Christmas retail is the most compressed season there is. Six weeks to make the year, and a tree lot that looks identical to the one two miles down the road.
The seasonal business problem
Tree lots, pop-up gift shops, light displays and holiday markets all share one difficulty: you are temporary, so you have no permanent signage and nobody knows you are there.
A balloon at 120 feet solves exactly that. It says *something is happening here* from streets away, which is the whole job when your business did not exist last month and will not exist next month.
It is also the reason a balloon suits a tree lot better than it suits a hardware store. The hardware store has a sign already.
Order by early November
Work backwards. Production is three to seven days from artwork approval, shipping is two to five business days.
If you want your lot name printed on a blimp for a season starting the day after Thanksgiving, order in the first week of November. Leave room for one artwork revision.
Order in December and you will be flying it for the last fortnight of your season, which is the worst two weeks to be late for.
Cold weather, plainly
Gas contracts when cold. On a frosty morning the balloon looks soft and by afternoon it firms up again. That is not a leak and you should not chase it with helium at dawn.
Do not fold or unfold it frozen. If you need to box it mid-season, bring it inside and let it warm first. Polyurethane tolerates the cycle; PVC cracks at the folds.
Next year, and the year after
This is what makes the arithmetic work for a six week season. A $1,526 blimp used for six weeks is expensive. The same blimp used for six weeks a year for ten years is not.
It deflates, folds and stores flat in the carton it arrived in. Customers report still flying the same balloon after fourteen years, and a seasonal one spends most of its life in a box.
Ask for a quote. Call 1-800-791-1445 or email [email protected] and tell us the size and whether you want it printed.
More at marketingballoons.com.