Idealog test-drives Bunch O Balloons

My kids and their friends couldn’t wait to try it.

“We can fill 100 water balloons in under 60 seconds! No way!” said George.

We had a plan. The kids would play after school, in the area of the garden that still got sun at that hour.

The water battle would be epic; a swansong to the end of the vaguely warm weather. I attached the hose. I turned the tap on. “It’s not 100 balloons in under 60 seconds, is it,” said George, counting. “It’s 37 balloons.” He had a point. After 40 seconds, some balloons were filled, others were pitifully small.

George shook the balloons off the attachment, as per the instructions, and they landed in the bucket. “They look like they are deflating,” he said. Indeed, some did look they had punctured. I pondered user error.

“Oh well, just play with the ones you’ve got!” I shouted.

They did. They threw 15 balloons at each other, laughed and ran around.

We didn’t have much success with the next lot of Bunch O Balloons either.

George held the bunch over the bucket, and we debated about whether we had filled them up enough.

“That will do!” said my husband. “Let’s get in to it!”

We decided to go for the fast-fill technique with the last bunch, and that went better. There were still some sad looking balloons that wouldn’t inflate but the kids had enough to have more of a fight.

The verdict from my test group of four kids was the balloons were underwhelming.

They had visions of a big fight with balloons that filled easily. Instead they got an interrupted fight, with not as many balloons as they had hoped for.

“They didn’t inflate well,” said George after the fight, under blankets with a hot chocolate.

Verdict: Bunch O Balloons is a great concept and there is potential for some fun to be had. But if your job (or your credibility with the kids) is at stake, I’d recommend a test run.