Who has the best mullet in America? 10 kid finalists compete for the hair-raising honor

Kids across the country are competing against one another for the unique title of “Best Mullet” in the first-ever kids mullet championship.

The competition is hosted by Kevin Begola, the owner of Michigan-based men’s clothing store Bridge Street Exchange, who decided to create a mullet championship earlier this year. After crowning an adult men’s Best Mullet winner in July, Begola created mulletchamp.com and set out to continue the USA Mullet Championship. Ironically, the pandemic and resulting quarantine helped him achieve that goal.

“I wanted to bring something fun and different to the landscape of what was going on in 2020. Beard contests have been pretty big for years but the mullet came back quick and now we have lightning in a bottle,” he tells Yahoo Life. “It has blown up fast and I think the quarantine helped with so many people skipping hair cuts.”

The hairstyle, famously worn by David Bowie, Billy Ray Cyrus and John Stamos, features short hair at the front and sides of the head with long hair in the back. Although the look already had its heyday, it seems to have returned as a result of canceled haircut appointments, closed hair salons and people getting creative with at-home ‘dos. Now people are loving the style on the top 10 contestants currently competing to be crowned best mullet in the kids’ competition.

“For the kids’ contest, we had an open entry period [which began on Sept. 11] where contestants went to our website to enter in. They signed up and they were mailed an official contestant number and form they had to include with the photos they submitted. This was done to verify people and make the contest legitimate, to avoid any Photoshop stuff,” Begola explains. “We had over 120 kids enter the contest in a small window, before this blew up to what it is now. The judges then sat down to narrow it down to the Top 10.”

Begola is one of three judges who “all know a good mullet when they see it.” With the last 10 competitors left, however, it’s up to voters to determine who the winner is.

The voting period to crown a winner began on Oct. 14 and closes on Oct. 25. Then, “we will then crown our winner of the best Mudflap in all the land,” Begola says.

The first-place winner of the 18-and-under competition will win $500, while the two runners up are set to get a pair of sunglasses and an official Mullet Champ bandana for second place. Beyond this latest contest coming to a close on Sunday, Begola sees room for expansion.

“For 2021 we want to expand out what we are doing with regional contests, hopefully hosted by bars and concert venues across the country. We will have more categories as well that include men’s open division, 55+, ladies’ division, longest and then kids again,” he says. “We really want to grow this to become something bigger and we want to send the 2021 Champion for the Men’s division overseas to the World Mullet Competition.”

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