Big Mascots & Big Costumes

Avant Garb

School Mascots – Your Students Will Love Them

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Say you’re looking at a couple of schools. Both are terrific schools. At one school, the mascot shows up to greet the potential students. You take a selfie with the mascot and go to the bookstore to pick up a plush of the mascot. You’re already invested in the school culture.

Or you’re at a sporting event and turn to the person next to you and say “Holy cow! I love that mascot!” and that comment leads to a new romance or a lifelong friendship.

Both scenarios are monster events. Something BIG happened because a mascot was present.

As a college, university or high school, when you add a mascot to your program, you get more than a mascot to show up for your school’s sports programs, you also get a representative at events that matter in your community like parades, charitable runs and festivals. You can probably name a dozen of local events where your mascot’s presence would enhance your brand. Your mascot will interact with students, their families and create media opportunities.

How do I choose a school mascot?

You might already have made the decision to get a custom mascot for your school, and now you wonder where to go from here. We will guide you. we will be with you from the teensiet germ of and idea until the completion of a wonderful mascot that will walk with you, in front of you and tickle your fancy

Avant Garb can help guide you through the process. Starting from just the school name, logo or team name, or maybe you already have a sketch of what you would want your mascot to look like.
Send us your ideas, and we’ll work with you to create a professional mascot design and bring the mascot design to life as a full-sized mascot.

©Jennifer Smith 2023

National Mascot Association

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nmalogo3

There are a lot of mascots running around, but there’s no central spot where mascot people can check in and come together…

….That is, until now! INTRODUCING

THE NATIONAL MASCOT ASSOCIATION

At AvantGarb, we are big fans of everything mascot. All mascots bring joy and curiosity whether they are totally fabulous, or a teensy bit ragged from age. Mascots create community for all who are near them.

As mascot makers, we like to connect with all of the people in mascotdom:

  • other mascot makers
  • mascot performers
  • designers
  • trainers – yes, really -get some training for your mascot!
  • the marketing people who have incredible ideas for characters.
  • The suppliers of the mascot stuff,
  • the people who dye the fabric,
  • the sewing machine guys,
  • the fabric & fuzz suppliers,
  • the foam suppliers
  • …and everyone who fills orders at McMaster-Carr.
  • the people who know where to get the props, Gameops.com, comes to mind,
  • the video people who catch the amazing mascot moments,
  • ….and the mascot fans.
Fuzzier Together – Safer Together.

Mascots are fun, but there are serious issues that need to be addressed within the mascot world. The most important issue is safety. The NMA is compiling  Mascot Safety Guidelines and Best Practices – for the performers, handlers, organizations, makers and planners.

JazzyJagKissCharging Ahead!

I hope you join as we bring the Association into being.

In 2018, we will gather, meet, chat, decide some stuff and put on little mascot shows.

…..and, well, it is a mascot organization…so there will be fuzz, foam and hilarity.

Everything changes when a mascot shows up because, when a mascot shows up, you know you’re going to have fun. Welcome to the National Mascot Association!

©Jennifer Smith 2017

 

Bringing BetXi Bear to Life – The Alpha Xi Delta mascot

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Bringing BetXi Bear to Life – The Alpha Xi Delta mascot

According the Alpha Xi Delta, AvantGarb is the”Glam Squad” for BetXi Bear. Her belt matches her shoes. of course! – and her shoes are yellow, patent-leather BetXi is ready for any occasion. Quote button

Lauren Fisher, wrote an article about making BetXi Bear, Bringing BetXi to Life – in Quill, the sorority’s quarterly publication.

Details, details, details

Getting the details right is what AvantGarb does best.

Making BetXi’s dress

We matched the fabric to theAlpha Xi Delta’s colors.

There is no fabric that is durable enough and has polka dots big enough for a socially active mascot like BetXi.

The artisans at AvantGarb cut out polka dots and stitched them onto blue fabric. We added light blueBetXi - Dress in process trim to the bottom of the dress and made that giant bow!

BetXi’s first appearance was at the Autism Speaks Walk in Indianapolis. BetXi travels from campus to campus promoting Alpha Xi Delta and their good works.

BetXi is classy, stylish and she has a big, big heart.Quote button

Alpha Xi Delta’s BetXi Bear

Small Business makes Big Mascots – UPS blog

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We ship big mascots and we use UPS a lot. We use UPS so much, as a matter of fact AvantGarb made it into the UPS blog – Small Business makes Big Mascots. With big, custom mascots, good, reliable shipping is crucial. The mascot has to be at the game or at the product promotion or at the play-offs or cheering the runners at a marathon. We play a very tight game with logistics.

I have faith in our shipping sources. So, when UPS called, I answered. I am, after all, a wee bit of a shipping nerd or possibly a shipping obsessive.

Being featured in the UPS blog is an example of the power of accidental marketing. This is how it happened.

I tweeted @UPS to complain about a minor billing issue – the UPS people took the complaint seriously & they made my billing smoother – 1 bill a month rather than many. I tweeted something nice about shipping & UPS’s PR people gave us a call.

UPS is a classy company. Not only do they get mascots where they need to be when they need to be there, they respond calmly and efficiently to a complaint.

Turns out we’re mascot mavens &  shipping savants here at AvantGarb.

 

JJ Jumper

 

 

Know No Stranger took a field trip to AvantGarb

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The other day, Know No Stranger came to AvantGarb on a field trip. KNS is a collective of artists who put on puppet & shadow puppet performances —-well—-they also break dance and tell stories and the josh w/the audience a bit and they are totally sweet and totally cool and they are very in love with lo-tech – like overhead projectors.

…so KNS came to AvantGarb. They wanted to talk about different kinds of foams and adhesives. These are things I find endlessly fascinating. So we talked foam adhesives and where to buy fur.

A couple of days later, I got in touch with KNS because we needed some hands at AvantGarb to finish a mascot, Matt & Mike came by to help us.

Turns out they took some pix and wrote a blog. Here’s what they thought – KNS at AvantGarb.

We had a blast!