Click Frenzy Awards $50K to “Australia’s Best Online Shopper”

Click Frenzy took its annual November shopping event to the next level this year, with its inaugural Ironshopper competition seeing everyday Aussies compete for the chance to win a cool $50,000.

The online shopping event announced this year’s winner on Thursday, with the prize money going to Beechworth resident, Katie Skinner.

“We’re so excited to announce our first Ironshopper winner,” Click Frenzy’s Managing Director, Grant Arnott said. “This initiative was very successful and gives the art of online shopping the status it deserves. It’s great to see someone from a regional town take out a huge prize like this – regional areas are the heartland of online shopping. We congratulate Katie and all of the finalists that participated in the inaugural Ironshopper event.”

Skinner received the news while she was at the supermarket buying nappies and says she couldn’t be happier.

“I’m at the cash register at the supermarket, But I am so excited,” she said. “My heart is racing, I’m so over the moon! I’m shaking!” According to Skinner, she’ll use the money to buy a new car, as her one is “in desperate need of replacing”.

Speaking to Power Retail, Skinner says her heart nearly leapt out of her chest when she saw an unknown Melbourne phone number calling her. “When the phone rang and I saw it was a Melbourne number, I thought, oh my God it could be them. Then I thought, no, don’t get your hopes up.”

Skinner says she originally heard about the competition through a Click Frenzy EDM, and immediately knew she should enter because making a short video seemed easy enough.

“I actually had more photos and footage than I needed, so my video needed to get cut down a lot to keep it within the one-minute limit,” she jokes.

Click Frenzy announced its search for Australia’s best online shopper in late October, asking everyday Aussie’s to submit a short video outlining why they deserved to be the first Click Frenzy Ironshopper.

According to Arnott, the promotion was the biggest the company has run since it first launched in 2012.

“This is without a doubt our most exciting promotion ever,” he said. “We’ve crowned Australia’s best cooks, best renovators and best singletons ad nauseum. Now it’s the online shopping community’s time to shine!”

Kicking off on Tuesday night at 7 pm, the pool of finalists had to compete in a range of challenges, where they were judged on speed, discovery, brand knowledge, variety, value, quality and creativity.

For Skinner, the Style competition was the best challenge. “I really enjoy looking at interior design things and I’ve been looking at a lot of stuff for our house over the past few years. Just thinking about what sort of items were needed and trying to stick with the budget was fun as well. And of course, the $1,000 haul was amazing because I get to keep the stuff I bought.”

A team of panellists and Jo Munro, from The Savvy Shopaholic then judged the competitors on their shopping prowess and ability to beat the clock to grab a true Click Frenzy-style bargain.

“Judging the $1,000 shopping hauls of the finalists was enlightening.  There was some very savvy bargain hunting, some really well thought out strategies and some really amazing savings,” Munro said.

“Congratulations to Katie! Being named the first Click Frenzy Ironshopper is a testimony to great skill, good buying decisions and deft gamesmanship working through the challenges.  I would love to go and do some savvy shopping with them sometime!”

Post Ironshopper, Skinner says she has been overwhelmed by the kind messages people have been sending her, since it was announced on Facebook on Thursday afternoon that she’d taken out the $50,000 prize. “Just a big thank you to Click Frenzy,” she says, “and to the other finalists. It’s been really nice getting congratulatory messages from those involved in the competition.”

Click Frenzy also says it’s in the process of determining the winner of the ‘Ironshopper Wild Card’ competition, which will see one lucky subscriber awarded $10,000. To be in the running for the Wild Card prize, shoppers had to become a registered Click Frenzy shopper (which is free) and then share the items they purchased via their account page. The company says that the winner of the $10,000 cash prize will be announced before November 21.

Despite getting off to a slow start, Click Frenzy organisers have said that this year’s event was it’s best yet. More than 500 Aussie retailers participated in the homegrown shopping event, with big names like Myer, Bonds and Rebel Sport all getting in on the action.

This year’s special deals included $2 GHD straighteners, $4 Beats Headphones and $5 Nintendo Switch Consoles.

Click Frenzy is the first major online shopping event in the pre-Christmas sales season, with Black Friday and Cyber Monday also tipped to generate big bucks for Aussie businesses in the coming weeks.

Disclosure: Click Frenzy Pty Ltd is owned by Global Marketplace, the parent company of Power Retail.

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