Well, I think that design contests are not fair, because they have only one winner, who gets payment for the job... Others spend their time and resources and get no benefit at all...
And I think designers know this fact very well. And maybe because of that many of them (if not all) are not so industrious while working on the contest project...
And this will influence the quality for sure...
I think it's better to hire one designer and be as picky with him as possible until you get what you want - that's because you pay him the money.
We had some picky clients and it was really hard to work with them. But the key to success here is patience. They were satisfied by the way and now they are our returning customers.
