The Mascots of The Events Calendar

Have you ever noticed the friendly creatures that accompany each feature release? They range from narwhals to pandas, and although they may seem random, most are not.

If you’ve ever wondered about the meaning behind the collection of mascots we have today, you’re in luck. We’re going to tell you how it all began.

It All Started with a Narwhal

Back in May of 2015, Matt, our (then) Back-end Engineering Manager, now Head of Engineering, joined our remote team. It just so happened that he and our Director of Product, Zach, lived in the same town.

They decided to make the most of it and rent a small office space so they could work together. Matt created a sign for the front door, featuring a narwhal (and The Events Calendar, of course).

It should come as no surprise that our team adored this lovable narwhal. Soon after his introduction, we were featuring him on t-shirts and other swag.

Around the same time, version 3.10 of The Events Calendar was about to release, and we wanted to include our beloved narwhal in the announcement. When version 3.11 was ready to roll out, it was clear to everyone that we had no intentions of going back to our old, critter-less feature releases. A new tradition was born!

Introducing: The Mascots of The Events Calendar!

As this new tradition was forming, Matt randomly drew whichever animal he wanted—often an animal he’d never had the chance to draw before.

The Jerboa was the second mascot and was partnered with the 3.11 release of The Events Calendar and its add-ons. After this release went out, the general consensus was that mascots should be a thing going forward.

The Cassowary was the sixth mascot and was partnered with the 4.1 release of The Events Calendar and its add-ons. The Cassowary was chosen because it is an awesome bird and Matt really wanted to draw one.

The Orangutan was chosen because it is Matt B’s favorite animal and he wanted to draw one.

As time went on, however, we started to view our mascots as an opportunity to reflect our team and strengthen our unique culture.

Extensions of Our Culture

It’s no secret that we at The Events Calendar value a rich relationship between work and life. This is evident not only in our Slack’s #watercooler channel—the hub for our team to hang out and chat—but in every Slack channel.

It’s critical, in a remote setting, to allow conversations to ebb and flow naturally from personal to professional if you’re going to feel a connection with the people you work with. Over time, we’ve seen running jokes born, funny stories divulged, strange talents discovered, and real, strong friendships formed.

Instead of keeping our personal connections separate from our work, we choose to integrate the two in an effort to encourage and celebrate the online environment that keeps our workdays fun, and our team bond strong.

The panda mascot was a celebration of someone who was new to the team at the time, Luca. During our team chats, we learned that Luca absolutely hates pandas for being a “lazy and inferior species”. If you’re a panda-lover looking for a good debate, Luca is the man to talk to.

Teasing Luca about his panda hatred has kept us entertained throughout many, many workdays.

Our funny stories with one another aren’t contained in Slack alone. Once, during a video call between George and Zach, George was unceremoniously attacked by a flock of geese as he attempted to walk through the park. Just another average meeting, right?

The goose mascot accompanied the release of Image Widget Plus, in celebration of George’s first major release as a developer.

The ladybug was chosen to represent The Event Calendar’s full REST support feature release in honor of the project’s QA leader, Jeff. We have Jeff to thank for many of our bug fixes.

Once, when discussing bugs, Jeff revealed that when he was young and asked what he’d like to be when he grew up, his reply was always: “a ladybug!” We thought it was too precious not to share.

Symbols of Our Personal Lives

Another thing we experience as a remote team is a unique blend of lifestyles and geographical locations. Sometimes, we choose to celebrate our teammates not with a silly joke but by something really neat they have going on in their lives.

As you may have noticed, The Events Calendar fawn is named Dale. Dale is a representation of a real baby fawn who was found near his mother, who had been hit by a car and rescued by our former team member Brook. Before his return to the wild, Dale often joined in on daily meetings with the Modern Tribe team while he enjoyed his bottle.

Connections Beyond the Internet

Thanks to our strong commitment to team culture, genuine friendships have flourished. Many times, the conversations we have with each other online get carried into the real world as well.

Take for example, our mascot chicken. The chicken was chosen in honor of Stephen, for his first feature releases as a primary developer. Stephen raises chickens in his backyard and will often deliver fresh eggs to Zach and Sara, who live close by with their two boys.

We Build Cool Stuff, Too

Sometimes we just want to show some pride for the cool stuff we’ve built! The giant squid is the first mascot to ever actually represent our plugins or their features. He accompanied the release of our Event Aggregator service, proudly representing the many platforms from which you could pull events into your calendar with his long, suction-cupped tentacles.

Mascots through the years

We’ve shown you some of the early highlights of Matt’s mascot beginnings. So let’s take a look at the rest of the mascots that have made their appearances in our feature releases.

The White Rhino was the 8th mascot and was partnered with the 4.4 release of The Events Calendar and Event Tickets and their add-ons. This was the last mascot that was made with enhanced detail. For future releases, Matt switched to a much more illustrated approach.

The Wild Goat was the 9th mascot and was partnered with the 4.5 release of The Events Calendar and Event Tickets and their add-ons. This release was the first release where plugin version numbers were no longer released in sync.

The Wild Goat was chosen for this release because the release coincided with the Team Retreat where Luca Tumedei regaled the company with stories about killer wild goats that hate the internet.

The Whale Shark was the 11th mascot and was partnered with the June 6, 2017 release. It was chosen for this release because Matt wanted to draw a sea creature again and the Whale Shark is one of Leah Koerper’s favorites.

The Capybara was the 12th mascot and was partnered with the June 21st, 2017 release. The Capybara was chosen because Matt wanted to draw an animal that is near and dear to Gustavo Bordoni’s heart…or at least present in Rio.

The Red Fox was the 13th mascot and was partnered with the August 1st, 2017 release. The Red Fox was chosen because Brian Jessee, the engineer that made the bulk of the work happen for this release, had just moved into a new house and Red Foxes were frequent visitors in his yard.

The Bumblebee was the 16th mascot and was partnered with the March 13th, 2018 release. The Bumblebee was chosen because this release was the Tribe Commerce (PayPal) release. PayPal brings in money. Gold is money. Honey is golden. Fine. It is a stretch. Whatever. IT IS A BEEEEEEEEE!

The Horned Lizard was the 17th mascot and was partnered with the June 4th, 2018 release. The Horned Lizard was chosen because this Eventbrite Tickets launch was a particularly prickly release. We had some struggles with it and we bled a little. Horned lizards shoot blood out of the top of their head as a defense mechanism. And they are prickly.

The Red Winged Blackbird was the 18th mascot and was partnered with the August 22nd, 2018 release. The Red Winged Blackbird was chosen because our Marketing Director at the time had been recently dive-bombed and attacked by a Red Winged Blackbird and she had to dive out of the way. We felt that it was a fitting mascot in the moment!

The Honey Badger was the 19th mascot and was partnered with the November 11th, 2018 release that added support for the Block Editor. The Honey Badger was chosen because, like the official WP Gutenberg timeline, Honey Badgers don’t give a crap about anybody.

The Tardigrade was the 20th mascot and was partnered with the February 5th, 2019 release that reworked our Plugin Bootstrapping process to better harden our plugins against fatals. The Tardigrade was chosen because that little creature is incredibly resilient, and resiliency and durability was the theme of this release.

The Aye Aye was the 21st mascot and was partnered with the August 22nd, 2019 release that rearchitected our Split Payments within Community Tickets to support the PayPal Payouts API.

The Prairie Dog was the 22nd mascot and was partnered with the December 2019 release that added the AR Modal. The Prairie Dog was chosen by the Green Team because both modals and prairie dogs “pop up”.

The Sea Otter was the 23rd mascot and was partnered with the January 2020 Views Redesign release. Matt additionally added a monarch butterfly because it is a solid representation of the metamorphosis that our views have gone through to make this release. The Blue Team was polled on which animal would be appropriate, and the butterfly won by a landslide. Luckily, fitting both animals in this release picture was possible!

The Leafy Sea Dragon was the 24th mascot and was partnered with the June 2020 Virtual Events release. Matt and Luca brainstormed about potential ideas for the mascot for this release, and Luca had a solid suggestion that an animal or bug that masqueraded as another thing would be a nice theme due to Virtual Events doing similarly for in-person events. Originally, Matt was going to do a leaf bug of some sort but then landed on the Leafy Seadragon instead.

The Echidna was the 25th mascot and was partnered with the August 2020 Event Tickets RSVP Revamp release. Why an Echidna? Ultimately, it was a suggestion from Sydney’s son, and the Green Team thought it’d be a neat animal to herald the release.

The Corgi (Tofu) was the 26th mascot and was partnered with the September 2020 Filter Bar 5.0 release. This corgi holds the markings of the beloved dog that lives with Paul Kim, the principal engineer that led the front-end work on the Filter Bar release. Tofu is amazing.

The Magpie was the 27th mascot and was partnered with the November 2020 Event Tickets Plus 5.1.0 release with Individual Attendee Collection (IAC). Since this release was all about collection, it seemed fitting to choose an animal that likes to collect things. So a Magpie was an excellent option!

The Wombat was the 28th mascot and was partnered with the first December 2020 TEC and ECP 5.3.0 release with some newly refreshed widgets and EA Batch Pushing. The wombat was chosen because Matt wanted to draw a wombat and nobody provided an alternative.

The Manatee was the 29th mascot and was partnered with the first feature release of 2021 Event Tickets 5.1.0 and Event Tickets Plus 5.2.0 release. This release brought along the long-requested feature of Manual Attendee entry. The manatee was chosen by vote due to Manual Attendee almost sounding like Manatee.

The Alpaca was the 30th mascot and was partnered with the first Blue feature release of 2021, The Events Calendar 5.4.0, and Events Calendar Pro 5.3.0 release. The alpaca was chosen due to this being the first release of the newly formed Blue team, who have declared that the alpaca is their team mascot.

The Warthog was the 31st mascot and was partnered with the Filter Bar 5.1.1, TEC 5.6.0, and ECP 5.6.0 release. This mascot was chosen by popular vote in an animal poll where all animals started with the letter “W” as this release’s main focus is an update/facelift to our widgets.

The Scottish Highland Cow was the 32nd mascot and was partnered with the Events Calendar Pro 5.7.1, Event Tickets Plus 5.2.6, Filter Bar 5.1.3, and The Events Calendar 5.7.1 release. This mascot was chosen due to Stephen’s recent acquisition of a Scottish Highland Cow for his farm.

The Chameleon was the 33rd mascot and was partnered with the Events Calendar Pro 5.9.0, Event Tickets 5.1.8, Filter Bar 5.2.0, and The Events Calendar 5.9.0 release. This mascot was chosen by vote, where the choices were flashy sorts of animals due to the Customizer and Calendar Manager flashiness.

The Parrot Fish was the 34th mascot and was partnered with The Events Calendar 5.10.0 release that brought a Single Event reskin for events built with the Block Editor. This mascot was actually drawn before the Chameleon mascot because Matt remembered the results of the team’s mascot poll incorrectly. So…this mascot was used for this release, which was also a flashy upgrade.

The Tortoise was the 35th mascot and was partnered with the Event Tickets 5.2.0 and Event Tickets Plus 5.3.0 release that brought about the Tickets Commerce feature. This mascot was drawn on Matt’s new XP-Pen monitor, and he really loved using it! The tortoise was chosen as it is a symbol of wealth and prosperity, which seemed a fitting animal for a release centered around commerce.

The Racoon was the 36th mascot and was partnered with the Events Calendar Pro 5.10.0 and The Events Calendar 5.11.0 release that brought about the scheduled, canceled, and postponed statuses to events, as well as a new Mini Calendar and Events List blocks.

The Pelican was the 37th mascot and was partnered with the Events Calendar Pro 5.11.0 and The Events Calendar 5.12.0 release that brought the subscribe-to-calendar feature.

The Bald Eagle was the 38th mascot and was partnered with the Events Calendar Pro 5.12.0 and The Events Calendar 5.13.0 release that brought more widget functionality in blocks. This mascot was the favorite animal chosen by Eugene, since he was the primary engineer on this release.

The Crested Guan was the 39th mascot and was partnered with Event Tickets 5.3.0 and Event Tickets Plus 5.4.0 release that brought Stripe integration to Tickets Commerce! This mascot was the favorite animal chosen by Ricardo for his first major release as a Green Team member.

The Monk Seal was the 40th mascot and was partnered with Event Tickets (ET) 5.4.0, Event Tickets Plus 5.5.0, and a whole pile of other plugins. This release was all about the new Tickets Menu that really solidified ET as a standalone product.

This mascot was chosen by Matt. He wanted to find a solitary animal to commemorate the standalone nature of ET – the Monk Seal is the animal that piqued his interest the most, so he drew that!

It All Comes Back to Matt

To this day, all our mascots are illustrated by Matt Batchelder. He uses a Wacom Intuos Pro tablet and stylus to draw the animals directly into Photoshop, where he can apply his editing magic. He’s illustrated a children’s book, a number of book covers, and—in his own words —”a whole pile of nerdy art”. At The Events Calendar, illustrating the mascots gives him a nice break from his usual code-heavy work.

We’re grateful to have Matt on our team—and all the quirky mascots he brings with him.

Representing Our Team

These critters represent the whimsy we bring to our work every day, and help us show you a bit of who we are with each new feature release. They offer brief glimpses into the conversations that make us love what we do and the stories and bonds that make us a strong, successful team.

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