Elizabeth River Project Scoop the Poop Calendar Contest: How Voting Works & How to Win

What is the Scoop the Poop Calendar Contest and who runs it?

The Scoop the Poop Calendar Contest is Elizabeth River Project's pet photo fundraiser for Virginia, produced together with Windhound Photography as its photography partner. GoGo Photo Contest hosts the ballot at gogophotocontest.com/elizabethriverproject. Supporters back submitted pet photos there, and the strongest images fill a printed rescue calendar that anchors the whole campaign.

The organizer's announcement pairs the two names directly, presenting the "Scoop the Poop" calendar contest for 2024 in partnership with Windhound Photography. GoGo Photo Contest positions itself purely as the technical host for donate-to-vote fundraisers, leaving design, printing and prize fulfillment to the organizations it serves.

The stake for entrants is a printed page: the top finisher's photo takes the coveted cover slot on the 2024 "Scoop the Poop" calendar, the honor the ballot itself advertises.

When does Scoop the Poop voting open and close?

Dates anchor this fundraiser. For its 2023 cycle the ballot printed a voting phase running from 9:00 AM Eastern, Saturday, April 15, 2023, until 9:00 PM Eastern, Saturday, June 3, 2023. That stretch held the entire public vote, with no separate nomination round set out ahead of it. Both endpoints fall on a Saturday, and the close lands in the evening rather than at midnight, details worth weighing against whatever the live page posts.

Two editions are confirmed so far, in 2023 and 2024, and the organizer speaks of the project as a repeating fixture: "our annual rescue calendar has evolved into one of our top annual fundraisers." Between cycles the ballot stands down behind a contest-ended notice.

Several things stay off the page. The organizer has not announced the year of the next edition. GoGo Photo Contest publishes no promotion dates for this fundraiser. And the ballot itself prints neither a category roster nor a per-supporter ceiling nor an eligibility term; confirm on the live ballot each cycle.

How does a supporter actually vote on the GoGo Photo Contest ballot?

Voting here is giving. GoGo Photo Contest builds donate-to-vote fundraisers, and this ballot follows that shape: a supporter picks a pet photo, completes a donation, and a gift of one dollar translates into a single vote for that entry. There is no free button to press; the tally climbs with the money behind each photo.

The page itself is laid out like any conventional website. Menu tabs named Contest Rules, Prizes, About, Participate and View Entries ring the entry grid, and the header carries a Sign In link. The ballot stops short of saying whether an account is required before donating, so a first-time supporter should simply follow whatever prompts the live form raises.

Two practical points follow. Because dollars drive the count, repeat participation is really a question of additional donations, and the ballot sets out no per-person ceiling. Phone browsers load the entries and the donation flow without a desktop, so backing a photo from a pocket is routine.

Timing matters as much as method. The window stretches across weeks rather than hours, so a supporter who spreads gifts over the open period, instead of concentrating everything into a single day, keeps an entry climbing steadily toward the close. The Prizes and Rules tabs carry the organizer's own terms, which is where any adjustment between editions would surface first.

How does this pet calendar vote compare with other Virginia ballots?

Virginia readers meet a crowded field of public votes: Best of Arlington, Best of Coastal Virginia Magazine, Best of Charlottesville, the Daily Progress Charlottesville Readers' Choice, and the BroadwayWorld Central Virginia and NOVA theater awards. All of them ask the public to pick favorites, yet the Scoop the Poop fundraiser sits apart in three ways.

The subject is pets, not businesses or stage productions. The currency is dollars, since every vote arrives attached to a gift. The beneficiary is the organizer itself, with the printed calendar acting as a fundraising engine rather than a marketing exercise.

The mechanics also shape what a supporter's money means. On a reader poll a click costs nothing, and loyalty decides the outcome across weeks of daily returns. Here a donor watches the tally move with each gift, which makes the campaign feel closer to a drive for a good cause than to a popularity chart. That framing explains why the printed rescue calendar is the prize dangled in front of givers: they are putting a familiar animal face onto a physical month, not merely scoring points for a name.

Those differences change how a campaign behaves. A restaurant chasing a coastal Virginia magazine title courts repeat free clicks from its customer base, while a Scoop the Poop owner rallies donors who each want a beloved face on a printed month. Unlike the city and region reader polls, this ballot draws its audience from a single organization's supporter base across Virginia rather than from a metro area's voters. Neighbours worth reading side by side include Best of Coastal Virginia Magazine and Best of Arlington.

How can a supporter strengthen an entry in this fundraiser?

Since every dollar lifts a photo's standing, momentum comes from people, not tricks. Share the ballot link with friends who love animals, post the entry while giving is open, and remind donors that late-window gifts count exactly the same as early ones. A short thank-you to everyone who has already given often prompts a second gift during the closing stretch, when entries are most likely to trade places. Read the Rules tab on the ballot before leaning on anyone else's effort; the organizer prints its terms there rather than in a separate policy document. Outside help exists as a wider market: this guide to widening support covers no-cost tactics, and paid vote services for award-style ballots sit one click away, though nothing on the ballot spells out where purchased support stands with this organizer.