Carolyn Baldwin founded the Miss Jnr SA’s in the year 2000. This pageant was the brainchild of Carolyn after having seen that the South African market desperately needed a Pageantry system that was above board and most importantly Honest and Fair.

With the contestants’ interests at heart, the first pageant went ahead in August 2000 at Sun City, after nine months of preparations. Semi-finals were held in the various provinces around South Africa and finalists were chosen to represent their province in the National Finals. Sponsors were approached for prizes and each contestant, whether they were a winner or looser went home with a Jacket, tog bag, clothing, swimsuits and hair products to name a few. The winners walked off with computers, bicycles and prizes valued at over R300 000, 00 making it the biggest children's’ beauty pageant in South Africa.

Pageants SA then went on to obtain the rights to send each of the four various category winners to the “Miss Universe Int’l 2000/1” pageant that took place in Anaheim, California in September 2000. History was made for South Africa when all four category winners won their sections and brought back the crowns and titles to South Africa. This was an outstanding achievement and the pageantry industry went crazy at the prospect that by entering the 2001 pageant, the winners would have a chance to compete in the International event.

The “Disney Princesses” were introduced to the public for appearances in the year 2000. The “Disney Princesses” have appeared at many functions including launches at Pick ‘n Pay, Johannesburg Zoo, Birthday Parties and much more.

With the 2000 pageant being such a huge success, no choice was left but to continue with the 2001 plans and competition. It was no surprise when calls starting coming into the offices from potential contestants enquiring as to the Regional Finals and the entries began pouring in for these events. A small dream had begun to turn into a huge reality with an even bigger responsibility to ensure that the competition was a success. Once again, a countrywide search was started and finalists were then chosen. The 2001 event, which now included the 13-15 age category of Miss Jnr Teen SA took place at Sun City in October 2001 and each contestant received a Jacket and tog bag just to name a few of the prizes, from the sponsors. The prize packages were again fantastic and almost immediately that the winners were announced, those that did not win the title began enquiring as to the 2002 event.

With such success in the year 2000, the organizer of the Little Miss Universe Int’l pageant contacted Pageants SA to host the Miss Universe Int’l 2001 in South Africa. It was decided that this event would take place simultaneously with the Miss Jnr SA and Catwalk Model of the Year at Sun City. Carolyn had taken over as the Editor of the Catwalk Magazine and Jackie as the Sub Editor, therefore it was sensible to utilize Sun City for the host venue from an International point of view and also due to the fact that it had many varied activities to offer both the local and International guests.

The Catwalk Model of the Year took place on the Friday evening, the Miss Jnr SA on the Saturday evening and the Miss Universe Int’l on the Sunday evening. The winners of the Miss Jnr SA immediately participated in the Miss Universe Int’l on the Sunday as part of their prize.
The event was a huge success and the Miss Universe Int’l organizer then signed over the rights to the pageant to Pageants SA. This was a fantastic achievement and was again the beginning of many more very successful events on an International level.

With the response from girls in the 16-19 age categories becoming oWith the response from girls in the 16-19 age categories becoming overwhelming, it was once again decided that the need for this additional category was apparent and this age group was introduced in 2002. Due to the fact that this age group fell into a similar category as the Miss SA, it was necessary to find an alternative name for this and after receiving many calls from males and females of all ages, the Miss & Mr Africa was registered, thereby introducing this category as the Miss Junior Africa for 2002.

The prize package for the 2002 event was in excess of One Million Rands, making the event the biggest event of its kind in South Africa. Each of the 350 contestants, 50 Top Ten winners, 40 Individual category winners, 5 winners, 5 1st Princesses & 5 2nd Princesses walked off with a prize package. The smallest prize being worth a minimum of R2000, 00 and the largest over R50 000, 00.

This was again a positive aspect of the pageant as Pageants SA is the only pageant organizer in South Africa that rewards each and every contestant that enters the event and the news of this spread very rapidly throughout the country and also into Africa. Calls from countries all over the African continent started coming into the office and it was soon obvious that we had to include contestants from all over Africa for the 2003 event.

Noticing the standard of entrants to beauty pageants was very high, Pageants SA decided to assist models that needed a little polishing with preparation for events, workshops were held covering all aspects of modeling, health and beauty.
Pageants SA were approached by several charity organizations, to assist with fund raising and began hosting mini competitions to raise funds for them. These included the SPCA, Avril Elizabeth Home and the Variety Club to name a few.

In 2003, the Miss & Mr Africa took place in September in Mafikeng in the North West Province, with the age categories ranging from 4 – 24 both male and female. Media reports have noted the The Miss & Mr Africa pageant was a ‘world class’ event, bring much pride and honour to Pageants SA. With the Miss Jnr SA set to take place in April 2004, the entire country was waiting with bated breath to witness the event – the event of the Year.

Simultaneously to arranging the Miss & Mr Africa event, Pageants SA once again made history by being the first pageant organizer to host a competition on board a luxury liner sailing on the magnificent Indian Ocean to the Portuguese Islands. Pageants SA hosted the King & Queen of the Ocean on board the luxury liner, the Olympia Countess, in February. The event was a great success with very few contestants experiencing any seasickness. The event was a ‘party’ from the time we boarded the liner in Durban to the time that we returned. Fun was had by all, and this is definitely an event we will host again.

Pageants SA were approached by the Virgin International Group to put together an event for teenagers in high school incorporating health, fitness and moral values. Miss & Mr Teen Active became a National competition and will become an annual event.

During 2003, Pageants SA became actively involved in raising funds and awareness for Bone Marrow transplants, and had been instrumental in assisting young Adriana van der Merwe who desperately needed a transplant. Apart from fundraising, Pageants SA, were one of the coordinators of a fundraising cycle tour for 40 cyclists from Johannesburg to Durban – Adriana unfortunately passed away on Sunday 27th June 2004 at 2.40pm. Rest In Peace, Little One. Visit her site for more information www.adrianasfund.co.za

The reigning Miss Jnr Africa 2003, Monica Ferreira attended the Miss Teen International 2003 in Ecuador in November 2003 where she was placed in the Top Ten in the world.

In December 2003, the reigning Miss Africa 2003, Angela Beck, went to Malaysia to represent South Africa in the Miss Tourism International 2003 pageant. We are extremely proud to announce that Angela was crowned the winner of Miss Tourism Int’l and will now be travelling the globe to represent South Africa and promote tourism throughout the world.

In June, Pageants SA coordinated the Pick ‘n Pay Idols competition with 12 finalists. These finalists were put through their steps for the final event by Carolyn & Jackie and the final event was an outstanding success.

Stay Alert – Stay Alive Campaign

Tsunami Relief – Red Cross

With the Tsunami making world headlines, Pageants SA, lead by Courtney Elson started an initiative to collect food clothing and medical supplies to give to the Red Cross. Over 3 ton of relief was collected, resulting in Courtney being made an honorary member of the Red Cross. Carolyn, Jackie and Gillian Elson offered their services as relief workers from South Africa, and listed on the International Relief list. We assisted in packing and sending relief to these people devastated by this natural disaster.

In February 2005, Carolyn, Jackie, Michelle and Joanne began what was initially supposed to be a very exciting event! Acting as chaperones and co-coordinators of all sightseeing to over 80 contestants and 10 assistant chaperones, the event turned out to be absolutely dreadful. No trips had been arranged for the contestants, which resulted in 80 very upset young ladies.

To try and save the event, Carolyn arranged trips free of charge for all contestants, chaperones as well as country directors to the Victoria Falls, Elephant sanctuary, Boat rides, river cruises, trips to Lake Kariba and much more. The event as organized by the Miss Tourism World organisers was nothing short than totally disgusting. The words “cattle parade” come to mind when thinking back to the event, however, with trips arranged and contestants a little happier that they had seen a little of Zimbabwe, we were extremely pleased to return home.

The organisers of this event are little more than totally unprofessional and we will never work with these people again. We are not sure why they had the event, other than to make money out of the Zimbabwe government. After we confronted the organisers about their mismanagement and exploitation of the girls, we were moved from chaperones and then assisted the producer of the television production, which thankfully worked out well.

Practicing what we preach is our motto: - Pride, Honesty, Fairness, Equality, Fun and Integrity.

Without the above, we would not have reached this far. We pride ourselves in our honesty, the fair way in which we treat our contestants and have the scores audited, the equality that we instill in all the contestants at the same time as teaching them that competition can be fun providing integrity is maintained at all times.

Our pride is the successful fulfillment of every event we undertake.