A Larger-than-Life Idea: How the Inflatable Man Came to Be

They're colorful and vibrant, with grins permanently painted on their faces. Their cylindrical bodies and stubby arms flail tirelessly as they sway to and fro with the breeze. You can’t ignore them. You know who they are. You’ve seen them before, probably in front of a newly-opened store, shopping establishments announcing exciting discounts, or huge events where sponsors aim to showcase their brands. They’re customized with attention-grabbing graphics and designed based on what a business needs.

If your business is hidden from a main street's view, an inflatable tube man can grab a potential customer's attention. Read on to learn about his humble beginnings.

A Larger-Than-Life Idea

Hailing from Trinidad and Tobago, the carnival artist Peter Minshall caught the attention of the Atlanta Summer Olympics organizers with his gigantic puppet creations. In 1996, the planning committee commissioned him to design for the ceremonies. Minshall then ideated the inflatable man using random materials formed into tubes with a base attached to an air source to make it glide while being held in place.

Enter Doron Gazit

However, Minshall couldn't build them by himself, so he recruited Los Angeles-based artist Doron Gazit to do the job. Gazit had extensive experience in working with colossal balloon figures and even used them as an art form. He was known for having inflatables stretched across the Dead Sea and the desert and strewn on some buildings as well. His inflatable tube man creation, standing at 60 feet, made its grand debut during the 1996 Atlanta Summer Olympics.

Patents

Other companies began to rip off Gazit's design for financial gain, so in 2001, he patented it, along with the method for development. Unfortunately, he did this without consulting Minshall first. While Gazit acknowledged that the design was Minshall's idea, he explained that he was the one who addressed the engineering challenges. Minshall himself admitted that the patent idea hadn’t occurred to him.

Inflatable Scarecrows

Eventually, these inflatable men found a new use, from being air dancers to bird scarers. Gary Long, who owned apple orchards in Washington, had lost 20,000 out of 40,000 pounds of harvest in one season because of birds. He got the idea of using them as scarecrows from a fruit stall-keeper who used these same balloons to attract customers. Long noticed that nearby birds didn't go near the fruit because of the balloons, so he bought them from the stall-keeper. It was a huge success, and bird damage dropped to zero.

Today, the inflatable tube man remains a staple advertising tool in various industries. From toy stores to gas stations, they continue to wave at passersby and welcome customers with open, flailing arms.


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