By Mila Besich-Lira

While some were back to work on Friday and other slept in, thousands of other holiday shopper flocked to their favorite retail stores to shop for the best deals.

Former resident Pilar Peralta who is the Assistant Manager at the Walmart Claypool was faced with a big problem and she was able to call home to Superior to solve it.

Helium shortages acrossthe country left her Walmart store without adequate helium to fill up the balloons that would direct customers to the various door buster items and other sales items.

She called Rosemary Quiroz owner at Rose’s Roses flowers to see if they could have their balloons filled for the event.Luckily Quiroz had an adequate supply to fill all the balloons that Pilar needed.

“It is not very common that one ballon order will turn a profit on a helium tank,” Quiroz explained.She and her staff filled dozens of balloons late Wednesday afternoon into the evening that were then transported to the Claypool Walmart.

The helium shortage is raising the cost of filling balloons and is limiting the availability of the gas in many areas.The current helium supplier for Rose’s Roses will no longer be selling helium due to the increased costs of the natural gas so a new vendor will have to be procured for Rose’s Roses.

Consumers can expect the cost of helium balloons to rise until natural gas production increases again.Globally 180 million cubic meters of helium are consumed each year, the US Geological Survey reports that there are around 50 billion cubic meters of helium available.

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