There’s a moment in pop culture when a character stops belonging solely to its creator — and for the fictional TikTok LIVE gas station clerk Sue Dillon, that moment has arrived in the form of a public lookalike contest with real hardware at stake. The 2026 Sue Dillon Lookalike Awards are now accepting entries through October 31, inviting fans to submit costume photos for a shot at one of three physical trophies.
No account or email is needed to participate. Aspiring lookalikes simply upload their image at https://my.blupro.live/lookalike/, a process the organizers say takes roughly a minute. The rules are deliberately lean: dress as Sue Dillon, photograph the costume with filters off, and post it to the contest wall. From there, anyone can vote — up to six votes per person per day through October 31 — and the three entries with the most votes take home a Sue Dillon trophy.
For the uninitiated, Sue Dillon is a fictional gas station clerk hovering near seventy, a chain-smoking, mullet-wearing character who exists only on TikTok LIVE. Four nights a week, comedian Sarah Soda — a Tennessee nurse who built the character and her operation independently, with no agent or manager — performs prank calls in character, often keeping real businesses on the line far beyond believability, all for an audience of more than 1.3 million followers.
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The costume requirements are as minimal as the character’s patience for customer service: wig, flip phone, attitude. That’s the entire list. But the details are specific enough to replicate — the bedazzled cigarette earrings, the rasp, the posture of someone who checked out decades ago — and that imitability is precisely what the contest is designed to test.
The Awards are produced by blu shift creative, the live-streaming talent agency founded in 2022 by Ben Baldwin and Tara Stevens. The company has been an official TikTok LIVE partner since its first year and took home the top agency award at TikTok LIVE Fest US in 2025.
“A great character belongs to the audience,” Baldwin said. “Sue proved that the first time somebody did her voice back at her. We just built her a stage door designed specifically for the LIVE streaming format.”
The concept has cultural precedent. Dolly Parton has spoken publicly about entering a Dolly Parton lookalike contest and losing to a drag queen. In 2024, a Timothée Chalamet lookalike contest drew a crowd large enough to shut down a block of Manhattan. Both illustrate the same pattern: a lookalike contest signals the moment a figure transcends the person who created them.
Throughout October, Sue Dillon’s Sunday 6 p.m. Central LIVE broadcasts have doubled as open auditions, with viewers joining as guests to perform their best Sue for the live room — a tactic the contest site describes plainly as a way to campaign for votes.
The Awards were featured this week in Tinsel Magazine, which framed the contest as evidence of the character’s crossover into broader culture. The publication also previously mapped the larger TikTok LIVE performance economy in a field guide to the platform’s competitive season, covering nightly shows, competitive battles, and full-time performance careers.
Asked for notes on the competition, Soda answered in character: “They ain’t saggin’ enough! NEXT!!”
Entries close October 31. Submissions and voting remain open at https://my.blupro.live/lookalike/.
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About blu shift creative
blu shift creative is a talent agency for live streamers, founded in 2022 by Ben Baldwin and Tara Stevens. An official TikTok LIVE partner since its first year of operation, the agency represents and develops creators working in live formats, with a focus on performance craft, audience practice, and professional standards. blu shift received the top agency award at TikTok LIVE Fest US in 2025. The agency publishes a weekly podcast, The Guide to LIVE. Learn more: https://www.blushiftcreative.com/
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About Sue Dillon
Sue Dillon is a character created and performed by comedian Sarah Soda, broadcasting on TikTok LIVE four nights a week to an audience of more than 1.3 million followers. Private calls can be booked at https://suedillon.com/
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Daniel de Castellane
de Castellane Creative
Visit us on social media:
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Why it matters: Lookalike contests have long marked the tipping point when a cultural figure passes from creator to community — and for a character built entirely inside a live-streaming format, this contest signals that TikTok LIVE personalities can now command the same fan-driven cultural rituals as mainstream celebrities. The fact that a fictional gas station clerk with 1.3 million followers is being honored this way suggests the live-streaming economy is producing characters with genuine, lasting cultural weight.
