Once the event is over, we will deduct any expenses from the overall total from ticket sales, sponsorship and fundraising. Every penny that is remaining will go directly to Youth Works Northamptonshire for Sebastian’s Support Service.

The OLDEST member of the performing group will need to be no older than eighteen on the 31^st December 2025 to qualify as a contestant for The Seb Factor 2025.

Of course – last year we had contestants from across Northamptonshire and one from Bedfordshire. Where you are from does not stop you from entering.

No, but please be aware that parents and carers will not be able to join their children on stage, so if someone very young wants to enter they would need to be confident enough to be on stage by themselves.

This is new for 2025. The Seb Factor team would like to see each act perform before we decide on the final line up for the show. This is for a number of reasons – to make sure each act is covered by standard risk assessments, to make sure the performance is suitable, to make sure there is a variety of acts and styles ready to entertain the audience.

One of our primary aims with The Seb Factor is to raise money for Youth Works Northamptonshire. We have tried to find some more exciting ways to do so this year, and one of those is our fundraising prize. We will set up an online fundraising portal for each finalist. You will then have 3-4 months to try and raise as much as you can. You can do this by getting sponsors, holding events at school – the possibilities are endless! Make sure any money you raised is paid into the online fundraising portal as we will use that to announce who has won the “top fundraiser” prize on the night. Don’t worry if you aren’t able to fundraise – it wont change whether you are a finalist or not. We will only announce the top three, so nobody will be ‘shamed’ if they haven’t raised any money. This will not go towards the final Seb Factor results.

By entering the competition, you agree to be available for three specific days – firstly the live audition day at The Masque Theatre, Barton Seagrave on Sunday 13^th July. Next, the day of the show itself on Saturday 1^st November and, finally, the evening of Thursday 27^th November for the Kettering Christmas Lights Switch-On. If you are unavailable for any of these dates then, apologies, but you cannot enter this year.

Of course. You might have been in a group, a solo performer or one of our guest performers last year. The only person exempt is last year’s winner (sorry, Sabina!). The four “category winners” will be exempt from entering next year’s competition. Remember that we cannot promise any of last year’s live finalists will make it through to the live show this time around. On the live audition day, every contestant will be judged equally.

The Seb Factor judges will mark each contestant out of ten in four different categories – “performance”, “presence”, “audience response” and “star quality”.  This will lead to an overall score of forty marks per judge for each contestant – which means a final score out of 160. In each category, the contestant who has achieved the highest score will go through to the final result, where their score will be looked at alongside the other category winners. The one with the highest overall score will be crowned champion.

Yes please! We will put tickets on sale once we know who our final contestants are – we were nearly sold out last year, so we would like to do even better!

The whole show will be streamed live on our website, and will be available to re-watch afterwards.

We appreciate that you will want to take photos of your child if they are on stage – but we care about safeguarding. If your child is performing by themselves then it is reasonable to take photos. If they are performing as part of a group then please refer to the group’s usual expectations about taking photos. Children are allowed to take photos and videos backstage, but we would request that none of this gets uploaded to social media.

We will comply with all North Northamptonshire Council safeguarding requirements. There will be chaperones and we need have clear information about the number of shows your children may have performed in already this year. We must request that there are no additional adults backstage, as this will not comply with safeguarding requirements. Once you have dropped your child off at the stage door, they will be looked after by our experienced show team.

You can donate in two ways – if you would like to supply a prize for our raffle, please email us and let us know. The raffle will be online throughout October 2025, before the final results are announced on the show day. If you would like to donate financially then we have a number of sponsorships available. Please contact us for details. The more we raise, the more we can give directly to Youth Works.

During the show day we will aim to sound-check every contestant on stage before the show begins. We regret that parents will be unable to watch the sound-check as we cannot guarantee when it will take place.

The stage costume you choose is entirely up to you. While there will be dressing rooms at the theatre, they will be shared, so we advise that contestants come dressed in their stage wear.

Running orders will be pinned up in the dressing rooms by the time contestants arrive on show day.

Any photos or information you provide us for “contestant biographies”, or any official photos or videos taken on the day, may be used for The Seb Factor social media and websites, and in any press and publicity for the event.