Hi, everyone! I’m back with my second competition update of 2026! If you missed the first one on January 16, please check it out on Cookie Connection (or this site), as I revealed the competition theme (Architect of Your Dreams) and schedule in both places. This theme is designed to stimulate a personal expression of your dreams for the future, your plans for achieving them, and your role as the “architect” of them. And, as always, you have the freedom to be as literal or figurative as you want in your theme interpretation. In that same post, I also announced that this year’s competition will be my last (and best!) for various reasons, which you can read more about here. But back to the very important topic of this post – the 2026 Sponsor Offering!
Anyone who’s entered my competition knows that learning is the primary objective, but that doesn’t mean we come up short on prizes – quite to the contrary, in fact! Our prizes are the very best in the business, totaling in the tens of thousands each year, thanks to our sponsors’ generous contributions. In 2025, we gave out over $21,000 in cash and digital gift certificates, with a record-breaking $9,600 of that total being cash. Once again, I thank our 2025 sponsors for going the extra mile to celebrate our industry’s talent!
This year, I hope to top those numbers by leaps and bounds. After all, it is the competition’s retirement year, and there’s nothing I’d rather see than a competition that is a blow-out celebration of the cookie world’s incredible talent! One way I am trying to achieve this goal is through an exclusive media partnership with the esteemed D’licious Magazine, founded by the incredible Kelly Jane.
She and I have joined forces for the first time in the competition’s history to give competition sponsors more exposure across the world on both digital and print platforms. Together, we’ve added a new “Headline Sponsor” level and a number of new sponsor benefits that extend into D’licious Magazine’s online platforms and monthly print publication. Our hope is to attract more sponsors than ever, again in the spirit of making this competition (and its prizes!) the biggest and best in its history!
Here are some of the new benefits we’ve added, though I encourage you to review the complete 2026 Sponsor Offering for all of its splendid details. This list contains only a subset of the benefits (the new ones) in two of the three available sponsor levels:
Note: The new Headline Sponsor level is limited to three sponsors, and some of the Gold Sponsor benefits are limited to the first two Gold Sponsors. That said, don’t wait until the last minute to decide how you’d like to participate, as I suspect these first come-first serve spots/benefits will go fast.
Kelly Jane will also be offering additional prizes and perks to entrants and winners, including a special winner feature in D’licious Magazine. More details about those prizes and perks will be provided in the official 2026 Competition Overview post, coming on February 20. And, if you’re not already familiar with D’licious Magazine, I encourage you to check it out – and subscribe – in the meantime. It contains a wealth of tutorials, articles, and information that is sure to inspire!
I hope the excitement of giving back to the cookie community combined with this expanded sponsor offering will spur many of you reading this post to join as sponsors in 2026! We welcome companies big and small, those that sell products, those that offer services like classes and tutorials . . . In other words, everyone is invited to contribute – the only requirement is that you be committed to advancing the state of cookie art! 😀 Again, please download the 2026 Sponsor Offering to learn more about the various levels of sponsorship and what the competition offers in return for your contributions.
In order to make a record-breaking prize announcement when the competition opens for registration on February 20, my team and I are asking that all interested sponsors make their pledges as soon as possible, and that all supporting materials (cash donations, digital gift/service certificates, logos, etc.) be received no later than March 31, 2026. Please remember: I can’t start promoting you and your business until I receive your donation (cash and/or certificates), so don’t delay. Stretch your sponsor dollars, take advantage of some of our new first come-first serve benefits, and maximize your exposure by submitting early!
So, in keeping with this year’s theme, let’s build some dreams together and make this last-hurrah competition more magical than ever! Just imagine, your logo could be here . . .
If, after (or before) reading this year’s Sponsor Offering or this post, you have any questions about sponsorship of the 2026 Julia M. Usher’s Cookie Art Competition™, please don’t hesitate to leave them below or to email me at sweetlife@juliausher.com. Thank you again to Kelly Jane of D’licious Magazine for allowing me to bring you a dramatically enhanced set of sponsor benefits this year. I also thank you in advance for your support of this competition! I would be most honored to have you alongside me on this last leg of my cookie journey.
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Live sweetly, Julia