Hi all,
To be clear about this, even when the entry limit was 750 and all 11 competitions had that number registered last year (8,250), we ended up well below that number at 7,757. That is 493 under the registered maximum, or almost 45 entries missing per competition.
This year we allowed 775 entries as the limit during the registration, because historically that means we'll end up with closer to 750. There were 4 competitions that based on the preferred judging site were well under the 750 limit let alone the 775 limit. These competitions were "filled up" by assigning the 124 entrants left out of the 2 rounds of the lottery. Realistically about 40 to 50% of those people will accept our offer and ship to those competitions. So even though Kansas City (or Seattle, or Austin, or Saint Paul) looked like they had way more entries, the odds are that those will have well under 750 entries submitted.
These unrealized entries are opportunities that have been lost. Hopefully we'll get better at this next year.
Cheers,
Janis