Issue 1 No. 1 July 2000 *Balloon Sculpting Corner *Secrets of (Pricing) *Classy Wrap Corner *Interview of Month (The Road To Becoming A CBA)	How To Do Large Balloon Sculptures beyond its present stage of progress and in order to be able to achieve limitless design possibilities, you must be able to bring in other disciplines in cooperation with your projects. You must employ engineers, architectural draftsmen, sculptors, even stage and set designers using balloons as the primary mode of expression. How Many Balloons Even though you have on hand an engineer as a consultant, you still need to know approximately how many balloons are needed to construct this mall-size teddy bear, what size of balloons are needed and what colors of balloons you are to use. Here is your list: 9" Balloons to cover this size of structure. Professional grade balloons such as Qualatex® or TufTex®. 5000 Pink balloons estimated to cover the entire body. Hot Rose to cover soles of feet and inside of ears. The eyes are 2 black 9" balloons and Giant Balloon Sculptures are primarily an engineering problem. World-class balloon artist Shirley Mulrooney of Edmonton, Alberta designed and constructed a breath-taking 24 foot pink teddy bear for the Edmonton's Eaton Centre Mall in 1991. Since this amazing sculpture was spotted, over the years I have been asked many times how large sculpture such as these are constructed priced and promoted. Though we are unable to know the exact internal structural blueprint employed by Ms. Mulrooney, our engineers and designers on staff have come up with a possible way that a sculpture similar to the one Ms. Mulrooney created could be constructed. One must realize, especially the novice, that doing this 24 -foot bear is not a balloon problem but primarily an engineering problem. The average balloon decorator with solely a balloonist background would be traumatized to attempt such a project. In order for the balloon industry to grow 24 teddy bear took about 300 man hours to do. This is equivalent to 38 full eight-hour days or approximately 5 weeks of arduous labor.With 4 workers paid at, say, $6.00 per hour each, this would be equivalent to ($24 per hour) paid x 300 hours - a payroll of $7200! 5000 nine-inch balloons = 35 gross x $11 = $385. Your total cost = $7835. You'd charge $15,670. How To Market It $15,670. "Holy helium, Batman!" "How on earth am I ever going to sell anything for $15,670?" you may think. Well, the secret is that you need not always sell a large sculpture directly to a mall to make lots and lots of money. The secret is: Barter doing your balloon sculpture in exchange for free retail space during high volume periods like the week of Valentine's Day or Christmas. Obtain volunteers to work, reducing costs to $635. Contact local TV, radio and send out news releases! Best wishes. THE INTERNAL FRAMING of this 24 foot balloon teddy bear the nose utilize six 9" latex metallic silver balloons. How To Construct It With a knowledgeable and skillful mechanical engineer on hand, you can proceed with the following outline: Step 1. Translate measurements proportionally from a toy teddy bear to the actual sculpture size you desire. Step 2. Construct round conduit body rings and spaced bars and stand it up right. (Internal bracing is required in high stress areas such as leg, arm and neck joints.) Step 3. Construct tubular legs and arms with conduit rings and spaced bars. (Attach temporarily to main body.) Step 4. Construct spherical head and bulging nose at floor level, then temporarily attach it to top of body. Step 5. Test the structural stability of the assembled components and integrity of limb connections. Step 6. Dismantle components and cover each with gardening netting obtainable from any hardware store or major wholesale balloon distributor. Step 7. Pull netting tight over each frame and attach them with electrical straps (2 diagonal straps per joint.) Step 8. Attach a solid wall of balloons to all components using two correctly sized air inflated 9" balloons inserted onto a paper clip as the main unit utilizing about 2500 units such as this one to cover the body and parts of this sculpture. (Leave spaces near the limb and neck joints at this stage.) Step 9. Attach the completed structure to the floor. Final Touches: Tall ladders are necessary to finish off with the final touches. The bear could be laid on its back, side and front with balloons being progressively attached at the floor level. The estimated total weight will be 50 lbs. How Much To Charge How much to charge is based on the factors of the cost of your supplies, the cost of your labor and how much the client is willing and able to pay. The general rule of thumb is to charge 2 to 3 times the costs of whatever it takes for you to build it. It is estimated that this (Back to top.) | Balloon Sculpting | | Secrets of Pricing| | Classy Wrap Corner | | Interview of the Month | | Click Here to Go to Home Page | Copyright © 2000 Charles Prosper All Rights Reserved cprosper@prosperballoons.com