Tri-State Defender Best in Black Awards: How Voting Works & How to Win

What the Best In Black Awards are and who runs them

The Best In Black Awards are the annual honors program of The Tri-State Defender, a weekly African-American newspaper based in Memphis, Tennessee, whose coverage serves Memphis and nearby areas of Arkansas, Mississippi and Tennessee. The paper frames the program as a way to recognize outstanding Black businesses, community organizations, entrepreneurs and individuals across the Mid-South.

Voting runs on the newspaper's own web presence at tri-statedefender.com rather than on an outside polling service, and taking part costs nothing. The 2025 announcement appeared under the headline The Tri-State Defender hosts 2025 Best In Black Awards again in November and invited nominations across various categories. Three examples printed there are Best Entrepreneur, Best Restaurant and Best Youth and Mentorship Program. The notice presents those as samples inside a wider slate, so treat them as illustrations rather than the complete lineup.

The paper describes itself as an independent publication funded by contributions from readers, and the awards serve that same readership instead of an outside sponsor's audience. Its masthead publishes under the TSDMemphis.com name, and the honors program carries the paper's own branding from nomination call to awards night.

Which editions are confirmed and when the windows fall

The dated calendar

Dated evidence confirms runs in 2025 and 2026. The 2025 cycle is the better documented of the pair because its announcement spells out the working calendar. Nominations were open through Sunday, October 12. Voting was set for October 17-26. The awards themselves were slated for November, which is how the headline framed the event.

The series reaches much further back. The paper describes Best In Black as a program hosted annually by The New Tri-State Defender, and a nomination notice states that since its inception in 2012 the awards have sought to highlight outstanding Black businesses, community organizations, entrepreneurs and individuals in the Mid-South.

Between cycles the paper keeps a dedicated Best In Black page on its site, where the annual-hosting language sits alongside whatever the newest cycle contributes. That page and the culture section give supporters two fixed places to watch between one November event and the next nomination call.

What the paper leaves off the page

No rules sheet travels with the ballot. Neither the announcement nor the ballot page sets out a vote cap, a per-person limit or eligibility terms; confirm on the live ballot each cycle. The complete category list is likewise absent, and no winners roll accompanies the notice. For a later cycle, the dependable signal is the paper's culture section, where the 2025 announcement ran, because each new edition returns in that notice format with its own dates attached.

How does a supporter vote in the Best In Black Awards today?

The two-step shape of participation

Taking part follows a two-step pattern. First comes the nomination stretch, during which readers submit names for consideration through the paper's site. Only after nominations close does the ballot itself open, and the two stages sit days apart in the 2025 calendar. Second comes voting: a supporter opens the awards coverage on the paper's site, chooses a category and casts a free public vote for a favorite.

The 2025 notice also signalled urgency in its own wording: nominations were described as open now, meaning the submission stretch was already running when the announcement appeared. Anyone waiting for a second reminder risks missing that stage entirely, because the paper gives no indication it extends deadlines.

No sign-in wall, device restriction or per-day instruction is printed with the notice, so anyone planning repeat participation should follow whatever directions the live ballot carries that cycle. Because the vote is public, mobilizing others multiplies a nominee's reach far more than any single ballot action.

Momentum depends on timing as much as breadth. A nominee whose appeal reaches a wide circle of committed supporters enters the count in better shape than one hoping readers will drift back unprompted, and a campaign that waits for the voting stage forfeits the head start the nomination stretch provides.

How does this ballot compare with other Tennessee public votes?

The neighbourhood of Tennessee best-of ballots

Memphis also hosts the BroadwayWorld Memphis Awards, a theater-centered ballot that shares the city but not the subject matter. Outside Memphis, the state's best-of family includes CommunityVotes Chattanooga, the Best of the Best contest run by the Chattanooga Times Free Press, Cityview's Best of the Best ballot in Knoxville and the Knoxville HBA Parade of Homes, which ties public preference to a builder showcase. Nashville carries its own BroadwayWorld edition.

Two things separate the Best In Black Awards from every neighbor on that list. The publisher is a single Memphis newspaper rather than a national theater network or a citywide consumer survey, and the subject is deliberately scoped to Black-owned businesses, community organizations, entrepreneurs and individual leaders across a multi-state slice of the Mid-South. The Knoxville HBA Parade of Homes shows how far the family stretches, from community honors to industry showcases, yet none of the others centers Black entrepreneurship the way this program does.

The three-state footprint sharpens that contrast. A Chattanooga or Knoxville ballot draws nearly all of its participants from its own metro area, while this program's natural audience crosses state lines into Arkansas and Mississippi communities inside the paper's coverage area.

Scope shapes the electorate too. The voters most likely to arrive are the paper's existing readers plus the customers, members and supporters each nominee brings along, which concentrates attention inside a defined community instead of spreading it across hundreds of familiar citywide names.

How can a nominee build real support in this program?

The practical lever in this ballot is reach into the Tri-State Defender's audience. Nominees who ask customers, congregations, members and social followers to nominate during the opening stage, then to return and vote once the ballot opens, turn passive goodwill into counted support. Sharing the paper's announcement link directly, with the category name spelled out, removes guesswork for a supporter who arrives ready to act.

A simple cadence holds up well: post the nomination link as soon as the paper announces the cycle, remind people before the submission stretch closes, then post again with the category named once voting starts. Supporters who nominated early are the easiest to convert into voters, because they have already signalled their intent.

The organizer publishes no guidance on outside vote services for this ballot, so a nominee weighing paid help should start from the organizer's own terms and the general background in how to get more votes online. Whatever route a campaign takes, identifying and mobilizing sympathetic voters inside Memphis and the wider Mid-South remains the work no external shortcut replaces.