How to Become a Local Champion in Canada

To become a local champion in Canada, rate five different places in one town or city, answer three Top 3 questions about it and make one list of your own with a place there on it, all in the Mosey app. The title is earned by activity alone, and it works the same way from a big city to a small town.

What does it take to become a local champion in Canada?

Local Champion is a title for one town or city, not for a province and not for a whole profile. The app puts the three steps in plain words: "Rate 5 places", "Answer 3 Top 3 questions" and "Make a list with a place in" your town. Each step shows Done or To do, with counters such as "2 of 5 rated", so you can see what is left at a glance.

The name stays in English across the app. The thing it records is simple: you did the three steps in a town, and nobody checked your opinions along the way.

How do you rate five places in a Canadian town?

Open a place in the app and rate it with stars, a dish, tags and a few words if you like. Five different places in the same town is the target, so five ratings of one favourite count as one. A coffee shop, a dinner and a food truck all count equally, as long as each is a separate place the public can see.

Some ratings never count: a rating you hide later, a rating of a service rather than a meal, a place you run yourself and ratings from an account flagged for abuse. A rainy-day plan works well in this country: rate the lunch you eat anyway, week after week, and the five add up without a single special trip.

How do you answer three Top 3 questions?

Top 3 puts one question in front of you per visit and waits at least four hours before the next. The questions are about kinds of food and occasions, such as coffee, brunch, pizza, poutine, Chinese and sushi. You name up to three places, ranked, with number 1 as your favourite, and you need three different questions answered in your town.

Only answered questions advance the count. A skip protects your daily streak but adds nothing toward the title, so when you do answer, name at least one place. The questions are about the town your phone is in.

What counts as a list in your town?

Make a list of your own in the app with at least one place from the town on it. A list of places to try, a list for a visiting cousin or your go-to breakfasts all work. Two lists are left out of the step: the one called My Favourites and the list that Top 3 builds from your answers, because using it would turn steps two and three into one action.

Give your list a name, add a place and, if you like, share it with a friend who can add their own.

What if you live in one of Canada's small towns?

This is a country of small places, and the app has a rule for them. A town with fewer than five public places is treated as a village, and a village's people are counted with the nearest real town or city within 15 kilometres. If there is none that close, the village stands on its own. So a reader in a small community can still earn a title, and it will carry the name of the nearby town.

Your five ratings, your Top 3 answers and your list should then be for places in that nearby town. The card on Home shows which town it is counting.

What does not count toward the title?

A skipped question, the automatic Top 3 list, the My Favourites list, a hidden rating, a rating of a service, a place you run yourself and repeat ratings of one place are all left out. What is deliberately missing from the rules is the content of your ratings: a one-star rating counts exactly like a five-star one, and a rating with no words counts like a long review.

What happens when you earn it?

You see a thank-you reading "You are a Local Champion of" your town. The title shows on your profile and beside your name on a rating of a place there, and a Share my title button draws a picture card with three plain numbers. Once earned, it stays. There is no prize or payment. Among the first people to earn it in a town, some are offered the Original mark, covered in the Original mark guide.

Where do tags, dishes and friends fit in?

Ratings feed step one, and they do more than that. Name the dish, add tags such as Hidden Gem or Great Value, and tag who you ate with. Follow a few people and their picks show on Home under This week with friends. A shared list lets friends add places too. The earned, not bought guide explains why the title cannot be bought, and a worked example for a big city is the Toronto page, with a west-coast one in the Vancouver page. The Local Champion page shows the screens.

Mosey is free for a place to list, with no hidden fees and affordable tools, and supporting local starts with people who tell their neighbours what they ate. More ideas are in the Canadian food guides.

Get the Mosey app, rate the first of your five places tonight and watch the card on Home tick over to 1 of 5.