Design Thinking for Sustainable Mascot Character Design

In the character licensing industry, we identify one use of a character brand in the shape of a mascot. A good design for a mascot in an institution, community, or specific event will increase the mascot and the institute's sense of belonging. In order for the mascot design to match the community's tastes, the appropriate formulation is required during the process of producing this mascot figure. As a result, it is vital to have a strategy that enables achieving this goal to be more manageable, which can be employed in creating different mascot designs. This research intends to build a formula based on design thinking to capture the target market's tastes, through a poll based on design elements and principles, in a case study of making the "We Love Design" event mascot from Bina Nusantara University. The baby Sumatran tiger was selected as the mascot's form because, in addition to carrying the most frequently selected features in the poll, it also embodies the local content of Indonesia to raise the sense of belonging. The fundamental contribution of this study is the innovation of a system that streamlines the process of developing a brand character, which in this case takes the form of a mascot. Two polls with 724 & 1,018 respondents were employed as the approach. The process used to create this mascot character design is expected to be used in other character designs, including mascots and character licenses to make it sustainable.