3d character modeling and animations

I need to model and animate a 3d cartoon character. The character is pretty simple but it needs to be really good because its for a local TV commercial.

I work a lot with freelancers to help me on these kind of productions.

I was wandering which program to use. I am a 3d studio max guy but I know that c4d and maya are more used for characters.

reason for asking, sometimes I need to involve extra freelancers and I need to use a program that is used by many animators, in other words, it will be easier to find animators. With 3d Max I have found that there are not a lot of freelance character animators out there.

So keeping this in mind and that the budget is not super, which program would be best to start using.

Thank you for the reply.

You mention: "I would go as far as to say that this is Maya's core business. There's a reason most animation studio's use Maya".

What would be some of the reasons Maya is the industry standard for character animation?

Regards,

Adeeb