Topic - Cool Products

August 3, 2011

Wordless Wednesday: Teachers Go for Distance – a 12 Foot Mentos & Diet Coke Soda Geyser

A teacher attending Julie Gintzler’s Story Time Slime this weekend in Springfield, Illinois took this picture of Julie launching a 12 foot geyser!

Julie left the bottles of Diet Coke in her car with a 104 degree heat index for the day. The hot soda was the perfect ingredient to blast some super high geysers. That may be one for the Geyser Hall of Fame.

August 2, 2011

UV Bead Necklaces – Cute, Fun and a Reminder of Sun Dangers

By Blog Editor Susan Wells

Our customers are always coming up with unique and creative uses for our science toy products. Marilyn Daggett from Arizona designed duck necklaces with sun energy beads to trade on an upcoming Quacker Factory cruise in October.

Marilyn purchased a pack of our Color Changing UV Beads a few years ago to monitor her sun exposure at the urging of her dermatologist. She had about 500 left over and decided to create necklaces to trade with friends during the cruise. She mixed the UV Beads with crystal and plastic beads along with the duck lamp work beads.

The cruise sets sail in October to several ports of call including the Bahamas, St, Thomas and St. Martin. Quacker Factory is a very popular brand of clothing that sells exclusively on QVC and offers cruises for about 500 of their most dedicated fans. The ladies (and some of their husbands) bring ducky-related items to trade and share during the cruise. Marilyn has made about four dozen necklaces to trade.

She thought they’d be perfect for monitoring sun exposure and fun to wear. (We agree.) Only a few of

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May 26, 2011

Justin Timberlake Hypnotizes Saturday Night Live Audience with Steve Spangler Prop

Last Thursday, the producers from Saturday Night Live in New York called our office. They spoke with one of our amazing customer service representatives, Harmony. We’ve had producers from shows call us in the past, so this wasn’t a huge surprise for Harmony. But when the producer explained it was for the season finale and Justin Timberlake would be using it as a gag prop in a skit, Harmony took notice. The show purchased two Incredible Shrinking and Growing Head kits to use during the show.

Every box that is shipped from our Distribution Center is double checked for quality. For a package on it’s way to 50 Rock in New York, the product was taken out of the box and personally checked by Harmony before being sent out. Justin was the Mysterious Crandell, a not-so-good magician who used our kit to try and hypnotize the audience. Watch the clip to see what happened.

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May 24, 2011

Want a Fun, Hands-on, Creative Science Experiment? Try Sun Print Fabric

By Blog Editor Susan Wells

I took a package of Sun Sensitive Fabric into Mrs. Vernon’s 3rd grade class this week. Mrs. Vernon is a teacher who loves science and hands-on learning. She knows how to integrate science into her lesson plans and encourages me to bring in some fun science activities to share with her class throughout the year. I hope she knows this is what I love about my job.

With all the rainy, cloudy weather in the Denver area this spring, it has taken us weeks of trying to schedule a time between all of the other lessons she must get in before the end of the year and the rain drops.

We finally had a window this week. And by window, I mean a few hours before the rain clouds came in. Again.

Sun Print Fabric is treated with a special light sensitive solution, then dried and sealed in a light-proof bag. When exposed to the sun, the fabric will change color. It works just like Sun Sensitive Paper. Place some flat items on top of the fabric, lay it in the sunlight for 5-10 minutes,

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February 17, 2011

Mentos Geyser Car Makes Splash at Toy Fair

We are showing our new Mentos® Geyser Rocket Car at the New York Toy Fair this week. Strap the car to a bottle of soda, like Diet Coke, drop in some Mentos® and let it take off. It goes fast and can reach speeds of up to 35 miles per hour and travel about 150 feet, so make sure you watch for speed traps if out in the neighborhood. The Rocket Car will be available to purchase this summer.

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Science teachers have been doing the soda and mint experiment for years and years, but the original method used Wintergreen Lifesavers. When the manufacturer of the candies changed the diameter making them larger than the opening of the 2-liter bottle, teachers went looking for a substitute. MENTOS® candy did the trick, and proved to be the perfect candy to mix with the carbonated soda. For more information on the Mentos/soda reaction, read our experiment and watch the video that started the craze back in 2005.