Wisconsin's most successful Kickstarter campaign of all time is a 4-inch tall naked Donald Trump troll doll, equipped with a long blond combover and cellphone in hand.
The doll, titled "The Official World's Greatest Troll," launched on Kickstarter just over one year ago and quickly went viral, getting write-ups from outlets like the New York Daily News, Mashable and US Weekly. In all, the Kickstarter campaign raised more than $430,000, making it the most-funded campaign out of more than 3,700 projects that have been created in Wisconsin.
The man behind the humorous, or repulsive---depending on your feelings about the president---doll is Wausau resident Chuck Williams. Williams, a former senior staff sculptor for the Walt Disney Company and a professional sculptor for more than 30 years, said he started crafting the character immediately following the 2016 election to "blow off some steam" following Trump's surprise victory.
"After posting images on Facebook and getting a very positive response, my wife suggested I create the Kickstarter drive to fund the manufacture of the vinyl figures," Williams said in an email interview. "Without my wife Lynne, I would have just made a handful of resin copies in my studio instead of the thousands of factory made vinyls shipped around the world."
The doll had more than 9,400 backers during its Kickstarter campaign, and Williams continues to sell it on his own website.
Williams said there have been a few critics of the design, but for the most part the project's been a hit. The image of the Trump troll was even Anthony Bourdain's Twitter avatar for a few days, Williams said.
The biggest hiccup for Williams came less than a week before the end of the crowdfunding campaign, when NBC/Universal contacted Kickstarter and claimed they owned the rights to the "Troll" design. Kickstarter paused the campaign for about a month, but ultimately sided with Williams and allowed the project to continue. Williams said he's successfully sent out 95% of the Kickstarter orders.
Now, Williams is back with a new Trump-themed Kickstarter, but this time focusing on another figure that's regularly sharing headlines with the U.S. president: Vladimir Putin.
The project, called "The Official World's Greatest Troll; Russian Edition," features a shirtless man with a Make America Great Again hat, along with a beard and sunglasses---which can be removed as a disguise revealing Putin.
The most-recent Kickstarter campaign has raised more than $32,000 of a $50,000 goal with just over two weeks to go.
Williams is hoping the "Russian Edition" will capture some of the magic the original Trump doll saw.
"Political memorabilia and vinyl collectors know what having both pieces mean to a collection down the road," he said. "It is certainly more concept driven than the first piece but I feel strongly that it is just as important to the story of the Trump presidency as Trump himself."
