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Like many people, Glen Zelinsky’s hobby is photography. But her photos have been seen by a wider audience than her family and friends.
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Since 2007, Zelinsky has submitted approximately 200 photos to Jones Soda for its unique labels that use submitted artwork for their soda bottles. Six of these photos were chosen to adorn the labels, the most recent in the spring of 2020 as part of a series to help the company celebrate its 25th anniversary in 2021.
An avid Jones Soda fan since around 1999 and aware that all photos on their labels are fan-submitted, Zelinsky admits it took about four years and many tries to get his first photo accepted.
“I had a few funny photos and decided to send them over and try to put a photo on a label to see if they liked it or not,” said Zelinsky, 42, who works in purchasing. and media finance. in Winnipeg and lives in Niverville. “It wasn’t really that easy. It’s not that they chose my first from the start. I sent quite a few.
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It took until around 2011 for her first to be accepted, a photo of her then six-month-old son posed next to a suitcase.
“He was on top (of the suitcase) and he was just crying and I guess they thought it was funny,” he said. “So this one did.”
To date, Jones Soda estimates that Zelinsky’s artwork has been featured on approximately 300,000 of their bottles.
Each time there is a new one, it causes a somewhat unusual family hunting trip.
“The first ones, especially the one with my son and another one with my daughter, when we found out we were successful, we went hunting,” he said. “Any place we find Jones Soda, we’ll look at them and pick them up when we find them.”

His latest contribution to the art of etiquette is a photo of a collection of signs along a rural Manitoba road near where his mother lives, reading No Exit, Private Property, Private Drive and No Trespassing.
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“I thought that was a bit of a stretch, so I thought it was kind of funny that they needed so many signs,” said Zelinsky, who was unable to track down the last bottle.
He actually appeared on two bottles of Jones Soda after the company mistakenly credited him – each label includes the photographer’s name and location – as being from Niverville, NY, instead of Niverville, Man.
The collection of signs was something he had gone through many times until one day something finally clicked.
“I had seen these signs before and hadn’t really thought about them. But one day I said “I stop and take the picture and send it”. ”
gdawkins@postmedia.com
Twitter: @SunGlenDawkins