{"id":23241,"date":"2026-04-17T02:30:49","date_gmt":"2026-04-17T02:30:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mysourcefunding.com\/?p=23241"},"modified":"2026-04-17T02:30:50","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T02:30:50","slug":"how-new-york-city-fc-got-its-pigeon-mascot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mysourcefunding.com\/?p=23241","title":{"rendered":"How New York City FC got its pigeon mascot"},"content":{"rendered":"

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On a Sunday in late March, MLS fans packed into Yankee Stadium\u2014the temporary home of New York City FC\u2014to watch Thiago Martins, Aiden O\u2019Neill, and the rest of the home team take on Inter Miami FC and Leo Messi.<\/p>\n

Before the players took the pitch, though, all eyes were on the giant pigeon dancing in a pair of Timberland-esque boots at center field.<\/p>\n

Sky Scraper, or Sky for short, is NYCFC\u2019s pigeon mascot. The pigeon was officially introduced as the face of the club earlier this year, but it\u2019s been circling NYCFC in an unofficial capacity essentially since the team started playing in 2015, according to VP of Marketing Lauren Scrima.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s very perfect for New York,\u201d Scrima said. \u201cThere was always some light discussion about, \u2018Should we have a mascot?\u2019 We\u2019ve obviously seen what it can do for other teams, and now that we are so close to opening our own stadium and having passed that 10-year anniversary threshold, it felt like the right time to really seriously look at this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Any New Yorker knows that pigeons are polarizing animals, and while Scrima expected Sky to have some critics, after spending most of last year bringing the bird to life, she and her team have sky-high hopes of using the new mascot to drive fandom and revenue.<\/p>\n

Birds of a feather<\/h2>\n

Making Sky the official mascot of NYCFC was an involved process, Scrima told us. The concept originally started years ago with a fan who regularly wore a pigeon mask to games\u2014he\u2019s in touch with the team and still dons the mask, she added.<\/p>\n

Once NYCFC execs agreed they wanted an official mascot, there was still some disagreement over the animal, Scrima said. Ultimately, a fan survey asking people to write in what they thought the team\u2019s mascot should be proved evidence enough that a pigeon was the right choice, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe got a lot of really interesting examples, like bodega cats, and rats, and slices of pizza, and apples,\u201d Scrima said. \u201cThe list goes on and on, but pigeon was far and away the most popular, and, I think, the most obvious choice.\u201d<\/p>\n

To help bring Sky to life, the NYCFC team worked with Raymond Entertainment, a mascot consultancy founded by David Raymond, the \u201cfirst inhabiter\u201d of the Phillie Phanatic. They brought in a 2D artist to design creative options for the look of the mascot, had fans weigh in again, and then commissioned a local mascot and costume designer, Randy Carfagno, to make a suit of Sky. That part of the process involved sorting through fur swatches, eyeballs, and heads, Scrima said.<\/p>\n

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As for the name, fans and club employees got to give their two cents, and versions of \u201cSky Scraper\u201d came up repeatedly, Scrima said. It\u2019s a bit on the beak\u2014beyond the reference to the urban buildings, sky blue is the primary color of NYCFC\u2014but also a bit deep, with ties to the team\u2019s 10th anniversary Excelsior kit, which was photographed at the Edge, a sky deck located in Hudson Yards.<\/p>\n

The kit \u201cwas all about our ambitions as a team, always looking upward and onward,\u201d Scrima said. \u201cWe did a lot of photography on skyscrapers and with players looking out into the sky\u2026That\u2019s a symbolism that we\u2019ve used at the club for a little while, and now we have a mascot that embodies that idea that we\u2019re always building to something bigger.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boots to fill<\/h2>\n

The team\u2019s main objective in making Sky the official mascot was to foster fandom, Scrima said, especially among kids and families. A lot of that work happens on match days, but it also happens \u201cout in the world,\u201d she said, as demonstrated by mascots like the New York Liberty\u2019s Ellie the Elephant.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe looked a lot at that case study, and the ambition is to get even a little bit close to that in terms of the niche that Ellie the Elephant has been able to occupy,\u201d Scrima said, adding that after about two months in the world, the engagement rate for content featuring Sky was almost double the club\u2019s average. \u201cClearly, the content is resonating,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The \u201cEllie playbook,\u201d as Scrima called it, is also a masterclass in using a mascot to drive revenue, particularly through brand partnerships. It\u2019s something the NYCFC team is already working on: Sky\u2019s footwear, for instance, is one of the \u201cavailable categories\u201d for partnership, Scrima said. Sky\u2019s boots are modeled after Timbs, the work boots popular in New York streetwear culture, but the relationship isn\u2019t official\u2014yet.<\/p>\n

Between engagement and revenue goals, Sky has a lot to accomplish for a teenage pigeon from the Bronx. But the bird\u2014and the team\u2014are sure to get an assist this summer thanks to the World Cup, which presents a major opportunity that NYCFC is looking to capitalize on.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are the home team in the city where the final will be played,\u201d Scrima said. \u201cWhat can we do to harness the fandom that exists for the World Cup and hopefully direct it toward our team?\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Read the full article here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On a Sunday in late March, MLS fans packed into Yankee Stadium\u2014the temporary home of New York City FC\u2014to watch Thiago Martins, Aiden O\u2019Neill, and the rest of the home team take on Inter Miami FC and Leo Messi. Before the players took the pitch, though, all eyes were on the giant pigeon dancing in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23242,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[78],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-23241","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-marketing"},"yoast_head":"\nHow New York City FC got its pigeon mascot | Brandiary<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"On a Sunday in late March, MLS fans packed into Yankee Stadium\u2014the temporary home of New York City FC\u2014to watch Thiago Martins, Aiden O\u2019Neill, and the rest\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/mysourcefunding.com\/?p=23241\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" 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