It’s clear that Elaine Frei, Founder & President of Luft Balloon, delights in the sheer joy of sharing colorful balloon bursts and balloon art. 
She creates balloon art for her customers, but also loves giving back to her Chicago community. The company frequently “balloon bombs” first responders, front-line workers, and small businesses that have gone above and beyond, just because they want to spread that joy.
Luft Balloon prides itself on the enormous range of colors of its balloons. Elaine likens most balloon colors to the old, original Crayon box. She “double stuffs” her balloons, and uses high-quality latex and messaging on the balloons. She also adds her flair for color and design by creating jaw-dropping art with her balloons.
Here are just a few examples, but check out her website for a few of her amazing creations: 
Elaine shares with The Savvy Entrepreneur her interesting journey from landscape architect to CEO of a fast-growing startup focused on balloons. And she candidly shares some of the challenges of growing so fast.
It’s a delightful listen, and will leave you smiling and wanting to balloon bomb someone tomorrow!
The following is a transcript of our interview, which is guaranteed to leave you smiling! Or, you can listen to the interview here.
Doris Nagel 0:42
Welcome to The Savvy Entrepreneur show!
If you’re an entrepreneur or small businessperson, or you’re thinking about becoming one, listen up because this show is for you.
I’m Doris Nagel, your host for the next hour. I’ve counseled lots of startups and small businesses over the past 30 years. And I’ve also started or help start at least nine different businesses. And oh boy, have I seen and made a lot of mistakes!
The show has two goals: to help share information and resources — if I can help just one of you entrepreneurs out there, not to make some of the mistakes I’ve made or that I’ve seen, then I’ve been successful.
The other goal is to inspire — because I found that being an entrepreneur is sometimes confusing and often lonely. Sometimes you have no idea if you’re on the right track or not, or where to turn for good advice.
Every week, I have guests on the show who are willing to share their stories and advice to help with that. And this week’s guest is Elaine Frei. She’s the owner and founder of Luft Balloons, based in Chicago. As you might imagine, Luft Balloons is a balloon store – but not just any balloon store. Elaine says her company brings joy to their customers through unique and gorgeous balloon art. And I can tell you that if you go on their website, her balloon art is definitely unique, and it is gorgeous.
Elaine has been a local activist and change maker in Chicago. from giving away peace balloon bursts in response to increase increased gun violence in the city, to surprising health care workers of hospitals with balloon bunches.
She has been devoting time encouraging dialogue through balloons because they serve as a visual connector. She commemorated her fourth year anniversary of the company by giving back to the community and offering complimentary balloon bunches to a variety of causes.
Elaine, thanks so much for being on the show today. Welcome to The Savvy Entrepreneur show.
Elaine Frei 3:01
Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to have this conversation.
Doris Nagel
I am excited to because what you do is so fun and cool!
Elaine. talk a little bit about yourself and what led you to start this business and to decide to be an entrepreneur.
Elaine Frei 3:21
I think perhaps most entrepreneurs suffer from knowing that you have it in you as a little kid. You know, I was a kid selling stamps out of my red wagon, wheeling it around to neighbors. I had stamps, stationery, and embossed stationery.
I just had this desire to make and see bring somebody else’s joy, and then to also make money, you know, like that idea of like, oh, okay, so all these things are connected. And so, I have suffered from having that in the back of my mind, ever since I was a kid. And throughout the course of my career, until one pivotal moment: the 2008 recession.
That allowed me to pivot and really explore being coming an entrepreneur. It was a very hard 8 or 10 years until Luft came about, but it’s part of that journey.
Doris Nagel
What did you do in the interim? Were you in a typical corporate job or, and saving money for what you wanted to do?
Elaine Frei 4:31
I have my undergraduate in landscape architecture. And then I went to RISD [Rhode Island School of Design] to explore landscape architecture as well. And there I really focused on architecture graphic design. RISD really helped open my eyes: you don’t need to perfect the medium; you just need to understand design logic and then that can be applied to anything.
So, I was a landscape architect for a while. I worked in Boston, but I struggled to pay the bills. Even with having a Master’s [degree], I think it was making $36,000 a year in Boston.
Doris Nagel
Wow! You can live in a box under the interstate there on that salary, but that’s about it.
Elaine Frei 5:11
Yeah. And so, I finally just gave up and said, “This is not the lifestyle I want. I don’t want this.”
So, I quit, and moved back to Chicago, thinking that I would take a small summer break watching the Cubs play (who I love). But unfortunately, that is when the recession hit. My entire field went on a hiring freeze, and I didn’t know what to do.
I spent the next three years begging everyone for work. I offered to work for you for free, I’ll do this, I’ll do that I, I taught a class at IIT, I became the graphic designer for the Illinois Landscape Architecture chapter…. You know, I tried everything in my power to stay within the field. And at some point, I had to realize it just wasn’t going to work.
And now I realize life was pushing me, saying, “Go! Go do what you need to do!”
I didn’t know what it was going to be balloons, but I think for entrepreneurs, you don’t know what it will be, but it’s just in you. And you have to follow that passion to figure out what “it” is.
Doris Nagel 6:10
Talk a little bit about that process. I’m also a SCORE Mentor & a private business consultant, and I’ve counseled a lot of would-be entrepreneurs — people who have the itch to own their own business. Maybe they have kind of a concept. Maybe they don’t even have that. And they’re really just trying to figure out what fits. So how did how did that happen for you?
Elaine Frei 6:37
Well, mine was quite a long process. I knew I had always loved making things with my hands. And so, there’s probably three or four failed businesses before Luft.
The one right before Luft was a circular that we had designed with a friend. We were trying to launch this idea called the Facts and Science for Hosting Dinner Parties. We realized that people no longer hosted around the table anymore in our demographic, and we really wanted to bring everyone back to the table to connect to converse — to really just connect. And as we designed the process, we would pick a theme. But we would make it non-Martha Stewart like, so that it didn’t have to be so much pressure, things didn’t have to be perfect. You didn’t have to order anything from Etsy, you didn’t have to go to the fancy grocery store. It was a mix of how to entertain, but without the stress.
We devised a logic of: “Set the tone, set the table, set yourself.” One of the themes was a 30th birthday party. In the process of doing that, we sourced all of these birthday items that you can buy at Target or CVS or your local store. One of them was balloons. I’m not sure that I can take credit for this, but I ended up designing an entire centerpiece out of balloons because I thought. “Let’s replace flowers with balloons. Let’s make it interesting.”
In that process, we bought $400 worth of balloons from Party City, Target, and everywhere we could find them. But I realized then that the quality and the color profile were not good. Everything was off.
I kind of filed it in the back of my mind — there’s a void here for somebody like me who loves color and is obsessed with it. Why are balloons not responding in the same way? Like, why are they stuck in you know, the 80s? They haven’t grown up at all, like the crayons in the original Crayon box.
Doris Nagel
It’s like they’re stuck in the original crayon box palette, and they haven’t responded to the expanded big box of crayons.
Elaine Frei 8:45
Exactly. And so I filed away that little nugget, and then I started to really pursue it. It’s like I found my passion without knowing it in that medium, because it combined making colors with product development.
And I will tell you, we’re in our fourth year officially, but there was a good couple years of exploratory work before that. And that was when I had a new baby, and then a second baby. I was trying to get this off the ground, and I was like, “What is this?”
Like you said, you feel lonely. You ask yourself, “Is this a dumb idea? Should I not do this?” And I kept saying that, if by the next baby I don’t have it figured out, then I’ll quit. And I kept saying that and I just kept pushing.
Doris Nagel 9:28
A lot of businesses stumble, because they’re on to something that’s pretty cool, but still don’t know if there’s really a market for it. And so, yeah, colorful balloons are cool. But how did you know if people are really willing to pay for more colorful balloons?
Elaine Frei 9:53
I attribute the growth of Luft in the right way to my very simple rule. And the rule was — you know, I had my firstborn — so I must pay for my nanny or a babysitter or childcare to support this dream. I had to work part time as a contract graphic designer, and then part time on the business.
And so, I had that bill fueling underneath me. I knew if I couldn’t pay this bill, then it I just had to keep pushing essentially. So, by kind of torturous means I made myself say, “I must meet this bill,” and, and then kept growing the business from there. I didn’t let go of the contract graphic design work until I knew Luft was ready to keep going.
Doris Nagel
What’s unique about your offering? Obviously, people can go to the grocery store or Party City, as you mentioned, and buy a couple balloons. But that’s not what your business is about. How is it different?
Elaine Frei 11:07
As I mentioned, the color is the most important thing. I devised a tool that allows us to Double Stuff the balloons, so when you blow up a balloon, it mixes color. So now instead of having one green balloon, you can go to our website, where we’ve designed seven different colors of green. You can get a chartreuse, you can get a Kelly green, you can get an olive green. You can get any color, really. We can pretty much match any Pantone by making custom colors.
And then that segued into the big organic trend movement — this idea of building these structures out of balloons and forgoing the traditional arch and the traditional column. I fell in love with that, and knew I needed to do that, because it was a direct translation of landscape architecture, in the sense that, instead of manipulating the landscape in your three-dimensional environment with hardscape and trees and vegetation, now you were doing that with balloons.
And so, then I started working on that. And that took off in the events world. I really fell in love with just making and responding to the architecture.
So, we’re unique in that we make custom colors. We’re really color experts, we like to say, and we’re unique in the sense that we design art that responds to existing architecture.
And it’s not just a sideline, but a core line product that has standardized Luft items. We pared down our big art into smaller scales so that you can still have that in the home for a birthday party, or a baby shower. And that’s how we are different, I think, from our competition.
Doris Nagel
I really encourage people to go to your website, which is luftballoonsstore.com. Because you don’t really get a sense until you see some of the pictures of what I will call it balloon art. You’ll see there, quite frankly, just some gorgeous, gorgeous creations with balloons that I didn’t even know were possible.
How did you come up with a name for your company?
Elaine Frei 13:20
Luft means air in German, and my husband is German and so I’m kind of assimilated into the German language, and then we also create all those structures with air. Luft is also from the song “99 luft balloons” you know, 99 red balloons — it’s a song from my generation, so there’s a there’s a triple layer to it that’s just kind of fun.
Doris Nagel
I think it’s a very catchy. It’s a great name.
How did you start out? Have you been self-funded during your entire four years and all the planning and prep you did before that?
Elaine Frei 13:58
I think that that might be one of the Achilles heels of female entrepreneurs. I’m not risky with money, and so I have the mindset that whatever I made out of the business I put back into the business.
I never sought out a loan because I thought that at the beginning, I didn’t want to take that risk. Because like you said, what if it fails? But that mindset really helped create a solid foundation as a frugal business owner. I was always looking at everything, thinking, you know, we don’t need this, or we don’t need that, or I’ll go pick up the balloons myself to save the shipping fee.
I did that for years, and then I find that really how dumb it was, you know making that trip. But if you’re self-funded, it keeps it very honest. And also, you’re just very in touch with the ins and outs of your spending.
And so now, because I know where we’re going next, I’m okay with taking out a loan. I know what it’s in the P&L for the last couple years. I have more data.
Doris Nagel 15:02
That’s interesting. Your perspective is very consistent with what other female entrepreneurs have told me on the show, and I’ve had a lot of them as guests.
I wonder if part of that is due to the fact that, at some level, women entrepreneurs know that it’s very difficult for them to get funding, even if they decided they wanted to. It’s disturbing and I’m not quite sure what the solution is, but the amount of venture capital that goes to women owned businesses is only just a little over 2%. And sadly, since the pandemic that number has actually dropped.
So, I just wonder if, at some level — because a lot of women have their antennas pretty finely tuned — maybe at the back of our minds, we just know it would be challenging to find funding — certainly, when you’re starting out. So, I don’t think you’re alone. It’s very consistent with what I’ve heard.
So you’ve got this idea. How do you decide to manufacture or source your products? You could go to Party City and buy up a bunch of their supplies, but that’s probably not a very efficient or effective way to go about it.
Elaine Frei 16:43
Party City actually sources their balloons from China, and they use a pretty low-grade latex.
So we began a process of exploring distributors and options. Originally, I thought I would make my own balloon color line. But when I started researching that, I discovered that it’s a million dollars minimum for R & D in a new color. I learned about the whole process of how you make a balloon, and how you color correct, and how you color guarantee.
After that, I realized, “Ah, that’s why there’s only a couple really good balloon manufacturers in the game.” And they’re both in the United States. They have a premium grade latex. And so that’s when I started to learn the industry.
And that’s how I learned about the double stuffing of the balloon colors, and then I designed the tool to do that, and found a small batch manufacturer for that as well.
I find being an entrepreneur is like peeling the onion, or like figuring out the math problem. I loved math; I love figuring out problems. “Oh, I can’t get there from here. Well, then I must figure it out a different way.”
I think sometimes when we’re younger, if we don’t know the answer, we just give up. And the biggest thing to teach our kids — that I’m trying to teach my kids – is that the problem-solving process is the part that’s fun. It’s not the answer. It’s going through the process of finding the best balloon. And how you really have to just dive into it.
Doris Nagel 18:13
I really didn’t think about that. But you know, having worked in a medical supply company for a number of years, where they made latex gloves, I recall that the whole process of making things out of latex is a real art form that I people don’t realize unless I think they’re close to the industry. So I’m sure that was that was quite a journey in and of itself.
Who are your customers for the most part? Are they businesses, or organizations, or individuals, or a mix of all of these?
Elaine Frei 18:46
Luckily, since we cater to celebrations, it is everyone. That’s what makes it really an interesting product: it neutralizes demographics, it makes everyone equal, and it makes the plane of celebration equal.
And so, the clients are your neighbors with an anniversary, a business celebrating 50 years in business, it’s a small party, it’s corporate. It’s everybody who has a reason to celebrate and connect.
Doris Nagel 19:18
You’ve reminded me of one of my past guests who has a custom sign business, and he caters to some of the same kinds of events you do. And I think it brings him a great deal of joy, which we haven’t really touched on yet. But there obviously is a very big joy factor in terms of what you do, and the products you bring to people.
I’m sure you have some great stories. Talk a little bit about some of those.
Elaine Frei 19:49
Our tagline is that we’re dedicated to bringing the joy through the art of the balloon, and that bringing the joy is not just ours. It could be the person gifting the balloons the person throwing the party, you know, we’re just the connector, or rather, the balloons are. We’re the facilitator of bringing somebody’s joy.
Balloons resonate that youthful, nostalgic, joyful time of just being happy and saying, it’s my birthday, you know. You just see a balloon and you smile. There’s not one person who that I have found that it hates balloons. The only thing I found is that some people are afraid of balloons, but they don’t hate them. You know, like if they pop or they can’t handle being near them. But for the most part, it’s a joyful visual reminder of something in the past.
And so what we’re trying to do is really kind of refresh that and make it not something that is a reminder of the past of your youth, but something that can be part of current and future kind of mental memorabilia. Essentially, it’s creating mental memories. You can celebrate the present moment. You can say things with balloons, just like you do with flowers or chocolates but that they are just a little bit goofy or bold, you know?
It’s a lot to have a huge bouquet of balloons in your room. It just startles you and kindles a kind of joyfulness. I it says, “Okay, I’m allowed to smile.” It’s like when somebody’s being silly. It allows you to be silly, too. And so balloons just create that ability to be youthful again.
Doris Nagel
Do you sell your products through the internet and direct? Or do you have stores that you work with? Or distributors? How what’s your selling model?
Elaine Frei 21:48
One of the things that I found incredibly difficult at Party City was just how you get the balloons. It’s such a pain in the butt. You know, on a Saturday morning, you’re stressed with the party, you’ve got to pick up balloons, and nothing is streamlined.
So we really looked at that and streamlined the process online and made it something that you could order from your bed at night when you’ve realized, “Oh, no, I need balloons for tomorrow!”
We have a very easy helium builder, which allows you to create your own bouquet. We’ve broken it down into filters, so that you can explore foils, numbers, and then the air side, which is all the bursts of joy.
Those were completely the result of the pandemic. When the pandemic hit, we were 85% events-driven, and then 50% of our art was helium. That all went away overnight.
So then I designed two new products. One was a burst that I actually didn’t design as a product. I just made it and put it on my fence, just to make my neighbors happy. It was like one hundred smiley face balloons, just to make people smile.
It got so much reaction that I thought, “Let me just throw this up on the website.” So I did, and we sold over two thousand of those during the pandemic.
At that point, I realized people needed this. So we started to track all our bursts. We had a joy finder map where we would map where all of the joy bursts were, so that when you went on walks during quarantine, you could go search their area and go look for our bursts out in the wild.
Doris Nagel
What a cool idea!
Elaine Frei 23:29
That original smiley face rainbow was the start of our entire air line of balloons that were more off the shelf Luft art items. So you can buy those online as well.
Anything over $500 is considered a custom install, and that would be where you work with me directly. We’ll meet on site and talk about what your goals and objectives are, what we’re trying to highlight.
We try to make it as pain free as possible.
Doris Nagel 23:59
I noticed that there’s a seasonality that you can take advantage of, too. I was just looking at your website, where right now it’s autumn here in Chicago and people are starting to put up things for Halloween. So you’ve got some very cool Halloween items. Are those standard offerings that people can put in their yards or in their house as part of their Halloween party?
And I assume that changes as the seasons and the holidays change?
Elaine Frei 24:32
Yeah, Halloween is a big, big balloon holiday. People just love going all out for Halloween because you don’t have to follow this prescribed like, does my house look beautiful with wreaths. Because the holiday season is more fine-tuned or manicured.
Halloween, on the other hand, you can throw anything at it. You can throw anything in, and it looks good. It doesn’t have to look perfect or have this logic to it.
People love Halloween balloons. And who doesn’t? We have a five-foot ghost freestanding ghost. You just look at him, and you’re like, “I want to like hug you!” And you just need them in the corner of your house.
Doris Nagel 25:08
How has your business grown since you started it? You started from absolutely ground zero. Talk about how it’s evolved.
Elaine Frei 25:18
You know, the first year, I think what I would recommend to people who are kind of struggling and starting out is just meet with somebody, like a business coach. I met with this wonderful woman coach. She made me commit to a sales number that I had to hit. And I was like, there is no way I can sell these $5 packs of balloons and make that by the end of the year, no way. And then we surpassed it at the end of the year. And so I think a lot of entrepreneurship is believing in yourself and manifesting.
So I do a lot of vision boarding every six months for the business. I also do it personally for my own life, too. But I write down where I want it to go, what do I want it to do? And just by actually writing it down and saying, this is where it’s going to go, it happens, So our growth has been amazing, and the pandemic was the real fire that really gave us the wheels that we needed.
I would have gotten there without the pandemic, but it just helped accelerate it. It’s been really fun to see that growth. Now, we’re in a little bit of a growth period that I am a bit nervous about. I just don’t know about where we’re headed. And I know I have to remove myself operationally. And that’s really hard.
You know, this next phase will be interesting, because I don’t want it to grow too fast. That sounds horrible, but I don’t know if I want to be too big, you know. I love connecting with people and I love bringing joy, and I don’t want it to just turn into this thing that I can no longer control, if that makes sense.
Doris Nagel 26:56
It does make sense, and I’d like to explore that a little more.
I thought it was very interesting how you talk about scaling. So many people start businesses and just say – almost automatically, “I’m planning to scale my business.”
Well, that’s great, if that’s what you want. But not everybody wants to do that, because it involves challenges and different skills. And in some ways, I think you were alluding to the challenge of really letting go of certain things. Talk about your thoughts on that.
Elaine Frei 27:50
I was always growing, not from a profitability perspective, but through connecting with people. I wanted people to know that we wanted to bring them joy. It sounds crazy, but I just I wanted for us to be able to be your facilitator for that. To say we’re doing really cool things with lots of giving back and lots of art activism, and I want you to be part of this.
Now that we’ve gotten to this point, you do have to think about where it goes. So I have been vision boarding that as well.
You know, originally, I was on the train of opening a suburb shop, and then once we tackled that, we figure out how we do cities.
But as I’ve been reflecting on that, what I really want is a community space. I want a space where people can come and feel joy and equal.
So we left our headquarters and the space we’re actually moving into next month is going to be a great time for me to explore. It’s seven thousand square feet – so much space!
People always ask me, “Are you doing events?” And I say, “Yes, but untraditional”
I don’t know what that means yet, but I think our new space will give me a place where rescues or just teens in general can come. So we might develop a teen program, I’m not sure.
I do know I want to be able to use our growth and our platform to keep doing good or keep providing a space for connection.
I’m still working through this in my head, but I realized that I don’t want a franchisee model, because what’s the point if you grow it and just sell it and make some money. Then what do you do?
Doris Nagel
I suppose you could franchise it to other people who take your concept and replicate it.
I guess there’s lots of different models that you can use, but as you point out it is a different way of thinking about the business.
And you know there’s absolutely nothing wrong with growing where you are. I tell people this all the time: you don’t have to scale your business to be successful. If it brings you joy and gives you the kind of lifestyle you want, there’s nothing wrong with that. That’s great.
Elaine Frei 30:21
Right. And so I think that’s what I’m trying to sort through is what is that next step. It’s fun but it is hard work!
Doris Nagel 30:32
I’m sure it is. You’re very creative and persistent person, and also a thinker — I can tell — and you may find ways to expand it without losing that. I’ll enjoy watching your journey.
Looking back, what do you think’s been the hardest thing about starting up this business?
Elaine Frei 30:58
Hmm….I think in the beginning it was just a lot of like you said feeling alone. And saying to myself, “There’s something here. I believe in this.” But not having the proof yet.
And just a lot of falling on your face. For example, I signed up for a display at the Renegade craft fair. I spent weeks and weeks preparing for the craft fair. And I sold next to nothing, while the person next to me who’s making soy candles made a killing. I was like, “There’s nothing interesting about soy candles, I’m making Double Stuffed balloons, what the heck?”
But it really made me step back and ask, “What is my product? Where does it live?”
It wasn’t at a craft show. So I just think that beginning part was really tough. People would say, “Oh, Elaine’s doing like one of those Tupperware parties [with her balloons].” And so I brought them all in. And I told them, “This is what I’m trying to do.”
I literally didn’t know where it was going, you know. I just knew there was this idea.
So I think a lot of it was figuring out all of it alone, and missteps. But I just kept believing in myself.
And this is going to sound crazy. But on, I think our seventh anniversary, we were in Montreal, and for our anniversary, my husband and I were sitting at a little cafe, and I was crying, “I guess it’s over.” Baby number three was coming soon, we wanted to have a third. And I thought, “This is just dumb [to keep trying].”
And then — I kid you not — a yellow balloon came out of nowhere, flew into the cafe and was at our table. These things happen because our world is really connected. And it’s really there to keep pushing you and telling you and manifesting. I really believe in that.
But I do believe that there’s going to be some hard part parts in the beginning. But of course there’s always going to be hard parts. But that’s the fun part. You’ll figure it out and things will get rolling. You just have to figure it out.
Doris Nagel
What’s been the best part about growing your business?
Elaine Frei 33:19
The best part has been a validation of myself, of having this idea and really making it into a business. I kept saying that I will feel like I’ve made it when it’s sustainable. And by sustainable, I mean it paid all its bills, it paid the people. That it just was sustainable.
You always forget that when you get to that point. Just go on to the next tier, the next objective.
So I’m trying to just sit with this for a bit. I look at a P&L report or whatever and I still can’t believe this. There’s room to do good now with this. There is joy that we are bringing, and now we need to use our platform to keep growing and connecting.
I’m a big believer that this cutthroat capitalism can go away, that we can actually be a purpose driven company. And so we are getting B Corp certified, which aligns your business to do good for people and the environment. You can acknowledge that we’re all an interconnected web, and you can still make money, while supporting this idea that in parallel, we can become better humans, better business owners, better consumers, get better suppliers, if we just make it a priority.
And so, wrapped up into our business DNA is a lot of that architecture of giving back, doing good. And it becomes an objective to balloon bomb businesses. Because that’s what our businesses around us need.
And if you look at the hours that we put in and what we’ve committed to do, we’ve already hit it this year. So we can keep going, and we’re still doing okay profit-wise. They can grow in tandem. And so that’s what gets me the most excited.
But there’s another one that’s also really big. Going back to when I made $36,000, I had the worst work life balance. So now, I am very attuned to making sure our crew feels valued, feels like they’re getting paid a fair wage, that there is a balance between mental health between work life balance, and that we’re working through that together as we build this business.
We’re working through what that means. How do we unpack that in a world of the Google culture where people can have all these amenities? But is it really looking at how business and life intersect to be on the same plane?
It’s a complicated ball, believe me. There’s a lot of overlap that gets gray and fuzzy. We’re trying to figure out policies to put together.
I’m just excited to create a business where it’s all women right now, which is amazing. And we’re always thinking about how we can make a difference. How can our crew feel amazing and really feel dedicated, but also feel like I and Luft are dedicated to them, too?
So there’s room to really explore new ways of thinking and being and making money and running a business.
Doris Nagel 36:36
It’s really, I think, about defining the culture that you want, so that you hire the people who are more likely to find meaning and be a good fit.
I read an article yesterday saying you need to think about what your employees want. Some employees want perks, and some employees want to work from home, and some want other things.
It’s finding that out as part of your hiring process, figuring out what that culture looks like, and hiring for those kinds of people. So that what you offer as a company meets their needs, right?
Elaine Frei 37:17
Correct. We won’t be for everyone. And that’s okay.
Doris Nagel 37:21
You mentioned something I want to explore, which is balloon bombing businesses. Talk about what that means. And I’m sure that will lead into some of the charity and community kinds of things your company has done.
Elaine Frei 37:41
At Luft, we believe that giving back strengthens your business, but it also releases endorphins. So you’re producing a happier, healthier work climate and a more dedicated workforce, and more committed Lufters.
And so it’s a win-win for everyone. Giving back makes everyone feel good. And so, we try to do that.
Balloon bombing didn’t originally start with the intention of giving back. But during the pandemic, I felt guilty and uncomfortable that we were experiencing growth when a lot of people were not doing well. And I felt I needed to do something to give back and I didn’t know what it was.
And then I realized, oh my gosh, our massive installations that we do pre pandemic, we’re just going to do that for a hospital and bring some joy to the frontline workers.
So we did three thousand balloon installations on six hospitals. They were huge! I need to get pictures up on the website, I’m behind on that.
But we did six hospitals, we brought all those frontline workers joy. We had we calligraphy on the balloons like “You are Heroes,” “We Love You,” “Stay the Course” — you know, all these like inspirational messages.
And reflecting on that, I realized that felt good, and they felt good, too. This needs to be part of how we run our business. And it aligns with our B Corp strategy. When you become certified, you’re legally a triple bottom line company, and you’re dedicated to those things.
This quarter, we met with the team, and we asked, “Who needs this right now? Who’s our next hospital?” And this was back in June when we were talking about it.
And I said, “You know, it’s small businesses, because it’s like the faucet turned on overnight. Everyone’s open, no masks, go run business, like usual. And all of us were like, what? Supply chains are not back, we’ve just survived a pandemic. And now the entire republic is expecting us to be up and running in 100% capacity!
And it was a lot for small businesses, and a lot that consumers didn’t really realize that.
Doris Nagel 39:52
And the labor issues. A lot of businesses had to let people go, and then all of a sudden, were trying to hire all a bunch of people and train them on a dime. I know it was especially hard for a couple of friends who have restaurants and bars.
Elaine Frei 40:10
And so I said, “It’s the small businesses that we do next.” I came up with this idea called “balloon bombing a business.” We just asked our community. We told them we love to give back. It’s in our balloon DNA, so nominate your favorite small local business that had a rough go at the pandemic, and let us know why you love them, and we’ll surprise them with a balloon bomb and a plaque that says “You survived! You’re a pandemic rockstar, Love Luft Balloons.”
We got over two hundred nominations, and I thought, “Oh my gosh, we have a lot of work to do!” Because I expected maybe a couple of nominations.
We’ve done about twenty now. We go to these businesses, and they’re like, what are all these balloons doing coming in? And we tell them, we’re not soliciting you. And we’re not charging — this is free. And then I go into our spiel, and I say, “We know that you had a hard time during the pandemic, your communities recognize that.” And then I read who nominated them and what they said about them. And then there’s tears, and the patrons are clapping. And then we throw up the balloon bomb, and we put up their plaque, and then we leave.
Doris Nagel 41:19
Wow, that’s got to be inspiring when that happens. It sounds like it could actually be an offering because I have a feeling that bombing businesses might be something that businesses would want to do for each other, you know.
Elaine Frei 41:33
Yes. People do say that, and we tell them, “Go balloon bomb someone who deserves it.” And somebody recently bombed their favorite coffee business.
So it’s creating a trail, a connected trail. It’s like when you’re in the drive thru, and somebody buys your coffee, and then you buy the next person’s, and then they buy the next person’s, just paying it forward.
Doris Nagel
Do you think you’ll ever get tired of working on this business?
Elaine Frei 42:02
No. I have so many ideas, and so many things that I want to do with the business that I’ll never get tired. You can’t when any day you walk into our shop, there’s so many balloons that are prepped for the next day. You see new colors and the ways people come up with the most interesting ideas.
And it’s, it’s joyful, and it’s fun. I just couldn’t see myself doing anything else.
Doris Nagel
Who comes up with the ideas? Is it you? Is it your crew? Is it the customer? Some combination of all the above?
Elaine Frei 42:36
I come up with the ideas. But the colorways, you’re allowed to pick whatever colors you want for your burst for the people who order off the website. And so sometimes, they’ll say they want something very specific.
And we’ll put it together and I’ll be like, “Oh, that’s a good palette!” And then when people order helium bouquets, they’ll put together these things, and I’ll be like, “This is amazing! I would have never thought to pair an olive-green balloon with a hot pink heart with a disco.” It’s fun when you see people’s own creativity and what they’re creating.
Doris Nagel
Looking back on your journey, what advice would you give to your younger self?
Elaine Frei
Oh, goodness, my younger self. Which part of which younger self?
Doris Nagel
Well, maybe putting it putting it differently, what, if anything, do you wish you’d done differently?
Elaine Frei 43:35
I think way back when I wish I would have worked in between undergrad and grad. I was scared because I didn’t know what to do. And I think that that would have given me space to then figure out what to go to grad school for.
I also wish grad school was four years and undergrad was two years. I wish they would flip that, because I think you need the social component of undergrad. You need to figure that out.
But then when you really figure out what you want to do, and you love it, you need time to delve in I wish I could go back to school again if I had the time it. So I wish I’d given myself space to figure it out.
Because maybe then again, I don’t know. I mean, all of this connected, and maybe it was supposed to happen this way. So I guess I don’t really know.
Doris Nagel
Yes, I get it. My guest last week said, “You know, in my company, we don’t talk about mistakes. They’re not they’re not things that we regret. We view them simply as learnings.”
And so I think that’s what you’re saying, maybe in a slightly different way?
Elaine Frei
I like that. It’s all kind of meant to be.
Doris Nagel
The important thing is to step back and figure out, “What was I supposed to learn from this?”
If people are interested in balloon bombing a business or just chatting with you, maybe they’re looking for a little mentoring or some friendly advice or they they’re interested in your products, what’s the best way for them to learn more and to reach you?
Elaine Frei 45:10
You can go to luftballoonstore.com, and the balloon bomb business has its own link at the bottom of the website.
There’s also a contact us form, and you can just shoot us a line there. I see most emails, and even if not, it gets flagged and sent to me. So I’m very on that.
You can also follow us on Instagram at Luft Balloon — that’s where we show some of the fun stuff we’re doing.
Doris Nagel
I really encourage people to go to the website because it is a feast for eye. There’s some very, very cool things on there that I think are hard to really convey in an audio-only format. It’s hard to envision what you create, and much easier to just see some examples.
So I encourage people to go and just take a quick look. I think your jaws will drop. This company is doing some very cool things. And obviously trying to do good for our community and for the environment – Elaine, I really commend you. Good for you!
It’s been a delight having you on the show. Thank you so much for being you know, with me today and sharing some of the insights from your journey. I really appreciate it.
Elaine Frei 46:32
Thank you. It’s been an absolute pleasure.
Doris Nagel
Likewise.
We have just a few minutes left, and I thought it might be a good opportunity to talk a little bit more about something Elaine raised just a few minutes ago. It’s something that I tell clients who are starting their businesses to think carefully about.
So remember, Elaine mentioned that she realized as her business was growing, she didn’t necessarily want to expand and scale her business as quickly as possible she could have. She realized she enjoyed the interactions with her customers and being personally involved in the day-to-day aspects of the business, even delivering some of her balloon arrangements herself, and also connecting with her local community. She realized she might lose much of that if she expanded quickly.
What I always advise my clients is to begin with the end in mind. I wish I could take credit for that very wise expression. But it came from Stephen Covey in his Seven Habits book. Although Covey wasn’t specifically talking about starting a business, it certainly applies equally there.
In my experience, many entrepreneurs do not think in terms of what they want from the exit of their business and what it should look like until the moment is nearly on them. And that’s generally not a good thing, because many of your daily business decisions affect your ability to successfully grow and manage and yes, exit your business when the time comes.
I can think of a few examples. But I think if you think this through for your own business, you’ll see what I mean.
Let’s take something as basic as how and where you find funding for your business. Let’s say your goal is to successfully sell your business or go IPO.
In that case, you might want to aggressively put together a pitch deck and start looking for external funding from angel investors, family offices, even venture capitalists, because that will give you the cash, ideally, to rapidly expand your business. That will show the amazing fast growth that big investors love and produce all those multiples that might lead to a lucrative exit.
The truth though, is that many entrepreneurs absolutely love their business. It is their baby. Many are the entrepreneurs who believe, unfortunately, that they want a need to scale their business and grow rapidly. That will make external investors happy. And as I said, if your goal is to make a bunch of money, move on to your next venture or retire early, that’s great.
But all too often the founder finds it doesn’t make him or her very happy. It often quickly pushes the entrepreneur founder into roles that are not nearly as much fun, or not nearly as connected to the day-to-day hustle and bustle of production and customers.
Suddenly the entrepreneur spends more time doing things that are not nearly as much fun, like hiring and firing people, and delegating things to other people, and managing people who have departments, focusing on policies and procedures, and dealing with all sorts of administrative problems.
Because remember, when you scale, the goal is for the founder to make himself or herself essentially replaceable. That’s so the business can continue running and growing in the future, without them at the helm. That’s the cold reality.
If your business is acquired by a strategic, they may want you around for a little while to help with the transition. But they’re usually pretty eager to start integrating the business into their own company, with their own ways of doing things. And a lot of business owners who’ve been through that have found that, even if the acquiring company one of them stay, they don’t really fit in.
And if you go IPO –unless you’re also a very effective manager, and leader and great at interacting with shareholders, and all sorts of complicated issues related to publicly traded companies — your board or shareholders will start pushing you out the door.
The truth is that many of us who are great at starting a business, or even running a small business, aren’t very good at scaling the business and running a larger enterprise.
And I personally believe from the many entrepreneurs I’ve worked with, that lots of those founders have a very hard time extracting themselves from their business because they love it so much. That’s where they get their joy. And it gets in the way of scaling that’s needed for rapid growth.
I love that Elaine’s clarity about Luft Balloons. She realizes it is her baby. She not only makes good money for herself, and for her team, with whom she’s close and cares about. But it clearly gives her a great deal of personal satisfaction.
I suppose some people, rather sneeringly I think, call this a “lifestyle business.” I personally think we need to come up with a better name that gives this option the respect to deserves.
There is nothing magical about scaling. And there is nothing wrong at all, with creating a thriving business that you, the founder, are in the middle of and want to stay in the middle of for a long time. Maybe a very long time.
Now, eventually, you will have to think about exit. But that may be a long way off. And there’s another way, by the way, that your end game affects your daily decision, and that is your hiring decisions.
If you want to stay small, you might want to hire generalists and people who thrive in a small family like environment and are happy just doing that.
If you want to scale though, you probably want to hire different people, hard charters maybe, or people with experience managing larger departments of people, probably people with more specialized expertise.
I think the really hard part is that many of us entrepreneurs, we don’t always know what we want when we start. A lot of us say without thinking, “Of course we want to scale our business.”
Maybe that’s because we’ve been a bit brainwashed by the tech industry, talking about their huge IPO numbers.
But when push comes to shove, a lot of us find that isn’t what we really want. And it sure helps if you’ve done some real soul searching ahead of time, or at least pretty early on.
The world is way too full of founders who thought they wanted to scale and grow rapidly and brought in external investors to do that, only to find they lost control of how the business grows, or that they’ve hired the wrong people. Or that they’re just not good at the new role they’ve been pushed into, or don’t have fun doing it.
I really encourage all of you out there to take the time to step back answer as honestly as you can: What makes me happy? What are the kinds of activities I’m really good at and enjoy the most?
Then design your business and your exit around that. Because if it’s not fun, what’s the point?
All right, I’m off my soapbox. That’s a wrap for this week. Thanks so much for listening.
And a special thanks again to my guest this week — Elaine Frei, the founder of Luft Balloons, based in Chicago.
You can find more helpful information and resources on my consulting website, globalocity.services.com, and also on my new radio show site, thesavvyentrepreneur.org. There’s a library of blogs, tools, podcasts, and other resources there that are all free.
I welcome your comments, questions and suggestions, or just connecting to shoot the breeze. You can email me at dnagel@thesavvyentrepreneur.org — I promise you’ll always get a response back.
Be sure to join me again next Saturday at 11am Central/noon Eastern.
But until then, I’m Doris Nagel, wishing you happy entrepreneuring!
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