And the winner is...

It's that time of year when the black tie or ballgown comes out and hotels are booked solid with ceremonies celebrating everything from erotic fiction to bingo calling. Here, the award-winning writer Julia Stuart* witnesses the triumphs, tantrums and tears of a typical week on the awards circuit

WEDNESDAY

The Quality Food & Drink Awards, the Dorchester, Park Lane, London, hosted by Checkout magazine

7pm Champagne reception next to the ballroom. The women may well have made millionaires of the nation's sequin manufacturers. While they have done their utmost not to turn up in the same gown as anyone else, the men, in DJs, have made an equally big effort to be dressed identically.

Karen Hornby, a contact developer for Sainsbury's, is like a snorting bull waiting to be let into the ring. "The other retailers should watch out, because we're a force to be reckoned with these days," she says. "The heat is on and may the best retailer win." Its rivals, Marks & Spencer – clearly shamed by their performance last year when Sainsbury's scored a higher tally – has entered 55 products, far more than anyone else. Each carries a £381 entry fee. Feeling lucky, they have taken 14 of the 44 tables, at £140 a head.

Janine Wills, a M&S product developer, is toeing the party line in a black velvet trouser suit from the retailer's Autograph range. She has eight products shortlisted. "I'm a bit tense, if the truth be known. I'm not in an environment in which I find myself particularly comfortable, and also I really, really would like us to win. The temptation to get absolutely slaughtered is almost overwhelming," she says.

Meanwhile, Dominic Edwards, salad buyer for Somerfield, is imagining victory with his baby plum tomatoes in the fresh produce category.

8pm Four-course dinner in the ballroom. Some of the judges are sniffy about the food.

9.45pm The comedian Dominic Holland warms up the contenders with food gags, and picks on Adam Phillips from Ginsters, the pie manufacturer. An anonymous voice, which sounds like the man who unctuously described the prizes on The Price is Right, reads out the shortlist for the first category. Each firm maniacally cheers itself. M&S's caramelised onion & chilli relish is declared the winner. An employee leaps onto the stage at full grin, then stretches the grin even further for the photographer and thrusts the trophy into the air on exit.

10pm Marks & Spencer is wreaking a particularly sweet revenge on Sainsbury's. While the M&S tables display a masterful talent for self-congratulation, the rest of the room looks on glumly. People start booing. Even Janine looks sheepish as she goes to the stage for the fourth time.

10.35pm Untold joy sweeps through the ballroom. Ginsters Original Cornish Pasty has beaten M&S's Scottish haddock, Lockerbie cheddar and spinach mash pie.

Finally, the top award, the Gold Q, goes to M&S for its chicken achari. Janine is up on her feet again. "Fix!" screams a man from the Asda table, which has failed to get on to the scoreboard. The PR for Waitrose, which has also failed to win anything, rests his head on the table.

12midnight Arms start to flail as the disco begins. Dominic, however, is still thinking about tomatoes. "It's judges at the end of the day. It's a small panel of people. The actual winning product was a very similar tomato to mine."

1.30am The disco finishes. The last people to leave the ballroom are a woman in a floor-length black gown carrying her shoes, who is entwined with a bald man who is questioning how a looker like her could be interested in a baldie like him. The woman is so drunk she can barely stand up unaided.

It's the silly season for award ceremonies. Thousands are held in Britain a year, and November is when the big guns come out. A number of top London hotels are hosting up to four a week. Virtually every industry has a gong to strive for, from fish fryers (the Fish and Chip Shop of the Year), to glass packaging manufacturers (the Shine Awards), to hair reporters (the Wella Hair Journalism Awards). "Everyone wants an accolade. Awards are the work version of Pop Idol or Big Brother," says Kamala Panday, co-publisher of Awards World, a quarterly magazine to be launched in March. "They want to be able to get up on a stage and have five minutes of stardom. And they don't want a crummy old stage, they want the Grosvenor or the Royal Albert Hall."

While the rewards for winners are obvious – employees can be headhunted and their salaries doubled, while firms can market their victories loudly – those with the most to gain are doubtlessly the hosts, many of them publishers. Not only are they seen as arbiters of quality, they can pocket a hefty profit. A figure of £250,000 would not be unusual in the financial sector. Many hosts charge several hundred pounds per entry, as well as per seat at the ceremony. And the events are often heavily sponsored.

According to Panday, some firms will spend up to £1m on their awards scheme. Jeremy Lee, the director of a company which provides presenters for about 200 award ceremonies a year, says that companies will happily pay up to £7,500 for a broadcast-news journalist, up to £15,000 for a comedian, and up to £25,000 for "somebody absolutely of the moment".

Many opt for a theme. This year's Mobile News Awards for the mobile phone industry went for a Far Eastern look, complete with a pot of 15 live snakes. For some guests, however, bad behaviour, fuelled by drink and bruised egos, is entertainment enough. "There was a brawl at the British Press Awards in 1999. One of the sponsors got his nose broken," says Amanda Anderson, director of Head to Head Communication, which stages about 60 awards a year, many of them high-profile. "There have been people going down the banisters at Grosvenor House, people asleep under the tables and people having sex on the bar top behind some curtains. Then there was the PR person who decided to relieve themself in Grosvenor House kitchen."

At one regional advertising and design awards ceremony, 11 people vomited, there were five fights, the police were called twice and one person left in an ambulance. "They just went mental," says Tony Murray, editor of Awards World.

THURSDAY

The UK Housing Awards, the Hilton, Park Lane, London, hosted by the Chartered Institute of Housing and Inside Housing magazine

12.15pm Drinks reception in the Grand Ballroom foyer. There is a distinct lack of sequins. The only things shining are bald patches, unpowdered noses and the shoes belonging to Steve Oborne, the assistant head of housing at Canterbury City Council. Steve, who is hoping to leave with the Good Practice in Housing Management and Maintenance award, polished them this morning, just in case.

Mark Cook, here with his colleagues from the East Midlands Tenants Participation Forum, is optimistic about victory. But Mark is preparing himself in case disaster strikes. "It's a bit like going to a cup final. Beforehand, you're getting yourself in the frame of mind thinking: 'We're going to enjoy the event, and the result doesn't matter.' "

1pm Under chandeliers that even the residents of Blackpool might question, a three-course lunch is served to almost 400 people, paying £72 a head.

2.15pm Chris Lowe of BBC News 24 kicks off the proceedings with a joke about tax, which receives a polite "get on with it" chuckle. After all but genuflecting to the sponsor, he reads out the shortlists. Each organisation cheers itself. The winner's name is read from a card ripped from a sealed gold envelope. They leap up, often accompanied by eight other people whose presence Lowe has not called for.

3.30pm The ceremony concludes. Staff start stacking the chairs as soon as people stand up. Tom Manion, chief executive of Irwell Valley Housing Association, the overall winner (of Outstanding Achievement in Social Housing in the UK) compares his victory to Liverpool winning their first European cup, his scoring at his first semi-pro football game and "meeting my Mrs".

3.40pm Gloria Madeley, of Bradford Council, which won the Good Practice in Recruiting and Developing Housing Professionals Award, knows precisely how she is going to spend the rest of the day. "I'm going to get rat-arsed," she says. "I'm elated, it's like pins and needles all over. I'm actually back in the Himalayas on top of the mountains, free as a bird. I've phoned my husband, daughters and granddaughters."

Meanwhile, the team from the East Midlands Tenants Participation Forum bears the same expression worn by David Seaman one unforgettable day last summer. Sue Lowis is stupified. "I'm gutted. I'm very disappointed. I didn't even finish my wine in case I fell asleep and missed them saying 'East Midlands'."

4pm People have moved back into the Grand Ballroom foyer for drinks. Steve Oborne is no doubt quietly congratulating himself for having cleaned his shoes following his win. He has just called his wife. "This is one of the best days of my life," he says.

4.15pm Gloria now has a gin in each hand.

4.50pm The stragglers are asked to leave the Grand Ballroom foyer.

Awards – irritatingly American, vacuous and too many of them to take seriously? Not so, says the Confederation of British Industry. "Industry awards have a vital role to play in motivating individuals, encouraging creativity and highlighting best practice," says a spokesman.

Others, however (and not just the losers), see them as wholly destructive. Alfie Kohn, the author of the book Punished by Rewards: the Trouble with Gold Stars, Incentive Plans, A's, Praise and Other Bribes, says research suggests that everyone ultimately loses in the race to win. "The central message people receive from contests such as these is that everyone is a potential obstacle to one's success. That means that people are far less likely to collaborate, which is a source of genuine excellence. There's quite a lot of research demonstrating that the quality of people's work actually suffers when they focus on trying to triumph over their peers. There is a dubious pleasure to be gained from the feeling that one is superior to one's peers. What tends to happen in the long run is that you come crashing back down to earth and you need more and more such victories to regain that initial sense of triumph."

MONDAY

The British Hairdressing Awards, The Grosvenor House Hotel, Park Lane, London, hosted by Hairdressers Journal International

7pm Guests are sporting hairdos that would get office workers the sack. The women, many wearing black, high-fashion designer outfits, are revealing formidable décolletés and tiny tattoos on naked backs. The men, in narrow-hipped designer suits, have wide ties and wide sideburns.

Each contender has spent thousands of pounds (some up to £75,000 was last year's rumour) on photographs of their work for submission. Little wonder, then, that Richard Ward, hairdresser to Will Young, S Club and the Countess of Wessex, who is dressed in a purple, pin-striped Oswald Boateng suit, cried with joy when he was told he had been shortlisted for British Hairdresser of the Year. He has been practising his smile of defeat for the cameras should the worst come to the worst tonight.

It is the sixth time that Michael Quigley, who has clearly laboured over his "I haven't washed my hair in months" look, has been nominated for Scottish Hairdresser of the Year. "I'll not stop until I win it. You become a local celebrity and your prices can then go up a wee bit. I do feel there's a strong chance that I could get it tonight."

Adee Phelan, who was responsible for David Beckham's World Cup tomahawk has come dressed in a 1954 navy Kenyan police jacket with spoof communist armband. He won Men's Hairdresser of the Year in 2000 and wants it back. "This year, it's in the bag. I'm going to fucking win," he crows.

7.45pm About 1,800 guests totter, swagger and mince through a red tunnel where they are blown with bubbles, and sit down to dinner in the Great Room. Seats, which cost up to £150, were sold out within half an hour. Last year, there were 60 gatecrashers.

9.45pm The comedian Mark Lamarr kicks off the ceremony by stating, with no hint of irony, that "this country doesn't honour hairdressers enough". As the nominations are read out, pictures of the contestants' work flash up on two screens. The winners are gently applauded while their colleagues go potty and sound klaxons. Brett Ryan, named Southern Hairdresser of the Year, is thrown into the air by his boss; he disappears from view for several minutes, before resurfacing and heading to the stage.

The winners receive a silver hallmarked trophy. Lamarr yelps "get him off me" when one appears to be about to hug him. At one stage, Helen Adams, the hairdresser made famous by Big Brother last year, yawns.

10.10pm Dannii Minogue performs two numbers, while young hairdressers charge up to the stage with cameras.

12.05am Richard Ward is engaging his smile of defeat as gold confetti rains down on the table of Beverly Cobella, his rival. Beverly's daughter starts crying. Most of the room stands up to cheer and vigorously applaud the Hairdresser of the Year.

12.10am The disco starts in the ballroom. Michael, still at his table, says that he is handling his disappointment. "I'll get smashed in the bar tonight, go back to Edinburgh, and my preparation will be better next year." Kathryn is gutted. "It's like someone has put a pin in the balloon." Meanwhile, Anita Cox, Colour Technician of the Year, feels "as light as a feather". "It's like a damn good orgasm, but it lasts longer," she says at full grin.

12.45am "I was absolutely cheated," Adee tells me. "I feel like somebody walked up to me and said: 'You've won the lottery', I've gone out and spent £5m and then they've said: 'Sorry, I've got the numbers wrong.'"

1.10am People are dispensing with wine glasses and swigging straight from the bottle. A group of women are slumped in the corner with their shoes off .

1.30am Men and women on the floor near the foyer are performing the rowing movements to "Oops Up Side Your Head", though the song by the Gap Band isn't actually being played.

2am The disco finishes and people sway out. The last few hours will undoubtedly remain a blank for many. The Independent inspects the floor of the kitchen and is relieved to report that it remains unsullied.

*Julia Stuart is a previous winner of an Amnesty International Media Award