Christian Retailing is restyling its award honoring what are deemed to be the best products in the Christian market. Formerly known as the Retailers Choice Awards, the 2013 awards program has been rebranded as “Christian Retailing’s Best.”

For 2013, a number of new categories have been added, including Games/Toys and Seasonal/Holiday in the Gifts super category and Fiction: Amish and Fiction: Biblical in Books. The youth book category has been split into two, Young Adult Fiction and Young Adult Nonfiction.

Those nominating are asked to enter their best 2012 releases in more than 50 categories of books, Bibles, gifts, music, DVDs and more, along with products in the Backlist category. Click here to nominate starting Jan. 2.

The nominating period runs Jan. 2, 2013 to Feb. 15, 2013, but products entered by Jan. 25 benefit from the Early Bird discount (for every five paid, get one free). Although this year’s entry fee is raised slightly to just $60 per item entered, suppliers will no longer be required to supply samples of their products. Nominating companies or authors will be invoiced for the appropriate entry fee.

Following the nomination period, Christian retailers and others in the Christian products industry, including authors, editors, literary agents and distributors, will be invited to vote. Voting details will appear in the March print issue of Christian Retailing (Click here to sign up for the digital issue.) and in the Christian Retailing Update e-newsletter (Click here to sign up for Update.).

Winners will be announced in June at the International Christian Retail Show in St. Louis.

For more information, e-mail Editor Christine Johnson at crbest@charismamedia.com.