Do you know what’s more fun than having a mascot? Having TWO mascots. Many organizations successfully start with one mascot and then extend their mascot family by adding further characters to their roster! Perhaps your mascot needs a wife, husband, kid, grandparent or little cousin? Maybe your company represents a series of products that could all benefit from a brand ambassador of their own? Perhaps your national park has several animals that could be represented in your educational programs? People love mascots, so there’s never any harm in adding to your team of characters!

What are some ways that you can expand your mascot family?

Add a Family Member

Introducing a mascot family member is a great way to endear your customers to your brand and to facilitate some adorable mascot antics. Perhaps your mascot has a cousin from out of town who has decided to show up to support your Little League team? Maybe your character has a little brother who is the brand ambassador of one of your newer products? Be creative!

Add a Female Counterpart

The world of mascots has always been dominated by male characters. Many organizations have had a lot of fun adding a female counterpart to their mascot team. After their fan base responded exceptionally well to their first mascot, Trax, Baseball team Eau Claire Express debuted his wife, Trix.

Adding a female or male counterpart is a great way to provide your current mascot with a mate with whom to share in mascot antics! Even more so, it is a great way to diversify your team and embrace equality through one of your more fun marketing tools!

Add a Buddy

The Toronto Blue Jays introduced “Junior” to their mascot family to be a buddy to their main mascot “Ace”. He frequently appears on “Junior Jays Days” when children are invited to run the bases after the games.  The Jays have a lot of fun with Ace and Junior, often dressing them up in costumes for theme days.

Add a Product Representative

Does your company champion two or more products? Having a mascot to represent each of your major products is not a bad idea at all! Premier Tech, a home and gardening company, purchased a brown bear named Mike and a Polar Bear named Al to represent two different soil brands that they sell! This allowed them to double their mascot presence at conferences and other events, as well as having some fun interplay between their two unique mascot characters!

Add a Relevant Character

Perhaps you run a national park and feel that your single mascot does not sufficiently represent the wildlife that your park encompasses? National Parks of Toledo Area purchased three mascots for their park, Otis the Leaf, Owlberta the Owl and Boggs the Frog. This allows them to represent the amphibians, birds and plant life of their park through loveable characters. It also allows them to ramp up their educational programming with the integration of several characters that can interact with one another to teach children about their park.

Dress up your Mascot for Different Events and Purposes

Many major corporations have several versions of a central character that they use for various different purposes and events. Over the years, Scotiabank has dressed their

“Scoti Dog” mascots up for different events (for example in marathon clothing for races and hockey gear for games). At any given time, they are therefore able to send different themed versions of the character to events where that particular themed version might tie in! This means more brand visibility across the board, as well as the opportunity to match their mascot to whatever type of event he is attending. What inventive thinking!

What are the benefits of adding to your mascot team?

Diversify

Your mascots represent your brand and therefore should represent your consumer base. It is important that your customers can relate to your brand and see that they are represented by your company’s values!

More Mascots = More Brand Visibility

Do you ever run into the problem where you have too many events and not enough mascots? This problem could be easily solved by adding more mascots to your mascot family! In this instance you may want to consider whether duplicating your current character or adding another would be a more viable plan for your organization.

Interplay between your characters

If you think that watching one mascot get up to shenanigans is fun, imagine how much that fun is magnified when you have two mascots interacting with one another for your audience! People love to watch mascots interacting with one another in playful and humorous ways, so why not entertain your audience with double the mascot fun?

We hope that this article has provided some fun insights into growing your mascot family! Remember, people love mascots, so you really can’t go wrong when it comes to adding to your team. When planning to make an addition, feel free to be creative and think about unique ways to use further mascots to engage with your audience. Have a fun idea for adding to your mascot family? Feel free to get in touch with us to discuss further!