naturally, winners pay an undisclosed fee to be featured in the directory, too.

AAA was not amused by Cinque's awards and sued in 1999. But the suit apparently never made it off the ground, as Cinque, along with his good friend Donald Trump (who has his own cozy relationship with the AAHS board), is still lavishing Five Star credentials on luminaries like Philippe Starck (2005's Best Designer in the World) and Dieter Huckestein, CEO of Yellowstone Club World (Lifetime Achievement Award). We couldn't reach Cinque because he's currently in the Caribbean, enjoying a 9-day cruise aboard the MS Europa, flagship of the Hapag-Lloyd fleet, and winner of the first ever Six Star Diamond award. (Really.) An excerpt from Cinque's press release: "The American Academy of Hospitality Sciences commends MS Europa as the most extraordinary vessel in every aspect of its operation and for setting the highest standards in worldwide cruising."

This spring, Phil Capitano, mayor of Kenner, Louisiana, was thumped in his bid for reelection. The town's slow recovery after Hurricane Katrina surely played a roll in his defeat, but the real culprit was more likely Pat Summerall, former NFL place-kicker, sportscaster, and liver transplantee. Pat Summerall Productions had duped Capitano into spending $28,000 in city funds on a Champions of Industry award honoring Kenner as the best city of its size in the country. Instead of the promised national exposure, which was to include Forbes advertisements and a two-minute television spot hosted by Summerall, Mayor Capitano got an acrylic trophy in the shape of a pyramid. Pat Summerall Productions declared bankruptcy and split with the cash, along with the $20,000 to $30,000 fees paid by 50 other "winners."

The scam worked like this: salesmen would cold call small town executives, university provosts, school boards, and anyone else with public money to spend, and inform them they had been selected from a huge list of towns as a "Champion of Industry." If they chose to accept the award, the invoices arrived soon after.

In greener days, the Champion of Industry award often went to private businesses—Jos. A. Bank clothiers paid for it in 2000, and White Castle was a proud recipient in 1998. But as the award matured, the focus increasingly turned to small and medium-sized towns around the country—perfect targets because mayors and city executives are expected to promote their constituencies, and often have cash at the ready to do just that. Little by little, auditors and newspaper columnists began questioning how the awards were judged, and what the towns were actually getting in return. In one case, the mayor of Rowlett, Texas, was forced to face both an ethics panel and a criminal investigation for agreeing to pay $25,000 to Pat Summerall productions. Many towns asked for their money back, which is when things started going downhill.

You'd think that after 100 career field goals, 257 extra points and untold hours locked in a broadcast booth with John Madden, you'd be able to see an end run coming. But Summerall, who unwittingly liscenced his name to the outfit, was listed among the 250 creditors owed money when the parent company, Texas-based Criterion Productions, went belly up in late 2004. (Also on that list was Troy Aikman and, strangely enough, the Securities and Exchange Commission.) Criterion's founder, one Bob May, disappeared soon thereafter.

Summerall seems to have weathered the storm. In fact, he's even back in the awards racket. Last February, a tiny promotions company with some big-time NFL connections introduced the Pat Summerall Award, which was given out at a Super Bowl banquet. The fees are cheap, only $150 to enter and $150 to win. The first winner? Summerall's pal, sportscaster James Brown.