Monday, September 16, 2013

Trick or Treat ... great balloon design ideas and more for Halloween!


Sue Bowler CBA
Funny Face Taper Jack
by Sue Bowler CBA
As a child I remember Halloween as a time when we played fun games like 'dooking' for apples or apple bobbing which is probably a more familiar term for most, but that was more than a few years ago...

Halloween I am excited to say is still on an upward trend, with overall sales in the balloon and party sector increasing year on year! 

So what will you be doing to make this a successful Halloween for you?

(See below for the design recipe to create Funny Face Taper Jack on the left).

Monday, September 9, 2013

From professional tennis player to professional balloon artist.... Fiona Fisher 's incredible journey!

very best balloon blog
Fiona Fisher CBA



Well known for her amazing balloon sculptures Fiona Fisher's balloon career has grown from strength to strength since she first discovered balloons in 1999!
Fiona has very kindly shared her 'balloon adventure' with the Very Best Balloon Blog...





I have had a very varied working life over the past 36 years:  professional tennis player, antique furniture restorer and cabinet maker, cafe owner and finally, a balloon artist. 

Tuesday, September 3, 2013

Thinking of competing at the World Balloon Convention 2014, here are some great reason why you should!

Registration for the World Balloon Convention has now opened, so if your thinking of going to WBC then why not enter a competition too!
"To all of you who have doubts about whether or not to participate in the competitions , I say try , no matter be good or not , the important thing is to try and never stop to learn and always improve" . - Alessandro Patanè CBA
I can remember the very first competitions that I entered, it was at the Qualatex - European Balloon Symposium in Paris in 1996! I entered everything that I could, large sculpture, delivery arrangement and table centrepiece, what a huge learning curve and the start of what I can only really describe as a passion for entering competitions! 

So what motivated me? 


Monday, August 26, 2013

Helium - A little bit of what you need to know as a balloon professional Part 2.

In Part 1 of this 2 part blog we looked at helium, and a little bit of what you need to know as a balloon professional, plus a brief introduction into costing.
However, for those of you who want to really understand how to calculate your helium costs for all balloon sizes then please read on, I hope that I have managed to explain this well?

Helium cylinders vary depending on it's size and the pressure (bar or PSI) that it is filled to, so knowing what you use is very important, without this information you wont be able to calculate your costs.

The world is divided by metric and imperial calculations, which has made this blog a little more complicated to write, so I have decided to show both, starting with metric, please scroll down for the imperial calculations.

Tuesday, August 20, 2013

Helium and a little of what you need to know as a balloon professional Part 1


I wonder how many people who read this blog are unsure how much it costs to fill a balloon with helium?

When I first started working with balloons, I had absolutely no idea how to work out the cost of helium, along with a lack of job costing my work, everything that I ever sold was complete guess work, and very bad guesswork at that!I was asked recently if I could help someone to work out how much helium each balloon uses and how to cost it when using the job cost form, so I thought that this would be a useful blog for others too!Before we start talking about costs and prices, lets just take a few moments to review helium and a few points of safety.

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

How much should I charge for that... how to price your work!


"How much would you charge", is a question that I hear and see often, posted on Facebook and other social media sites, or asked when showing a design in a class.

Being creative is fun, but working out how much to sell our work for is not quite so exciting! 


Sue Bowler
Candy Swirl Arch created by Sue Bowler CBA


I suppose it’s like anything, if it’s something that is readily available at a variety of outlets, such as carton of milk or a helium filled 18” foil balloon on a weight, then it will have a ‘market’ price, however if it’s a one off balloon sculpture, event decor or even an elaborate arrangement then pricing is not so straight forward.

Monday, August 5, 2013

17th JBAN 2013

JBAN - Japan's Balloon Artist Network with Emily's Balloons presents it's 17th Convention in Tokyo, Japan!

This is the second time that I have been invited to teach at JBAN and on each occasion I have found it to be a truly magical experience.


This years JBAN theme was 'CARNIVAL', a truly great theme used as inspiration for some of the competitions and of course the final night party!

There were 5 competitions including Large Sculpture -no theme, Photo Spot (a place to take photographs) - Carnival theme, Helium Bouquet - no theme, Hat - Carnival theme and a Twister Live... twisters showing off their skills to an audience.