About a week ago while gathering my mail I tore one open that my daughter had been recommended for NAM and was invited to open call for the National American Miss. What? The first thing that came to my mind was SCAM. Looking more closely at the letter it did have some well known sponsors and was accredited by the Better Business Bureau with an A+ rating, but before getting ahead of myself I decided to do my research.
Now, I think my daughter is the most beautiful little girl on earth, although I am a little partial:) So I don’t believe in the Toddler in Tiara pageants where they are caked in makeup and wearing little clothing. National American Miss does not allow for girls under the age of 12 to wear any makeup and there are no swimsuit competitions, this is great news.
This pageant seemed to be geared more towards building life skills like public speaking and interview skills.
My daughter had been sick the last couple of days and wasn’t really feeling up for this, but I was really interested in finding out more information on it in person, so we went to the open call, it was free and only lasted about an hour. They interviewed each girl there only a few questions about themselves. My daughter wouldn’t tell me the details, she was in one of her moods where it was all “blah blah blah”. When she came back out to me in the line of girls ages 4-6 she was holding hands with a couple of the other girls and having fun!
So, it all sounds really good. NAM is the biggest outfit right under the girl scouts and gives away 1.5 million in prizes each year! So what’s next? Well, in a few days we should either get a phone call saying she’s an Arizona finalist or a post card saying she’s not. Then the work begins… she must secure sponsors to pay for her $440 registration fees!! Wow. We’ll see what happens, I look at it as an opportunity for my daughter to learn some great skills at an early age. I will keep you updated on what happens!
Your daughter is a cutie! Good luck in this adventure and can’t wait to hear more!
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She is beautiful! I hope to see more pageant posts soon. Good luck!
She’s really adorable! Good luck with the sponsor searching! I hope she wins!
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Thank you so much! We are happy to have the chance for the great experience.
Hi, Your little princess is such a cutie! We received a letter too…. I almost threw it away thinking junk mail. We are going to check it out.
Do you know what kind of “snappy” clothing is good for this open call? Just a cute dress???? AND if something does come of it…. how does one shop for sponsors???
Thank you
They say for open call anything that you would dress them in for Church, a nice dress is perfect. As for Sponsors, they give you brochures to give out and you can make up something of your own as well. Then visit your local businesses, especially those you work with and talk to them about sponsoring your daughter.
Thank you soooo much and for getting back with me so quickly. Wonderful, I will be shopping for her adoption dress so hopefully it will work for two events!!! She is actually my granddaughter and I am adopting her at the end of Feb. We are very excited.
NAM is totally a scam. They say they only pick the special ones to be accepted, but when we went to the “free” training we noticed that there was a ton of people that showed up. At this point I started to question NAM. We immediately got our money back. What a joke. It was totally obvious that they had “accepted” every single person that showed up…besides how could they decide in only a few minutes if a girl is qualified? The answer is that they can’t. By accepting every person that shows up you guarantee that at least you’ll get some suckers money. Yes, there are parents out there that think this is great and I say great or you, but a scam is only a good scam when you get people excited about it and willing to give money. How do you think they can afford to pay salaries and prize money? They can afford it by getting desperate people to fork out money with the hope of finding “sponsors”. (by the way, most companies now are unwilling to donate to a single person, only to an organization.)
Also, check out Clark Howard’s website. He has a great article about modeling scams and it sounds just like NAM.
http://www.clarkhoward.com/news/clark-howard/scams-rip-offs/modeling-and-acting-scams-still-popular-ever/nFnp/
Mike,
I have had the pleasure of meeting some people who have had fantastic experiences with NAM people who are not involved in the pageant in any way now because it has been a few years and they have great things to say. I say to each their own. It’s a great opportunity to teach these girls to get in front of an audience and work on their confidence and skills for the future.