Mascots are enormous fun and they are also the one costume with a real safety brief. All three fixes are cheap and none of them is optional.

Heat, and how to manage it

Inside the head it is considerably hotter than the air outside, and the performer is working. Overheating comes on faster than people expect and the performer is the last to notice.

Specify powered ventilation, agree a maximum wear time before the day, and run a rota with breaks somewhere cool and out of sight. Water in a bottle with a straw, ready before the break, not after.

Vision, and where the aperture goes

A performer needs to see the ground about a metre and a half in front of them. Put the aperture at the character’s eye level and they often cannot.

Check the sightline with the actual head on, standing, before signing off a design. It is easy to fix on a drawing and expensive to fix in fur.

The escort

A mascot should never work a crowd alone. Restricted vision, no peripheral view and a large soft silhouette that children run at is a combination that needs a second person.

The escort steers, manages photographs, watches for the performer getting into difficulty and can get the head off quickly if needed. It costs one volunteer.

Storage, which is where costumes actually die

A head stored face-down in a bag over a closed season deforms and a body stored damp grows mould. Both are complete write-offs and both are avoidable.

Store the head upright on a stand, air the body thoroughly before it goes away, and keep it somewhere dry. We supply the stand and the guidance with every costume.