Treb Heining and the balloon industry

Check out this short film by Joshua Charow featuring a man named Treb Heining preparing for and talking about the confetti drop during the Times Square New Years Day celebration in 2021.

As Treb himself explains in the video, the confetti you see on live broadcasts of Times Square New Years are almost all entirely done by hand (a surprise to me!) and have been for over 30 years!

People like Treb really interest me because they’ve basically created a market for a product that so many people today associate with celebrations — BALLOONS. His career started with Disney as a “balloon boy” where he quickly learned to tie 17-20 balloons a minute.

Here’s a video of Treb tying a lot of balloons.

After a stint at Disney, Treb went on to literally invent the balloon garland, a flowing collection of balloons all tied together to help usher in a celebratory mood for a space. It all eventually led up to him forming his own balloon launching business known as BallonArt By Treb, which put him on the map as the balloon guy in an industry of virtually just himself. One thing led to another and he still ushers in the largest party in the world in Times Square each year with hand-thrown confetti!