Subject: NEW Betallic review Date: Sun, 16 Sep 2001 22:44:06 -0700 From: Lorna Paris hi all, Sandi Masori and I got a chance ot jam with a different mix of Betallic balloons. All in all we were quite happy with them! (I got my balloons back!) Sandi's review will be coming soon. :-) types: Neon assortment, Pearl assortment, Crystal assortment, Metallic assortment, Fashion tone assortment, Various shapes and sizes. FIRST: Neon :-) WOW WOW WOW The NEON assortment is EVEN BETTER! Once the balloons are inflated they lose almost NONE of their color. They still remain BRIGHT! (good job, Betallic!) The colors that we got in the bag were blue, yellow, pink & green. they were more vibrant when inflated than the first time I played with them BUT the blue and yellow were not black light reactive. . . . HOWEVER, both SAndi and I ADORED them. . they are wonderful shades of opaque baby blue and opaque yellow. (The blue was a little darker and a little teensy bit different in other ways that Qualatex's light blue but even though the differences were small, it had a teensy bit more green in the coloration and both SAndi and I LOVED the shade! My vote? I would buy SOLID BAGS in ALL of the neon colors!!!!!! btw I used a technique that I have for testing balloon durability and the passed! (I make a dog and then SQUEEEEEEEZE the balloon with my hands and fingertips until it either explodes (or, in this case I gave up). . . depending how hard I have ot squeeze to pop it, it passes the test or not. . . . ALL of the colors passed the test!. . . they all passed Sandi's "squirrel test" as well. . both are good durability tests for different reasons. .she'll explain hers. . . suffice to say that I am strong. SECOND Pearl The pearl balloons look beautiful in the bag, and all of them become VERY transparent, losing a lot of their original color after inflation. They seem durable, but they don't thrill me. It didn't seem like the same sort of formula. . . but they were ok, i just wouldn't buy them, myself. If i want a highly transparent balloon, I will avoid these and just go for the Q's Diamond. THIRD Crystal Well, I of course LIKE this assortment. . . it is lots of primary colors. I like them. they are as transparent as Qualatex's jewel tone AND they have a beautiful(!) shade of purple that is a sort of burgundy color (like wine). VERY NICE assortment.. I LIKE THIS ONE! Personally, I would buy all of these colors, but I want to be cautious abut recommending that they make these standards in solid bags until i am sure that other folks would be ready to make a switch like I am. I love the balloons! (ok Betallic THIs batch has won me over, if you can consistently pull off the mix like this one and like the NEON balloon colors, they are durable enough and malleable enough that I LOVE THEM!) I had a green and a blue have the ends just pop off when I was making a sculpture, but all in all i have no other problems with any of the balloons. FOURTH Metallic GREAT! Nice.. . they are a little more opaque than the Q's jewel tones. . . they are really nice colors! MUCH MORE MALLEABLE than the Q metallic balloons, and easier to work with and to twist but not as opaque. There were no silver or gold in this mix, but the colors on those probably haven't changed. I don't think that they need to make solid color bags of these balloons, just yet. the purple is my favorite. it is beautiful! (BUT it is not as metallic as you would think). I DO like it as a purple balloon though. I like it. . .then again PURPLE is my fave color. I would rather see a raspberry colored balloon. . . not necessarily a metallic one, I just like having lots of shades of purple in my pack. The metallics are nice, but I would like the silver and gold to me more opaque (I had none this time). . and THEN I will be ready to buy them in solid bags. . .I guess BSA spoiled me! Their silver and gold were just as easy to work with as the Betallic metallics, but they were totally opaque. . . (NOW make your metallic bronze a little less metallic and totally opaque and you have a great Mestizo skin tone! FIFTH Fashion Tone I LOVE EM! ALL OF EM! I would buy single color bags of EVERY ONE!!! I have finished off my prize of the fashion tone hearts that I won at the San Diego jam a few weeks ago, and I want more!!!!!!!! i love them!! i love it! EVERY COLOR in single color bags please! SIXTH Various shapes and sizes We like the various shapes and sizes. . . we keep playing with them and in general we are still playing with the shapes to see what we can do with them. Personally, I have had great luck with kids LOVING the snakes. In general, I can see a lot of uses for many of the balloons! nice balloons for artistic uses! Sandi showed me the link-o-loon poodle that someone did (at millennium jam?), she has kids going NUTS for it. We got together with Linda Berman, with our last bags of samples and she just looked at the peach balloons and then at the link-o-loons and wanted to have the link-o-loons in peach so that she would have yet another type of balloonicature style to work with. (She also LOVED the peach as a skin tone balloon. . . her wish list includes a sort of 160 made with the fashion tones and brown so that she can have more than the standard jewel 160 assortment that is presently available.) I will probably be bopping up to jam a bit with Linda Berman in the next couple weeks, and I will probably try ot hold off on using the rest of my sample until I see her (Sandi and i split it in half and shared it). . . She likes the link-o-loons. . and wonders if they are in peach? they would help her a lot with developing more Balloonicature style with 160's! hoo hoo! THANKS BETALLIC for the formula correctionS I am ready to switch!. . . now i have to run out of the stock I just bought so that I can start stocking up on your single color bags that I am sure will be on the market SOON. I had a few minor problems with some of the balloons but they proved to be great! (I am in love with this balloon again!) Now remember, not all of the balloons by Betallic are the same formula. . I have three or four different formulas in bags in my freezer, as is. . . if you get a bag of terribly easy to inflate or very hard to work with ones. . you might have a past formula that some store is trying to sell out of stock! I wanna switch to THIS ONE! (PLEEASE DON'T CHANGE THE FORMULA AGAIN!!!!!!) I want 5" hearts in Fashion Tones and Metallics!! I seem to remember seeing white in the past. . . and I want that too I can't remember if the black is opaque. . . if it is I WANT IT!!!! I remember in the days of balloon Baron and Ashland when blaCk balloons were opaque (and sometimes Whirlies anyone remember those?). OK I have babbled enough. . hopefully the Maryland balloon jam was as great as mine and Sandi's was. There was one last thing i was going to say and now I can't remember what it was. hrmmmmmmmmmmm Lorna