In my last two posts I’ve been writing about brand mascots, which are generally cute, cartoon creatures who extol the merits of a business, non-profit enterprise, sports team or public good. Cartoon mascots have existed since marketers first decided to promote their client’s products as distinctive and superior to the generic alternative. Uneeda offered packaged biscuits that successfully displaced the loose crackers sold in an open barrel.

Brand mascots aren’t always barnyard critters. Children have been successfully used since the start of branding. Examples include the Gerber baby, the

Of course adult figures have done their part. Topping the list would have to be Betty Crocker, followed closely by Aunt Jemima, Uncle Ben and for us oldsters, the Clabber Girl. Though when it comes to real life people, the concept of mascot and company spokesman can get blurred as it is with Frank Purdue, Orville Redenbacher, Colonel Sanders and George Zimmer, who I’m sure your remember gives us his word that cheap clothing will make us look cool.

For my money, the most successful mascots have been cartoons, especially those that people have appropriated as personal totems, or symbols. I’m no scholar, so I’ll leave the definitive treatise on the phenomenon to someone else but – the best I can tell – the practice began in WWII when pilots and armored vehicle drivers began personalizing their planes and tanks.

While these “mascots” were frequently airmen’s and tank crews’ wives and sweethearts, quite often they were sexy movie stars whose images were appropriated from pin-up calendars. Betty Grable leaps immediately to mind – in a black and white photo of her in tight one-piece swim suit taken from behind (and what a behind) while she glanced coyly over her shoulder at the camera.

Yet much of the most evocative nose art – for the paintings were almost always on the “nose” of the plane, on the left side under or near the pilot’s side – were cartoon characters that were often straddling bombs or blazing machine guns. Whereas the cutie gals were objects of the pilots or tank driver’s affections*, the cartoon mascots seem more like stand-ins for their bellicose intentions and/or statements of warrior determination, e.g., a promise to kick the enemy’s butt.

*Interestingly, the one female who doesn’t make an appearance on many planes or tanks is Mom. 

Which brings me to my point, (Okay, who said “finally?”) which is the way that people adopt cartoon mascots to express or demonstrate personal qualities or behavior. Since the purpose of a mascot is to create a more personal relationship between and brand and a customer, I think that if someone identifies with your cartoon mascot so much that they’ll wear it on clothing or tattoo on their body that must mean you’ve achieved some sort brand Nirvana.

Again, I’ll leave the scholarship to a curator at some advertising museum, but the cartoon characters that seem to me to be the ones most commonly adopted by folks have very strong characters. I think of the cigar chomping woodpecker for Clay Smith cams, Popeye, Warner Brothers’ Tasmanian devil, and the bee that tormented Donald Duck in so many cartoons. I’m sure there are many others.

What unites these characters is their strong and pugnacious (in most case) personalities. Certainly people love cute, cuddly and adorable mascots, but they don’t tend to etch them on their bodies or paint them on hot rods and boats. I’m intentionally ignoring the

Popeye, on the other hand, was tattooed on countless sailors’ forearms because he always knocks Bluto out and saves Olive Oyl…after downing the requisite can of spinach, no doubt one of the first examples of either product placement or parental didacticism (“Eat your spinach so you’ll grow up big and strong”).

So for everyone who’s been patient with me and read to the end, what can an enterprise take from these musings? Simply this, the best brand mascot will have a distinguishing personality that people can relate to and that expresses their inner desires. Put another way, your brand character must have genuine character.

In my last post I put forth the idea that a brand mascot can be employed by any sort of enterprise: business, non-profit, government agency, faith-based institution, etc., and that brand mascots are the quickest and cheapest way to create an emotional connection between your enterprise and the world at large.

However, as with telling a joke, juggling or running for office, if you don’t take pains to do it well you can end up looking foolish.

Rule one. Don’t copy anyone else’s mascot, especially if the company’s name is Disney. If you do, and they find out – and what’s the purpose of creating a logo if the world isn’t going to find out – their lawyers will send you a curt letter insisting that you desist, which means tossing out all the graphics that you created and starting over.

Rule two.  Don’t have your friend, or sister, or nephew – the ones who drew wacky cartoons on their school book covers and/or sign their letters with a cute little kitty – create your mascot. A cartoon mascot requires the same level of professional execution that you provide in your business. As with any aspect of self-promotion, an amateurish mascot makes its sponsor look like an amateur as well.

Rule three. “Cute” and “appealing” are on only part of why a mascot creates affinity and customer loyalty for a company or brand. To create a effective brand character, take the particular feature or benefit that your customers want most from your business: speedy response, friendly service, thorough attention to detail, resilient determination or large portions, and build the mascot around this quality. For examples of the some mascots represent the qualities I just mentioned, think of Speedy Alka Selzer, Dow Scrubbing Bubbles, Energizer Bunny and Bob’s Big Boy.

Granted, it’s hard to understand how the Aflac duck epitomizes the distinctive qualities of its insurance company sponsor. To me, their initial idea was that the duck’s “quack” somehow mimicked the company’s name – Aff-LACK! None the less, with a huge ad budget they’ve permeated the media ad made the duck a household name. Which leads to…

Rule four. If you don’t have wads of cash to spend forcing your brand mascot into the public consciousness, pay close attention to rules one through three. A brand mascot is supposed to work hard promoting your company, and not the other way around.

Do brand mascots always have to be dogs, cats, birds or farm animals?

No they don’t, though the anthropomorphic qualities of domestic animals make it easy to turn them into appealing characters. However, with care you can turn almost anything into a mascot. Please note the phrase “with care,” because the temptation for first-time and/or budget conscious companies is often to take an object, attach ping pong ball eyes, rubbery arms and legs with three-fingered white gloves and clown shoes, and call it a mascot.

Okay, okay! There are plenty of mascots with rubbery arms and legs, white gloves and clown shoes: the Baskin Robbins spoon, Domino Pizza’s “Noid,” the California Raisins, Mr. Peanut… No, wait. Mr. Peanut had a top hat, monocle and a cane. In any case, they all look like bendy toys to me. Turning an object into a character with an engaging personality takes skill, work, and a bit of inspiration. Fortunately, there are folks who do this for a living, they’re called professional cartoonists. And this brings me to my final rule.

Rule five. If you want a mascot that will work hard to build your brand, establish rapport with customers new and old, and become a valuable business asset…hire an individual or a company that creates brand mascots for a living. They will have a process for developing a character based on your company’s unique feature or benefit, and they have skilled artists who can deliver what you need.