According to some reports, toy designer Tim Kehoe spent 15 years and $3 million US to bring his vision of colored soap bubbles to market. Making a colored bubble is apparently hard enough, but the real challenge is making them non-staining. That's right: By virtue of some very fancy dye chemistry, Zubbles are only colored as bubbles. Once they pop the color disappears. After years of hype, they can finally (and only) be purchased here.
Posted by Sean Michael Ragan |
Aug 20, 2009 09:00 AM
Chemistry, Makers, Toys and Games |
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Interesting. A couple years ago, IIRC, they were coloured bubbles and non-staining, but you'd have to wash whatever clothes they landed on.
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I ordered my Zubbles the first day they were available, and got them a few weeks ago. They definitely look awesome, and make scary stains on walls and clothing. But the color vanishes completely after a little bit. The unique dye chemistry for this actually made it into several other products before Zubbles finally became available.
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I also ordered these the day they were made available! I've been watching their progress over time and as soon as they were out, I jumped on them. Right now they only come in purple and blue.
The dye seems to only disappear if the solution is wet. I got some zubbles on the carpet at work and when the solution dried out, it did stain.
Soap and water should be able to get the color out though.
Some Zubbles popped on a paper towel and also left a stain.
Still, the cool factor really makes these bubbles worth it.
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Their promo video is the saddest thing ever.
http://www.zubbles.com/flash/zubblesVideo.html
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It's just what you might expect. A bunch of kids playing with colored bubbles.
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