Judge a gingerbread house contest before the roofs cave in
Gingerbread house contests are judged under pressure: icing slides, roofs sag, and the kids want to eat their house by the end of the night. Take a photo of each house as soon as it is finished, add it to a Rankd, and let every builder and guest rank them all. Nobody has to pick a favorite out loud in front of the person who glued it together, and you keep a record of each house after it gets eaten.
- The candy cane cabin
- Gumdrop castle with a moat
- Graham cracker ski chalet
- The leaning tower of icing
- Pretzel log cabin
- Grandpa’s sturdy A-frame
Free. Add your own options (these are just examples), then send one link to your group.
Why ranking beats a regular poll here
- Photos taken right away keep a late roof collapse from costing a house the win.
- Builders rank every house, so the vote isn’t just for whoever brought the most relatives.
- Guests who stopped by later can still rank from the photos.
How it works
- Add the question and 3 to 30 options
- Send one private link to the group
- Everyone ranks privately, in about a minute
- You reveal the winner
Tips
- Decide ahead whether store kits count, and say so in the invite.
- Run a separate rank for kids, since a scratch-built adult house will beat a kit almost every time.
- Shoot each house from the front on a plain table, before anyone adds “just one more” gumdrop.
- Reveal the winner before anyone starts eating the decorations.
Questions
Should kit houses and scratch-built houses compete together?
It is usually fairer to split them. Make one Rankd for kit houses and another for houses built from scratch, and send both links at once.
Can people see how I ranked?
No. Each person’s order stays private. Everyone sees the group’s final order and where they personally landed, never anyone else’s individual ranking.
Is it free? Does everyone need the app?
Rankd is free and runs in the browser, so there is nothing to download. Friends open the link from any group chat (iMessage, WhatsApp, Slack, email) and rank in about a minute.