The Client for this project is Thams University. Thams University is a private four-year university established in 1826. Thams University has always prided itself on its high standard in education and sports and in both regards the school holds high expectations for its students. The total enrollment is 12,345 students, and the average GPA is 3.6, with a 23% acceptance rate, and a 98% graduation rate. Student life at Thams University is lively and exciting. Students around campus carry a large amount of school spirit and love to show pride. Average class sizes are 16-23 students per class allowing for a student-professor relationship. The University offers around 50 majors and minors, 20 D1 intercollegiate sports, and over 85 clubs to students on campus. The school is going through a rebranding and wants to update the current mascot and apparel while still appealing to their student, facility, and staff. The project for Thams University is to create a new mascot for the school and create a spring catalog to display the new merchandise and mascot to the student body, faculty, and staff. 

The overall goal of this project is to effectively redesign a mascot that appropriately represents the imagery, values, and community of Thams University and to then design a school spring catalog that displays merchandise and information about the school’s rebranding. Their overall business objective is to increase student engagement, and enrollment numbers, and of course increase income. To achieve these goals the mascot design will stimulate pride and encourage students with its imagery of a stern and fierce Echidna. The catalog design will successfully inform the reader about the happenings of the university and display merchandise while keeping the reader enticed. 

The target audience for this project consists of a large population of people, ranging from students, newly admitted students, prospective students, professors, staff, alum, student families, and many more. All of these people range from ages 18 to 60, and have varying economic statuses, however, they are all connected to Thams University which means they likely hold similar values to one another. Similar to the university, the target audience values the importance of education, scholarship, and community involvement. 

Thams University’s brand attributes can be listed as scholarly, prideful, thoughtful, prestigious, and committed. The overall concept for this project was to effectively display university merch to instill school pride to the reader while keeping the aesthetic and integrity of the school’s mission and newly redesigned mascot. The catalog was designed with the audience in mind. The main reader would range from current students, prospective students, newly admitted students, families of any type of student, alum, professors, and staff. Because of this wide range of target audiences, each page is tailored to a different one. The Typeface used for the Headlines and subheadings is the same used in the mascot design to keep the design consistent. The typeface is reminiscent of big, bold college lettering. As for the body copy, an easy-to-read sans serif typeface was used. The color used throughout the catalog are the university colors, blue and cream to match the mascot. Blue and white were picked because this university is an older school that prides itself on education so the classic, yet clean combination of blue and cream were utilized. Thams University is a smaller school that exemplifies education, scholarship, and athletics. The goal of the images and mascot design was to bring forth the school’s pride and values. The goal of the composition is to make it easy for the reader to see the products and read the copy clearly but the design was interesting enough to make the reader want to flip through the pages.