What you may not know is that a lot of effort and brain power went into selecting the mascots and naming them. It's a very tedious process-choosing just the right image and name!!!!
So if the process is such a drawn-out, deeply thought-out one...how did we ever come up with "Izzy" for the 1996 Olympics and really, what really is he??
Well, let's start from the beginning...
Izzy is a "Whatizit", a blue creature that lives in the Olympic Torch. (Really, I'm not making this up!) He was originally chosen by an exec on the Altanta Committee for the Olympic Games. He wasn't chosen by the public or selected via market research...he was simply chosen because this exec thought this blue blob was "cool".
Unfortunately for Whatizit and the exec, Whatizit wasn't too well received by the public when he was introduced in 1992 at the closing of the Olympics in Barcelona. So frantically, the ACOG worked on creating a better "Whatizit" and came up with a computer image that was leaner and more athletic looking. To build his popularity, the ACOG decided to allow the children of Atlanta the privilege of choosing Whatizit's proper name.
Initially, the ACOG invited children from all over the world to suggest names for the new and improved Whatizit. More than 3300 suggestions from 16 countries flooded in. Out of the 3300, the ACOG narrowed the list down to 18 and then beat the streets!
The final list was eventually narrowed down to Izzy, Starz, Zack, Gleamer and Kirby. Girls went for Izzy and the guys more often than not chose Kirby. Izzy won due to a technicality over trademarks and that's how he came to be.
So why did the ACOG allow children the privilege of naming the mascot?? Because children are the primary group that buy products related to the Olympics--basketballs, tennis rackets, t-shirts, etc!
Unfortunately Izzy was and still is one of the less popular of all Olympic mascots since they hit the scene in the 1960's. More than likely because he really doesn't represent anything!
However, if you'd like to learn more about Izzy and other Olympic mascots, check out The Izzy Page and Olympic Almanac .
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