Weekly Updates & Estimated Challenge Calendar

📆 Calendar	🗂️ Files	🖥️ Launches	💵 Tech & Payments
upcoming challenge timelines	file request deadlines and file prep updates	recent product & assortment launches	tech updates & upcoming payments

Thanks for stopping by to read the projected Current Estimated Challenge Calendar for the next two months! Please note that this schedule is subject to change. We update this page every Friday. 

Challenge Calendar 

Challenges are made up of (i) a Submission Period, during which artists submit designs, (ii) a Critique Period, a minimum of 24-hours of dedicated time for giving and incorporating peer feedback, (iii) a Voting Period during which Minted artists and customers cast their votes on submissions, followed by Minted's voting analysis & editorial review — analysis and review tends to take longer for Art and Partner Challenges, and (iv) Winners Announcements and File Requests. Below are current Challenge states.  

Notes on the calendar:

• [Updated 11/19] Both the Pairs & Sets Challenge as well as the West Elm Challenge are currently on hold. We recently posted a Forums update to provide more context to artists on the delay. We have left both Challenges on the calendar as placeholders but have removed the timeline to avoid further frustration with shifting timelines. Once we have more information about next steps for Art Challenges, we will add expected timelines back to the challenge calendar.
• [New 11/19] We’ve slightly pushed the winners announcement date back for both the Wedding and Valentine Greeting Card Challenges to avoid any file request overlap with the upcoming holiday weekend.
• [11/12] December is now on the calendar! 🎅
  

Submit to Challenges >>    Vote on Submissions >>

Happening in the Community Forums

With dedicated categories for your artistic medium, geographical region, and interests, the new Community Forums makes it easy to tap into the Minted community, so you can develop as an artist. Below, we highlight just some of what's happening in the Forums this week.

• [11/5] Pumpkin Contest winners! We received so many amazing submissions from the community that our social media team held two rounds of voting. Check out all of the winners here! 🎃

Files

Top-rated winners and Editors' Picks receive a request for final Adobe Illustrator files (fine art is accepted in other formats). Requests are typically sent within a week after each winners announcement, with the exception of Holiday challenges where requests are sent before winners are announced. This gives our Production team time to prepare the holiday assortment to launch before our big reveal in the fall. Below are final file submission deadlines. 

Art at Scale Large Format Art Challenge	File requests sent! Files were due Tuesday, October 19.
Seasons and Celebrations Holiday Greeting Card Challenge	File requests sent! Files were due Wednesday, November 3.
Better Together Save the Date Challenges	File requests sent! Files were due Tuesday, November 16.
Heart to Heart Classroom and Photo Valentine Challenges	File requests sent! Files are due Friday, December 3.

Notes on File Requests:

• [10/15] We're hearing that some artists have started receiving Dropbox File Submission confirmation emails. If you are still experiencing issues with receiving this email, please email [e-mail]. In the meantime, if you receive a confirmation message within your browser window that your files have been uploaded, we have received your file successfully.
• [10/8] We have also sent some file requests for early review for a subset of pieces from the Pottery Barn Kids x Pottery Barn Teen Challenge. Pieces requested are not guaranteed to be winners, and we will likely do another round of early file requests before announcing winners for this Challenge.

Launches

Below we've listed recent or upcoming launches of designs from Challenges. Keep in mind that late or incompletely submitted files, the need to acquire licenses for non-Minted fonts, investigation of clip art usage, and technical difficulties can cause delays in the launch of specific designs.

Holiday Giftwrap & Patterns	In Progress (97%)*
Large Format Art	In Progress (94%)

Notes on Launches:

[Updated 11/12] * Our Holiday Giftwrap & Patterns launch is almost complete! We are waiting to launch foil-pressed giftwrap designs until we receive inventory. Once that is received, we will fully launch those designs.

[Updated 10/22] We have reached the quality-checking process for the following assortments now that the majority of the designs from this assortment have been launched:

Holiday Giftwrap & Patterns

During this time, our team will carefully quality-check all designs. If you notice any bugs or issues during this time, please wait a few weeks to see if the issue is resolved before reaching out to us.

Tech Updates & Payments Schedule

All payments are processed through Payoneer. Commission Payments are paid monthly — with the exception of some sales made through partners, which are paid quarterly. Prize payments are typically sent every two weeks, at the end of the week, for all files received and reviewed by our team before that date. 

Latest Round of Prize Payments Sent:

November 9

See our commission payment schedule here. 

Known Holiday Bugs and Issues: Updated 10/15

We'll update this weekly during the holiday season for any widespread holiday bugs and issues. If you notice one of the issues below, our team is aware of the issue and working on a fix!

• [11/12] Our team has discovered a bug that is causing some designs to display with incorrect diecut shapes. We are working on a fix and, in the meantime, are manually adjusting these designs.
• [Updated 11/5] Our team has discovered this bug can also affect designs that were recently repurposed into additional flat or foil designs. We are aware of a technical issue causing the original orientation of a card to get "bumped" off the category page when the alternate orientation of that design launches. Our team is working to manually re-add these designs to category pages on artists' behalf.
• Our Merchandising team updates the arrangement of designs on our category pages on a regular basis. After a page is updated, designs may link to the wrong product page for a few minutes due to site caching. If your design links to the wrong product, please wait a few minutes and then refresh the page.

Tech Updates:

• [Updated 11/5] Storefront updates: Thanks to all artists who gave us feedback on common issues and frustrations in their Stores! We're excited to share that our engineering team has completed an update that removed duplicate products to show only the main product, and cleared out any retired designs that were still showing in stores. More details can be found in this Forums post!
• [10/22] Hidden design protection: We are thrilled to announce that we have launched improvements for when and how submissions will appear on the Minted site to better protect artists’ work. We appreciate the artists who surfaced this idea and Minted’s product and engineering teams for making it a reality! Learn more in our recent email here.

Self-Launch:

• Stationery
  
  • [9/17] The "unknown error" font issue with self-launch stationery templates has been resolved! If you're experiencing any issues with your self-launch files, please make sure you are using our provided self-launch templates and reach out to our team by emailing [e-mail].
• Art
  • Launching and fixing any bugs related to winning pieces is priority over launching self launch work. Please email [e-mail] to let us know if your piece has not processed after an extended period of time so that we can help move it forward. 

Office Hours

We host special office hours for specific topics here — for example, a chat specifically to answer holiday challenge questions. You can submit, even anonymously, ongoing feedback to Minted on our policies and processes for the broader team to our feedback form.