Inside the party industry’s latest trend: Bold and beautiful balloons
3 min read
WEST MICHIGAN — When you image balloons, you could photograph colorful bunches from Party City, floating in opposition to the ceiling through a child’s birthday social gathering.
But for Norton Shores resident Lisa Higgins, balloons suggest a thing else fully.
“Persons don’t notice balloons can really look seriously classy and tasteful,” Higgins, operator of West Michigan Balloons, told The Sentinel. “I began my enterprise in Texas about two many years prior to moving to Michigan in 2018.”
Back again in Texas, Higgins experienced competition. But when she sold her business enterprise down south and begun fresh in West Michigan, she identified the condition lacked infrastructure for balloon decorators.
“Folks didn’t really know what it was,” Higgins explained. “They just knew Get together Town helium balloons. It was really hard to get going. But I genuinely bought fast paced in 2019, just before COVID occurred in 2020. Every thing altered then, due to the fact anything was canceled.”
Higgins coped by offering dwelling deliveries, sometimes with balloon buffets.
“Men and women have been seeking for unique ways to exhibit they cared, even when they couldn’t depart their dwelling,” she mentioned. “These days, I do a lot of corporate and business enterprise events, but I also do little one showers and bridal showers and weddings.”
Higgins has three kids on her precedence listing, but still manages to deal with 10-12 orders per week. She recently transformed the identify of her small business from Lakeshore Balloons, just after increasing her service place to 150 miles.
“I was receiving so lots of phone calls from Grand Rapids,” she said. “I have quadrupled my business enterprise each and every calendar year that I have been listed here, even with COVID.”
What, exactly, is balloon decor?
“It falls into two categories,” Higgins said. “Classic, like archways, and organic, which is seriously stylish right now. Organic and natural implies placing balloons alongside one another in various means — you will find loads of dimensions and colors. When folks question for balloon artwork, that’s mainly what they mean.”
Whether or not she’s generating common archways or columns, creating bigger-than-lifestyle ice cream cones or gumball machines, or highlighting marriage proposals, Higgins thinks balloons can be used to increase atmosphere and pleasure — no subject how prolonged it takes to piece jointly.
“Two columns may possibly get 10 minutes,” she reported. “But when I make an elaborate natural balloon wall or garland, it can take 3 several hours. For a significant function, it may possibly take five to eight several hours of setup, and that will not consist of inflating the balloons.”
But balloon decorators never generally use helium, and Higgins never ever provides balloons for send-offs.
“I would say 80 to 90 per cent of what I develop is air-crammed,” she claimed. “From time to time for birthdays, that’ll be helium, but performing so considerably air-filled is wonderful, simply because you have a whole lot significantly less of them floating absent.
“And then there’s the helium shortage. It really is not really a shortage, but it truly is more durable to mine. When I started in Texas, a tank was $100. The identical tanks are $370 now. It can be vital to observe balloon helium is not the very same as professional medical-grade helium, I know people have been anxious about that. But possibly way, I will not have to use significantly of it.”
Higgins hopes to go on supplying color to residents and corporations together the lakeshore.
“It is really these kinds of a happy detail,” she reported. “It just helps make all people smile.”
Find out a lot more at westmichiganballoons.com.
— Contact reporter Cassandra Lybrink at cassandra.lybrink@hollandsentinel.com. Observe her on Instagram @BizHolland.
This short article initially appeared on The Holland Sentinel: Inside of the bash industry’s hottest development: Daring and stunning balloons
