Best of the Boro 2026: How Voting Works & How to Win

Statesboro Herald's own ballot, not a shared statewide page

Best of the Boro belongs to Statesboro Herald, the newspaper serving Bulloch County, Georgia, and it runs on that paper's own Second Street account at statesboroherald.secondstreetapp.com. "The Boro" is local shorthand for Statesboro itself, the county seat, and the ballot name carries that nickname directly into its own web address rather than spelling the city out.

The same Second Street account also carries a second, unrelated ballot from the same organizer: Discovering Bulloch Readers Choice Awards, which runs earlier in the calendar year. Two separate programs sharing one platform account is common for local newspapers running Second Street, and mixing the two up means nominating or voting on the wrong page entirely.

Nine editions, each with its own dated address

Best of the Boro has run every year since 2018, and every one of those nine editions sits at its own Second Street address rather than one page recycled annually: a 2018 edition, a 2019 edition, and a fresh Best-of-the-Boro- address for every year after that through 2026. That is a longer confirmed run than most single-city ballots in this state carry.

The 2026 edition's voting stage ran a tight eight days, August 24 through August 31, a window that has already closed. Nothing published since marks whether or when a 2027 edition opens; confirm on the live ballot each cycle rather than assuming the same August dates repeat.

What else runs on Statesboro Herald's Second Street account

Best of the Boro is not the only promotion Statesboro Herald runs through its Second Street account. The same account currently carries a $15,000 sweepstakes opening in November 2026 and an earlier $5,000 sweepstakes that closed in August, alongside two photo-submission promotions, Back to School and Hometown Heroes, where the public uploads its own images rather than picking from a fixed list of businesses. Best of the Boro sits apart from all of them: it is built as a ballot, meaning Statesboro Herald sets the list of names and supporters choose among them, not a contest where entrants submit new material of their own.

A business listed on Best of the Boro is not automatically entered into any of the account's other promotions, and the reverse holds too. Each one opens and closes on its own schedule, and confirming which promotion is currently live means checking statesboroherald.secondstreetapp.com directly rather than assuming one program's activity carries over to another.

How a ballot-type promotion differs from a submission contest

Second Street sorts every promotion it hosts into a type, and Best of the Boro carries the ballot type, the same category the platform uses for straightforward readers-choice voting on a slate somebody else assembled. That puts a nominated business in a fixed spot: it shows up as an option Statesboro Herald has already placed on the form, and a supporter marks a pick rather than the business adding new material once the voting window opens.

Two of the account's other promotions, Back to School and Hometown Heroes, carry a different type entirely, built for photo submissions rather than a pre-set list of names. A business hoping to land a first appearance on Best of the Boro depends on however Statesboro Herald decides who goes on the ballot, since no open nomination form for this specific program shows up anywhere on the account; confirm on the live ballot each cycle for whether one exists before the next window opens.

Bulloch County around Statesboro

Statesboro sits as the county seat of Bulloch County in southeast Georgia, and Statesboro Herald's coverage area follows that county line rather than the city limits alone. That same county footprint shows up on the organizer's own platform account: Discovering Bulloch Readers Choice Awards, a separate ballot with a separate window earlier in the year, carries the county's name directly into its own title.

None of that changes what Best of the Boro itself covers, but a business just outside the Statesboro city line should not assume it is shut out of a ballot named after a nickname for the city rather than a strict boundary.

One newspaper's ballot next to Georgia's other best-of programs

Best of the Boro is one newspaper's Second Street ballot. Best of Atlanta, Best of Augusta, Best of Cobb, Best of Forsyth, Best of Middle Georgia, and Athens Community's Choice Awards each answer to a different publisher, on a different platform in several cases, none of it tied to Statesboro Herald's own account.

A business that also appears on a neighboring city's best-of ballot is not building on the same rulebook twice. Each program sets its own dates, its own category list where one exists, and its own voting mechanics independently of what Best of the Boro publishes.

What to do while the ballot sits closed

A business planning ahead for next year gains more from lining up its regulars now than from waiting for an announcement. With no published vote cap on any past edition, repeat visits from the same supporters during whatever window opens next have historically counted for as long as that window stays live.

Structuring an award-vote push around a newspaper-run Second Street ballot like this one works better planned before the next window opens than during it, and where the legal line sits is worth reading given how little Statesboro Herald has published about this particular ballot's own rules. Statesboro Herald's own site remains the only place that will confirm the 2027 dates once they exist.