2025 MARL Pet Photo Calendar Contest: How Voting Works & How to Win

What the MARL Pet Photo Calendar Contest is and who runs it

The 2025 MARL Pet Photo Calendar Contest is a fundraiser built around pet photos, run by the Mississippi Animal Rescue League, an animal rescue organization based at 5221 Greenway Drive Ext. in Jackson, Mississippi. The ballot is presented by Fur On My Shirt Pet Photography, a photography business whose name sits in the contest title itself, and it runs on the GoGo Photo Contest platform at gogophotocontest.com/foms2025/pages/16335. The page invites supporters to cast a vote for favorite pet photos, browse the entries, and help make a difference for the league.

The vertical is pets, and the format is a calendar contest: the photos that collect the most votes earn placement in the league's rescue calendar, which the organizer describes as a top annual fundraiser. That makes this ballot different in kind from the readers' choice polls that dominate Mississippi's contest calendar, because every vote carries a dollar figure that goes to the shelter rather than a free click in a media poll.

The dated record for the MARL pet calendar ballot

Editions are confirmed for 2024 and 2025, and the organizer describes the rescue calendar as an annual fundraiser, so the photo contest rides that same yearly cycle. The rules page for the 2025 edition prints the operative window in full: the voting period runs from 8:00 AM Central Time on Monday, March 18, 2024 through 8:00 PM Central Time on Monday, May 13, 2024. The submission period shares exactly those dates and times, so entry and voting run as a single combined stretch rather than two separate rounds.

That printed window is the anchor fact for this page. The ballot leaves the current 2025 cycle's day-level open and close schedule unstated beyond those printed dates; confirm on the live ballot each cycle. The Contest Rules tab on the GoGo Photo Contest page is where the organizer prints the period for each edition, and it is the only place a supporter should take dates from.

Because the submission period and the voting period overlap completely, a supporter who wants an entry to matter cannot wait for a later voting round to open. The printed structure gives every entry the same March-to-May stretch to accumulate votes, and the close at 8:00 PM Central on Monday, May 13, 2024 is the hard end of that stretch for the edition whose rules page carries these dates.

How a supporter votes on the MARL ballot today

The mechanic on the ballot is a paid public vote. The rules page prints the price directly: $1 per vote, five-vote minimum. A supporter opens the GoGo Photo Contest ballot for the Mississippi Animal Rescue League fundraiser, browses the pet photo entries through the View Entries link, and buys a bundle of at least five votes to distribute to favorites. Entry fees are tax-deductible, and the email acknowledgment serves as the tax receipt, so a purchase doubles as a charitable contribution to the Jackson, Mississippi shelter.

The winner rule is printed alongside the price: winners are determined by the top 13 vote-receiving entries. There is no judge round and no secondary selection step in the printed text, which means the calendar lineup is settled purely by vote totals when the period closes at 8:00 PM Central Time on Monday, May 13, 2024.

Two practical points follow from the printed structure. First, because votes cost money, a supporter's budget sets the ceiling on personal participation, and the rules page held here does not print a per-person frequency limit or an eligibility clause for outside help. Second, the five-vote minimum means small gestures are not possible; the smallest action on this ballot is a five-dollar bundle, which shapes how supporters organize their spending across the spring window.

How the MARL ballot sits beside its Mississippi neighbours

Mississippi's public-vote calendar leans heavily on readers' choice ballots run by publishers: Best of the Best Jackson, Best of Mississippi, Best of Oxford, Daily Journal Readers Choice (Tupelo), and Best of Coastal Mississippi. Those programs rank local businesses across many categories for a media audience. The MARL ballot is a different animal: a single-subject pet photo fundraiser for a Jackson shelter, where the vote itself is the donation.

The closest structural neighbour in the state is the C Spire Conerly Trophy Fan Vote, which is also a single-subject fan ballot rather than a broad readers' choice poll. But the Conerly vote is free and sport-centered, while the MARL contest prices every vote at a dollar with a five-vote minimum and rewards pet photos with calendar placement.

From the supporter's side, the practical difference is strategy. On a readers' choice ballot, reach and daily return matter most because votes are free. On the MARL ballot, the printed $1-per-vote price means every push converts directly into fundraiser revenue, which tends to make the organizer and the community welcoming to enthusiastic voting, and makes the top 13 threshold the number every entry is chasing.

Strengthening support for a MARL pet photo entry

Because the printed mechanic is $1 per vote with a five-vote minimum, support for a MARL entry grows through paid bundles and through people willing to buy them. The most effective move is to send supporters straight to the entry page on GoGo Photo Contest rather than making them hunt for it, since every extra step loses pet lovers who would have given five dollars. Framing matters too: a vote here is a tax-deductible donation to the Mississippi Animal Rescue League, which gives hesitant supporters a reason beyond the photo itself. The organizer's rules page held here does not print any statement about outside vote help or eligibility, so a supporter planning a larger push should read the current Contest Rules tab for the edition in play. For the broader mechanics of rallying votes on paid ballots like this, see how to get more votes online, and for how purchased vote packages work on ballots of this shape, see buy award votes. What is certain from the printed text is that the top 13 vote-receiving entries win, so every dollar of support moves an entry measurably closer to calendar placement.