The Balloon Factory

Hi, I am a balloon. Have you ever wondered where balloons come from? Well, today is your lucky day. I am going to give you a tour of a balloon factory. Come with me! Look at all these colors. In this factory, they make 25 different colored balloons. Do you think you can name 25 different colors?

Try it! It’s not easy. Where should I begin? I guess the best place to start is at the beginning. In this room, the workers prepare all the ingredients that we need to make balloons. This white goo is called latex. This is what all balloons are made of. It doesn’t have any color yet, but it soon will.

Now let’s go to the production line. This is where the gooey mixture is turned into balloons. In this factory, they make many kinds of balloons: long balloons, round balloons, small balloons, and multicolored balloons.

Let’s look at some of the machines. This machine gives each balloon its shape. This machine heats the balloons until they are dry. Then, that machine removes the balloons and puts them into bins. This is a big factory. Can you guess how many balloons it makes each day? One thousand? One hundred thousand?

This factory makes one million balloons a day! Oh no! One of the machines is broken and the production line has stopped. This is very bad. But not to worry! The repairman will fix it in just a minute.

The repairman must work fast. If he doesn’t, people may not have balloons for their birthday or picnics. In this factory, all the balloons must be perfect. This woman makes sure that every balloon is good. She makes sure the color, weight, and shape of each balloon is just right.