Welcome to Top of the Town 2023:
Voting is now open!

Imagine that our beloved Lansing area was visited by friendly aliens from a distant world. Imagine they had a chance to experience, from a completely unbiased perspective, the very best Lansing has to offer for one year. 

What would they say is Lansing’s best olive burger? Its best ice cream? Its best barbecue, best auto dealership, best pet groomer, best budtender, best barber shop or best urban farm? How would they vote in the more than 300 categories that make up our Top of the Town contest, co-sponsored once again by Fox 47 News? It would be fascinating to see how their choices compared to ours.

The integrity of the contest is of utmost importance, so all nominations will come from the community. Yes, winners past and present often place ads, which sometimes results in more votes because of greater exposure. But it does not influence the results in any other way, and buying an ad is not required to participate or win. Top of the Town is absolutely a people’s choice contest.

To get started, please visit lansingcitypulse.revfluent.com/ToTT. There, you will find the contest’s homepage and links to register and vote. Or, to begin voting, select any category and follow the prompts in the pop-up window. Please note that all votes are submitted automatically. Once you’ve cast them, you’re done. Don’t worry about a second submission screen. 

If you need to stop and come back to your ballot, or your internet browser closed, you can return to the site and continue voting exactly where you left off. Remember that you can always log out of your voting session and, when you are ready to resume voting, log back in and get back to the contest.

As always, you can vote in as many (or as few) categories as you wish, but please remember to finish your ballot before 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 3. That should give you plenty of time to make even the most gut-wrenching of decisions! The Top 5 in each category will advance to the second round, which will be announced on Wednesday, Oct. 18.

You will then have two more weeks to vote for the Top 3, which will be announced in our Nov. 15 issue.

If you are the first one to nominate a business, please be patient. It will be submitted to an approval process so we can verify it is in the right category, spelled correctly, etc., so it may not show up immediately. If you do not see it after 24 hours, please contact Steve Underwood at (517) 999-6705 between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays or steve@lansingcitypulse.com.

Also, when you vote or nominate, you have an opportunity to comment on why it is the best. Please do so! We want to use those comments in the next round when the Top 5 nominees are winnowed down to the winner and second- and third-place finishers.

If need be, you can also send us your list of votes via snail mail to Steve Underwood at City Pulse, 1905 E. Michigan Ave., Lansing 48912. 

Top of the Town is THE platform in Greater Lansing to vote for the best of the best, and our new Lansing Guru website will host the Top 5 results after the contest concludes and serve as an invaluable reference for our community all year long! And thanks so much to Dennis Preston for his outstanding artwork on the cover and within this story!

While you’re on the City Pulse website, make sure you sign up for our new and improved newsletters. If you’re not sure if you’re one of the 7,000+ signed up for it already, enter your email address and we will sort it out for you and make sure you only get it once.

NEW CATEGORIES

Bar
Best Mocktail

Dining
Best BBQ Sauce

Best Bubble Tea

Best Cupcake

Best Sandwich/Wrap

Best Vegan/Gluten-Free Dessert

Best Vegetarian/Vegan Dish

Best Lasagna

Hangouts
Best Sober Hangout

Best Beach

Cannabis
Best Distillate Cartridge

People
Best Academic Advisor

Best Barber

Best Barista

Best Customer Service Worker

Best Drag Performer

Best Nail Tech

Best Entertainer

Best Farmer

Best Librarian

Best Retail Salesperson

Best Local Author

Services
Electric Repair

Engineering Firm

Estate Sale Company

Holistic Healing

Home Inspection

Irrigation Services

Junk Removal

Kayak Rental

Local Computer Store/Repair

Local YouTube Channel

Pet Rescue

Travel Agency

Shopping
Art Supply Store

Lingerie Store

Whatever

Best Place to Cry in Public

Best Vehicle Ever Made in Lansing

Best Place to Find Quiet

Best Staycation Hotel in Lansing

Services
Best Facial

Best Med Spa