Brown-Bagging It? Maybe There’s a Prize for You

When 52 Projects author Jeffrey Yamaguchi went to his day job as an online marketing manager at HarperCollins last week, he resolved to bring his lunch from home as much as possible. That worked out so well he’s going to try to keep the experiment going through the end of September. “I’m bringing my lunch for two reasons,” Yamaguchi explains on his blog, “to save money, and to stop eating the unhealthy foods that I gravitate towards when I run out to grab food during the lunch hour.” He’s also documenting his homemade meals on Flickr…and that’s where the fun kicks in.

Yamaguchi has also created a public “Brought My Lunch” photo pool, and whoever posts the best photo by this Friday, August 31, will receive three creativity-themed books and possibly some lunchtime accessories. “Best” is a relative term, “whether it’s because the food looks so good or it’s just an amazingly creative shot, or both,” so don’t worry if you’re not quite as visually creative as “Alyanah,” who created the vegetable and fruit bowl above. It’s enough to make me wish I was actually going in to an office; that way I could get more use out of my Mr. Bento lunch jar, a gift from my brother which currently only gets deployed on train rides.

Create a social media strategy, launch your campaign, and track the results in our Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting February 16. The online event and workshop will feature speakers including The Onion‘s Baratunde Thurston (left), Facebook’s Morin Oluwole, and bitly’s Tim Devane. Register now.