KROC Mascot
Client: The Salvation Army - Ray & Joan Kroc Community Centers
Project: Character/mascot development

A couple of years back, the guys over at Wiggity Bang Games gave Matt a call with a wonderful opportunity. "Would you like to create a mascot for the Salvation Army" they asked. Matt figured why the heck not.

After hours of concepting, the client agreed on a certain style then Matt had to create model sheets and spot illustrations for print and web materials. The bobblehead came after and was a pleasant surprise.

Here is a little information on the centers:
In 1998, Mrs. Joan Kroc, widow of McDonald's founder Ray Kroc, donated $90 million to The Salvation Army to build a comprehensive community center in San Diego, California. Her wish was to create a center, supported in part by the community, where children and families would be exposed to different people, activities and arts that would otherwise be beyond their reach. Completed in 2001, the center sits on 12 acres and offers an ice arena, gymnasium, three pools, rock climbing walls, a performing arts theatre, an internet-based library, computer lab, and a school of visual and performing arts.

When Mrs. Kroc died in October 2003, she left $1.5 billion much of her estate - to The Salvation Army, by far the largest charitable gift ever given to the Army, and the largest single gift given to any charity at one time. The initial disbursements of this bequest began in January 2005. The gift had by then grown to $1.8 billion and was split evenly among the four Army Territories - Central, East, South and West. The money was designated to build a series of state-of-the-art Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Centers nationwide patterned after the San Diego center.

To date, out of the 31 originally proposed sites, four Kroc centers have been built, and 21 more centers are likely to be built, based on the most recent information.