How to run an office sweepstake.
A good office sweepstake is one of the cheapest morale boosts there is: for a pound or two a head, the whole team suddenly cares about a tennis match on a Tuesday lunchtime. This guide covers the entire job - getting names in, drawing fairly, handling the money and keeping it fun for a fortnight.
1. Pick your moment
Tennis Grand Slams are the perfect sweepstake material. Each one runs for two weeks, has a 128-player singles draw with famous names and unknown qualifiers alike, and produces at least one shock a round. Set your sweep up in the few days between the draw being published and the first ball being hit - that window is usually the Thursday or Friday before the tournament starts. Doing it before the draw exists works too: people just pick from the seeds or add players by hand.
2. Get the names in
Decide who's in - a team, a floor, the whole office, the family group chat. Then collect names with a hard deadline ("names in by Thursday 3pm, draw at 4"). The easiest way is a message in the group chat; when you set the sweep up in SlamSweep you can paste the whole list straight in, one name per line, and it handles the rest. Twenty to forty people is the sweet spot: enough for a proper pot, few enough that everyone gets a recognisable player or two.
3. Decide the money up front
Free sweeps are great for bragging rights, but a small stake makes people check the scores. The classic office rate is £1 to £5 per entry, agreed before the draw. Three rules keep it friendly:
- Collect the money before you draw, not after - nobody chases a fiver from someone whose player lost in round one.
- Announce the payout in the same message as the invite: for example "winner takes 70%, runner-up 20%, first player knocked out gets their money back".
- Keep the stakes small enough that losing is funny, not annoying. If your workplace has rules about sweepstakes, check them first - and a charity sweep, where the pot (or half of it) goes to a good cause, is an easy way to keep everyone comfortable.
4. Draw fairly - and visibly
The draw is the moment the whole thing lives or dies. If people suspect the organiser fixed who got the favourite, the sweep is dead. The old way is names in an actual hat, which works but is slow and easy to get wrong once people want two entries each. SlamSweep does the same job in one click: add the names, pull the draw, and every person is randomly assigned players from the field. The result is encoded in a single share link, so the version you send is the version everyone sees - the organiser can't quietly redraw until they get the champion.
For maximum theatre, do the draw live: share your screen in the Friday stand-up or huddle round a laptop in the kitchen, hit the button, and enjoy the groans.
5. Share it where people will see it
Post the share link in the group chat and pin it. If your office is a printer kind of place, print the result sheet and stick it by the kettle - there is no better conversation starter than a wall chart with Karen's name next to the world number one. The link never expires and nothing is stored on a server, so it will still work when the final rolls around.
6. Keep it alive during the tournament
The organiser's real job starts once play begins. It takes two minutes a day and it's what people remember:
- Post a quick update when a sweep player wins or crashes out - "Dave's qualifier just beat the 4th seed" is office gold.
- Run a running "still in it" count as rounds go by. By the quarter-finals it gets properly tense.
- If someone's player retires or withdraws injured in week one, have a rule ready (see below) rather than an argument.
The pitfalls (and the fixes)
- More entries than players. With a 128-player draw this is rare, but if you run a seeds-only sweep (32 players) with 40 people, someone goes without. SlamSweep warns you before you draw and shows exactly how many stay in the hat.
- Latecomers. Someone always asks to join after the draw. The clean answer: no additions - but offer to run a second-chance sweep from the players left in the hat once round one is done.
- Withdrawals. Agree before the draw what happens if a player pulls out before their first match. The usual house rule: they get a redraw from the remaining hat; after the first ball is hit, tough luck - injuries are part of the game.
- The organiser wins. Perfectly legitimate if the draw was visibly random - which is exactly why you draw live with a link everyone can check.
That's the whole craft. Pick a Slam, get the names, draw in the open, post updates, pay out with ceremony. For the current tournament, start with our US Open sweepstake generator, or read up on rules and variations if your office fancies something spicier than one-player-each.