Creating a paid contest
Paid contests let you charge participants an entry fee. To publish them you need two things: purchased tickets and Stripe configured on the association.
Step 1 — Buy tickets
Each paid contest consumes one ticket when it is published. To buy tickets:
- Go to My associations → ⚙️ gear icon → Tickets
- Click Buy
- Complete the payment on the Stripe platform
- The ticket is automatically added to your balance
From this same screen you can see the ticket history and which contests you have used them on.
Step 2 — Create the contest
Go to My associations → ⚙️ gear icon → Create contest and fill in:
- Name — e.g. Spring contest 2026
- Description — free text about the contest
- Cover photo — a landscape format is recommended (1232x288 ratio) so it displays correctly
- Dates — start of entries, end date and verdict date
- Price — enter the entry fee amount (e.g. €5). The system will warn you that this is a paid feature and that publishing it will consume a ticket.
- Contest rules — PDF with the official rules
- Scope — Social (members only), National or International
- Categories — one or more, with the number of photos allowed per category
- Voting — Salon Chairman, jurors and mode (remote or in-person)
- Awards — name, description and amount for each award
Save the draft and keep working on it until everything is ready.
Step 3 — Configure Stripe (if not already done)
Before publishing a paid contest, the association must have Stripe configured. If it isn't, when you try to publish this error will appear:
"To create a paid contest the association must have a billing configuration."
To configure it, go to Settings → Billing and follow the steps in the Billing and payments section
Step 4 — Publish the contest
Once everything is ready and Stripe is configured:
- Click Publish
- Confirm in the notice — "Once published you cannot make changes"
- At this point, one ticket is consumed from your balance
⚠️ A published contest cannot be modified or deleted.
How users participate
When the contest is published and started, participants see it on the home page. When they click Participate:
- The entry fee and taxes (if applicable) are shown
- The user accepts the terms and conditions
- They are redirected to Stripe to complete the payment
- Once paid, they are registered in the contest
The payment goes directly to the association's Stripe account. From My associations → Contests the administrator can see registered participants and total revenue in real time.
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Here is an explainer video: