Balloons and UGlu® just go together, and so do sisters Joanne Zerpa and Barbara Llinas (aka “Globos Manas.”) Joanne and Barbara are professional balloon artists who work together to make incredible balloon arrangements and run balloon workshops.
Today we’ll take a closer look at what they do and see how Pro Tapes® UGlu® products help them with their amazing balloon work!
Do you have a website or social media you would like to share with our audience?
Instagram: @globosmanas
Pinterest: @globosmanasca
Facebook: @globosmanas
Tell us about you two! What sparked your interest in balloon art?
We are two sisters who started working together in the balloon industry back in May 2008. We started out as distributors of Anagram and Kaleidoscope foil balloons nationwide in Venezuela.
As we visited our clients who used these balloons in their amazing work, our interest in working with balloons ourselves quickly grew.
In 2009, we began to work with latex balloons. In the following years, we attended many balloon workshops and classes offered all around this wonderful world, where we met incredible people with impressive talent.
Little by little, we began to specialize in our own techniques, which led us to venture into hosting workshops ourselves during the pandemic. We continue to offer classes now, while balancing the needs of our clients who request daily balloon arrangements and decorations.
What do you like most about being balloon artists?
There’s a lot of things we like about being balloon artists! The main thing is seeing the final result of our work and the emotions that we inspire in our clients. Each arrangement and decoration is unique and personalized to them.
Each workshop we carry out is a unique experience, too! We don’t just teach; we also learn from our class participants. 1000% effort goes into each workshop. We thank God for each experience and the great friendships that we have made.
It’s a wonderful world, where day by day we continue to learn and work hard so we can offer the best. Our slogan is why we like what we do: We are LAS MANAS (the sisters, in Spanish.) We’re in it together!
How did you discover UGlu® products?
We discovered UGlu® through Planet Balloons Venezuela.
How does UGlu® improve your work as a balloon artist? What do you like about it?
UGlu® helps us so much in our work! We are known for our impeccable compositions. We pay attention to every fine detail of our work. UGlu® makes it so easy to create this highly-detailed level of work.
UGlu® is easy to use, it’s practical, it’s portable, and it comes in many different shapes and sizes to match any type of project.
Tell us more about the Floral Mural you created this year! It has gained a lot of attention.
We were preparing for an online master class back in April 2022 (one of the many online courses that we offer worldwide.) To help market the class, we did several live shows, showing some techniques to demonstrate our knowledge and ability to train future entrepreneurs in the world of balloons.
During one of these live shows, we just happened to create something different! Something really artistic that shows more than just balloons. This mural is really tall, too! It’s about 7-8 feet tall.
What inspired you to create this mural?
We were inspired by the natural beauty of women and what their hair represents. A woman’s hair speaks for itself, it indicates personality and moods.
How did UGlu® help you create this mural?
It was actually our first experience using UGlu®! We needed a glue that would provide us with a super strong and long-lasting hold that would not be noticeable in the final balloon arrangement.
We found that the UGlu® Dashes fit all of our requirements: it performed impeccably. UGlu® did not leave residues or damage the walls, and it was easy to remove.
We used exactly five hundred and fifty UGlu® Dashes to hold together all 270 flowers and 20 leaves that you see in this balloon mural.
It lasted a long time, too! We kept the artwork up for 8 days and we think it could’ve held even longer than that, but we had to clean the wall off for new projects.
We always tell our students to work with quality and responsibility, to take good care of the infrastructures to be decorated (thus guaranteeing a new contract in the future.) UGlu® Dashes are essential to meet these goals.
Tell us about the special feature this floral mural got from Qualatex!
It is an honor that our work has been recognized and appreciated by Qualatex, being that they are currently the #1 balloon company in the world! Their recognition meant that the photos of this mural got shared all around the world, and we are thankful for that.
Do you have any other favorite projects you’d like to talk about?
We’ll show you a whole gallery of balloon art that was created with the help of UGlu®! The red hearts, the wearable wings, the different holiday decorations – ALL of them are held together using UGlu®! That is why, in our workshops and classes, UGlu® is the first tool we put on everyone’s tables. ✌️
If someone has never used UGlu® for their balloon arrangements before, what advice would you give them?
Again, we would emphasize the importance of working with top quality materials, like UGlu®.
In our workshops, we talk about all the materials we work with, and we show every presentation of UGlu® that we have available. Our workshop participants always want to work with UGlu® after they’ve seen how easy and practical it is!
Planet Balloons Venezuela has also talked to us about Pro Gaff® and how we could incorporate this product in our decorations. They mentioned that Pro Gaff® can be used to cover tubes and bases. We haven’t had the opportunity to try this tape yet, however… Hey Pro Tapes®, can we get a sample kit? 😉 😁
