Who decided the final list?

Ella’s select team of editors met over the course of a couple of weeks to nominate different individuals and narrow our very lengthy list of options to ten final nominees. (Later shortened to nine, as explained below.)

Why are there notable people missing from the list?

Because our industry has too many influential people to include all on one list! Our goal with these awards was not to nominate just the most obvious scrapbook “celebrities,” the scrapbookers who have been around the longest, or the scrapbookers with the biggest audiences. This award is based on very recent effort and achievement, on out-of-the-box thinking and innovation, on partnering and pioneering into new frontiers, and very much on reaching out to support and lift others within the industry. It’s not solely based on being a longtime pillar of the scrapbooking community.

Our hope, in part, is to introduce you to some NEW faces who are influential in their own spheres, making a daily difference to their audiences and to their industry peers. Our hope is to help our nominees widen their influence even further, because we think they’re doing great things.

Why nine nominees?

Well, we originally chose ten nominees, but one was unable to participate fully in all the activities (including the blog tour), so she chose to bow out this year rather than participate on a very limited basis. Whomever you think is notably missing from our list, that’s probably the tenth nominee! (But you can nominate her again for next year, by clicking here.)

Aren’t these nominees all people that you guys know?

We haven’t actually met everyone in person, and there are several we’ve still never spoken to on the phone! But yes, all the nominees were known to our selection team beforehand because, well, we can’t nominate people we’ve never heard of. But next year, you can nominate people we’ve never heard of, and we promise to consider them!

Will anyone’s feelings be hurt?

We hope not! We hope to be able to celebrate the contributions these nine women have made to the scrapbook industry in the past year or so without making anyone else feel unloved or unappreciated.

Our goal is to make these awards an ongoing thing, so that present and future efforts to spread the good news of scrapbooking won’t go unnoticed. (Perhaps you’ll be nominated next year!) So if your favorite scrapbooking personality didn’t make this year’s list, please nominate her or him next year. Our nominations line is already open!

Can I nominate someone?

Yes! And we hope you will. Simply click here for a description of how to submit a name for consideration. You can nominate notable public figures or people who work behind-the-scenes (such as a magazine editor). And yes, you can nominate yourself if you’d like.

When will the next nominees be announced?

Depending on interest and the number of nominations received, we’d like to award a new set of Most Influential Scrapbookers in 2011. We’ll accept nominations on an ongoing basis!