Several of the contestants on Shark Tank have gone on Zeb Welborn’s Defining Success podcast.
Follow this link to hear an interview of our Founder, Ben Alexander:
Tag Archives: college jobs
To connect with people is a great blessing, indeed.
This is me and my sister Andrea in her kitchen in New Jersey, about 2 years ago.
We were joking around that day, I was talking about goofy stuff and making her laugh, probably because I had said something outrageous…. Andrea’s husband Jerry took the pic and it captured that specific moment perfectly.
It’s important that we connect with other people, every day, in a non-social media way.
I spent this morning interviewing applicants for an admin position within Balloon Distractions, I met a bunch of nice folks, and in the process had some lively discussions with a pretty diverse group of people. One applicant had been a detective in London, who knew?
Social media has it’s place and it’s utility, but let’s not substitute this for REAL human interaction.
This is one reason why I enjoy volunteering in local community events, it gets you out there meeting people and interacting with real human beings, not staring at a computer screen.
Commenting to a post on Facebook is nice, but sharing a laugh with someone in person is far more powerful.
Those are my thoughts for this afternoon….
Ben Alexander
Tuesday afternoon, February 11, 2014.
SHARKS! …. in balloon hats.
Shark Tank posted this pic on their Facebook wall today, and various bloggers have written about us ALREADY so there is no secret that our episode airing THIS Friday will be a BIG moment in latex history.
HUGE THANKS to all the members of the Los Angeles team who came out the day before and made these amazing shapes; the motorcycle for Robert Herjavek, Shark Hat for Lori Greiner, Fruit hat for Mr. Wonderful, Crown for Barbara Corcoran and Dallas Mavs player for Mark Cuban.
Most people have seen an artist twisting in a restaurant and never realized that you could build a fun and profitable business around that concept. We are the first company to establish a decade-long reputation with NATIONAL brands like Chili’s, IHOP, Applebees, Texas Roadhouse, etc.
Our online Orientation makes sure that 100% of our artists are trained to a very high standard, and 100% of our bookings are CALL CHECKED across 4 time zones.
We know that there are people out there who are looking for a fun business built on family values with a corporate culture of creativity and compassion towards children.
If you would like to work with us to build a region in YOUR area please go to:
http://balloondistractions.com/build-a-region.html
Feel free to hit the SHARE button below and work with us to bring more people into our fun and creative enterprise!
The Simplest Business in the Ballooniverse.
This is all the equipment you need to run a BD region with 10, 20, even 50 artists.
You can earn an excellent income with the simple objects in the photo.
An apron, a hand pump and a few balloons to do tryouts and land new clients.
A phone to close deals and contact your team.
A laptop to access our online orientation and online X-scheduler. Here at HQ we handle the billing, payroll, licensing, background checks on new artists and all the other back office functions crucial to the smooth operation of a national company.
Of course, you also need a mode of transportation to get around, which was not included in the picture. Our Regional Partner in Los Angeles gets around on a motorcycle with his balloon apron in a backpack, you don’t even need 4 wheels to make this work!
Back in 2011 we entertained the idea of branching out into Balloon Décor. At our company HQ we bought heavy helium tanks, shelves of balloons, PVC, and all the other equipment you need to do balloon arches, columns, balloon drops, etc. We did a handful of jobs, but we realized that scaling a décor business nationwide would require tens of thousands of dollars in equipment that could be lost, stolen, damaged etc.
By keeping this concept light and simple, with online tools that organize people and clients we have an enterprise that can scale anywhere there are restaurants and families.
We can scale this globally, the internet knows no borders.
If you are reading this blog from somewhere else in the world and you have a business background please reach out to us:
http://balloondistractions.com/build-a-region.html
If you live in a city anywhere in the USA and you want to have a business that is super simple and efficient we would like to talk with you. You can go through our Online Orientation in under a week and start earning cash within about 10 days.
There is no financial investment to join us other than balloons (which you can buy anywhere) the gas in your vehicle and your time spent building a team.
You will be a 1099 Independent Contractor, so you determine your schedule, the pace of your work, and the size of your income.
You determine the SIZE of your success.
Gardening and Business.
written by Ben Alexander, BalloonDistractions.com
When I moved to Florida back in 2003 there was minimal landscaping around my home, since then my wife and I have planted several small flower gardens around the house. The growing season here is from February to November, so if you don’t get out and weed things a bit you get a jungle rather quickly.
The picture above is our front garden in the full heat of summer.
In December and January it might get down into the 40’s at night, so everything goes a bit dormant and slows down or stops growing. During our “winter” I still have to mow the lawn every 3 or 4 weeks. The rest of the year everything grows at an accelerated rate, especially if the rainfall is consistent.
My parents are visiting for Christmas next week so I’ve been sprucing things up, weeding the gardens and even planting a few flowers around the base of the mailbox. I removed about 4 trashcans full of weeds and clippings from all our gardens…. this got me thinking about weeds, gardening, and how it all relates to business.
We have several rose species in our gardens, they’ve established deep roots and seem to weather heat and cold equally well. If you cut our roses down to a mere stalk they rebound and put out shoots, within a month or two you can’t tell they were ever pruned. The weeds, on the other hand, only have roots near the surface and you can rip them out easily, some species will wither when the temperatures get a little colder.
I’d like to think Balloon Distractions is like those tough roses in my garden, we’ve established some pretty deep roots in markets across the USA, and even though our numbers might fluctuate a bit we always rebound and survive.
We’ve also had some weeds that needed to be removed over time, and we had to do that to keep the core business strong and vital.
Moving forward the key is to establish strong roots in as many markets as possible, when we appear on Shark Tank on January 17th it will (hopefully) help us find a bunch of good people who we can develop into successful Regional Partners in many markets throughout the USA.
Let’s grow some roses!
Everyone has value.
Today I went out with 3 other members of my Rotary and we took shoes, socks, warm sleeping bags and few other sundry items to the men living in camps in the woods around Wesley Chapel.
The fellow in the picture is Will, a Vietnam veteran and an artist who told me he has sketched this beautiful lady many times and he has no idea who she is, but occasionally he dreams about her! Will has been homeless for a few years now, and when we brought him the supplies he invited us to sit on some plastic milk crates next to his tent and we talked for awhile.
He told us how children occasionally mistook him for Santa Claus, but he would smile and tell them he was one of Santa’s elves….
We had met many of these men during Thanksgiving when our club gave out hot turkey dinners, they live illegally in tents in the woods on pieces of land owned by anonymous developers. Will told us that the police would occasionally come by and kick him off a parcel of land, but that only forces him to move to another place where he is trespassing again.
There is no easy solution for people in Will’s situation, many times they are unemployable due to alcohol addiction, appearance (like missing teeth) or a lack of skills and reliability…..
… but they are still human beings; worthy of our compassion and worthy of our time.
You can’t make an alcoholic go to meetings, or force someone to show up for work on time, but you can give them a warm pair of shoes, a sleeping bag, or that camping tent in your garage that’s you haven’t used in years.
Benjamin T. Alexander
December 2013
The Seasons of your Life
Hanging out in North Carolina with Todd Barrow.
written by Ben Alexander, founder of BalloonDistractions.com
Todd started with us as an entertainer filling gigs part time and now runs one of the largest regions in our organization. I got to spend some time with him during the summer of 2013 and we had some great conversations about work, life, and all the BIG questions.
Todd and I are both knocking on 40, and we’ve both had all kinds of varied and weird jobs. Todd was in the military, counseled young people for drug addiction, and even installed water filters!
One of things that Todd and I discussed (over a beer or three) were the “seasons of life” that we all go through along this journey, and how certain types of work fit better at certain points in your life.
Case is point is the college student that joins us and fills gigs as an Independent Contractor, they log on, choose where and how often they want to work, and the flexibility of this works in their favor.
Then you have the stay at home Mom, she might have kids in elementary school, but she doesn’t want the hassle of a typical 9-5 job, so she learns to twist and uses our company to get out of the house 2 nights a week and earn a couple hundred $$$.
The third example might be a retired military veteran who gets out of the military in their 40’s with a small pension and joins our team as a Regional Partner and earns 40K per year by organizing the team, selling new clients and occasionally filling a gig to keep the schedule populated.
Each of these three examples represent someone in a different season of their life, with different perspectives and goals, along with varied levels of life experience.
As a company we respect whatever season of life you happen to be in, and we’re grateful that people from various backgrounds, ages and experience have joined our team.
So what season are YOU in?
Are you happy with where you are in life, or do you want to make a change and do something different? We are looking for Regional Partners in 200 metro markets throughout the United States, check out our website at BalloonDistractions.com!
The apple does not fall far from the tree….
written by Ben Alexander
Next month my oldest daughter Claire turns 16. When I started Balloon Distractions she was only in kindergarten, she’s been there all along from Balloon Jams in our living room to expanding this across the entire country. Many times Claire and her sister Grace went with me to restaurants to train new artists, and they’ve been there all along when my wife and I have discussed business challenges across the dinner table.
There are a handful of event gigs that I’ve been doing year after year, Claire has been going along with me as my “apprentice twister”. She’s wonderful with children and very good at handling people in general so I’m getting her ready to rock some restaurant gigs once she’s mastered a few more shapes.
My youngest daughter Grace has ZERO interest in doing this, so I’m glad Claire has stepped up to the plate. I don’t want to push them, I’m just glad to spend time with Claire, she is a joy to work with.
We’ve been in business 10 years already so it makes sense that we will still be around in another 20 or 30 years. I think Claire has some natural leadership talents that could lend themselves well to helping me lead this company, not just in the United States but internationally as well.
At the same time I don’t want to be the type of business owner who promotes his child just because of blood, Claire will have to prove herself at every level.
As a parent I’m doing my level best to make sure both my daughters get a solid academic foundation that opens many doors to them, whether in business or elsewhere.
Balloon Jams from Seattle to Schenectady!
Balloon Jam in DFW, August 2013.
Balloon Jam in Seattle, November 2013.
Balloon Jam in Los Angeles, September 2013.
Balloon Jam in upstate NY, July 2013.
written by Ben Alexander
Between April and October of 2013 I was fortunate enough to visit every single region that we do business with across the United States.
I did not get a pic at every jam (maybe in 2014?) but I got a few that really captured some great moments with our teams. Traveling around and training our Regional Partners and meeting their amazing teams is a big part of what I do as the owner of the company, and a great joy for me as well.
Our teams are a great mix of college kids, stay at home Moms and military veterans who have joined us to make great part time money and have a ton of fun as well.
Get out of your comfort Zone!
Many eclectic jobs led me to where I am today:
Here is a short list, in no logical order:
- Paid Baritone for a Presbyterian church.
- Insurance agent for Mutual of Omaha.
- Basic construction, ripping up sidewalks, building fences, etc.
- English teacher in Taiwan.
- Art model for my college’s life modeling class.
- Volunteer firefighter (no pay, but a unique experience)
- Balloon Twister 4 Tips in countless restaurants.
- Owner of a balloon twisting talent agency.
- Burger flipper at Dairy Queen.
- Waiter at many different restaurants.
- Lifeguard at several lakes and pools across South Jersey.
- Swim Instructor for children.
- Rollerblade instructor in Taiwan.
- Selling gold plating services to car dealerships.
- Selling deregulated energy door to door.
- Managing large door to door crews that sold deregulated energy.
- Selling underwater scuba camera equipment over the phone.
- Selling mortgages over the phone.
- Selling employment advertising over the phone.
- Selling solar and energy efficiency door to door, in NJ, PA and FL.
- Selling cars (mostly Toyota) in MD and FL.
- Mowing lawns and basic landscaping.
- Auctioneer’s assistant and go-to (when I was 12 years old)
- Delivery driver for Naple’s pizza in Mullica Hill.
- Substitute teacher all over South Jersey (my 3rd year in college)
- Package sorter on the midnight shift at UPS.
- Direct Sales with Amway and Life Leadership.
- Getting paid from sales of my first book on Amazon.
- Sales consulting for 2 marketing firms in Philadelphia.
- Goofed off with the EB-5 investment program in Taiwan, never made a dime.
- Imported Super Sonic Spheres from Taiwan, same result as #30.
I’ve tried so many unusual things in my life that nothing is that weird or unfamiliar.
In college every single time I got fired from one job (I had a big mouth and it got me in hot water) I would look around and try something different.
I feel bad for the person who turns 18, gets a job that he hates, then stays in that job for 40 years because he is hooked to a measly paycheck. How boring, right?
Be open to new ideas and experiences, and as you get older you will continually expand your comfort zone. When you stretch yourself you will learn how to be resilient and adjust to anything.
Trying many different things also teaches you to be resourceful, a great quality to develop whether you are an entrepreneur, teacher or any profession.
Once you’ve taken off every stitch of clothing in front of a room full of art students, or traveled 12 time zones away on a ONE WAY ticket to a foreign country to work, everything else is small potatoes.
I started Balloon Distractions (when I was 29) because I never found a job that I actually liked.
Previous to that I could never hold a job longer than 24 months.
When you move OUT, way OUT, from your comfort zone you will gain tremendous confidence and trust in yourself. After living in Taiwan and learning how to speak a bit of Mandarin Chinese I was not afraid to live somewhere very far from what I knew growing up.
Moving to Florida in 2003? No big deal, at least it’s still in the USA.
Consequently I feel at home everywhere I go here in the States. The entire USA is within my comfort zone. As I traveled around the United States building Balloon Distractions I always felt at home, whether in Seattle, Miami or Houston.
A little job or hobby that you try out in college can lead to something significant down the road. When I was twisting balloons in college I never would have guessed that it would lead to Balloon Distractions.
More recently I got involved in residential and commercial solar with Tampa Bay Solar. Here I was, learning a totally new industry at 43 years old! I’ve been making a great income and learning a ton. I feel like a million bucks.
Be thrilled by the potential of the unexpected, and don’t hesitate to get out of your own comfort zone! The only thing you risk by trying something new is loss of time.
Ben Alexander
blog was originally written in 2014, updated in May of 2017.
Ben Alexander Solar Sales Consulting. 