In short:
- Amberman is the world's tallest inflatable tube person - here to tell Aussies everywhere the best time to use energy
- During the first week of December 2024, he'll inflate and dance in the Melbourne skyline anytime the amount of renewable energy in the grid reaches more than 50% of the total supply - meaning cheaper, greener energy to run your home appliances or charge your EV
- Check him out live and vote for where you'd like Amberman to head next!
Look! Up in the sky! It's Amberman!
If you’ve noticed anything unusual in the Melbourne skyline lately - perhaps a giant green inflatable tube person - you’ve come to the right place.
50 metres tall and just as excited about cheap renewable energy as we are, Amberman soars every time renewable energy makes up the majority of the grid’s electricity supply. It’s all about letting Aussies everywhere know that it’s the perfect time to save money on running their home appliances or charging their EV.
Maybe not what you were expecting from an energy company, but energy is actually exactly what Amberman is all about!
(Not in Melbourne? You can check Amberman out here via our live webcam).
Why Amberman?
"Tube people" epitomise joy and fun. They never move the same way twice, making them hugely entertaining to watch. From featuring in ‘Family Guy’ to Tooheys beer ads, they’ve transcended their former role as emblems of used car lots everywhere.
Our very own Amberman is not just your average inflatable. He’s an unmissable, visual reminder of when renewables are powering the grid. He’s also the tallest tube person in the world. And like us and our customers, cheaper, greener energy makes Amberman feel like dancing! He’ll take flight when the grid’s renewable percentage peaks. Similarly, when fossil fuelled-energy dominates in the grid, Amberman gets a little deflated.
Amberman's also a fun extension of a long-running obsession/inside joke at Amber about the best visual ways to bring wholesale energy prices to life, beyond the Amber app.
Over the years, our amazingly inventive customers have suggested (and built) a bunch of their own and so have our team, including our staff engineer Myles's very own Amber Lamp in the shape of a stingray. This guy was built to commemorate the time our ever-adventurous co-founder (and Amber Lamp enthusiast) Dan Adams accidentally stepped on one while he was out surfing.
Building a giant tube person to educate people on the best time to use energy is a bit of an outlandish goal, but as an energy and tech company that likes to do things a bit differently, we like a challenge. Whether it’s our industry-leading battery and EV optimisation tech, publishing a fake obituary for an energy company that sold out to Big Oil (Powershop), or putting our co-CEO in a bathtub to explain the energy crisis.
Plus, at a time when there’s a lot of bad news flooding our feeds, we loved the idea of making an important message engaging, fun and most importantly, actionable. By raving in the sky when it’s a good time to use cheap renewable energy, we reckon Amberman ticks all three.
Designing Amberman
Designing Amberman was a joint effort between:
- The Amber marketing team
- Giant Inflatables, a Melbourne-based, family-run business specialising in - you guessed it - giant inflatable things
But even Giant Inflatables had never designed or built an inflatable THIS giant. In fact, Amberman was double the size of their biggest inflatable to date: a 25 metre one created for the World Masters games in Melbourne.
Two prototypes were built to test different skin designs, materials and the launch method that would be used to get Amberman into the air. As the world’s tallest tube person and a symbol of Amber’s mission, we knew Amberman needed to be both super light weight, durable, and sustainable.
“The very idea of Amberman was exciting because ‘Ravers’, as we call them, are a core product for our business. However thinking about the requirements besides gut feel to pull it off was daunting. It required an experience-based concept, followed by an engineer’s evaluation,” said David Abramowitch, Owner of Giant Inflatables.
“Finding an engineer who could understand the problem and evaluate our solution was huge. Eventually we made contact with James Holbeach Ph.D, a leading engineer in the field of fluid dynamics, who evaluated our proposal and gave the thumbs up.”
Building Amberman
After landing on the right design for Amberman, it was time to make the concept a reality. In terms of hands on time with Amberman, no one had more of it than Giant Inflatables’ seamstress Premilla Kumar whose job it was to spend three days turning more than 60 metres of recycled nylon into the world’s tallest inflatable tube person. Thanks Premilla!
But a heap of recycled nylon and a dream wasn’t the only thing we were going to need to bring this flailing tube person with a mission to life. Along the way, we realised that we’d need to build a custom fan to be powerful enough to get Amberman up into the sky when the grid turned green.
Giant Inflatables developed a fan that would run on three-phase power to be capable of pumping enough air into Amberman to keep him afloat. In addition to special fan blades, an in-take cone and a top flange (don’t ask), the upgraded fan evolved from one with a simple on/off switch to one with a dial. This would allow us to slowly turn down the amount of air being directed into Amberman so we could control his descent as needed.
Testing Amberman
Before Amberman was ready for showtime, we had to put him through his wavy paces. This included seeing how Amberman would respond to different wind conditions, how he moved, how we could control his ascent or descent, and how noisy he was.
Finding a place where you can unveil a 50 metre tall inflatable in the sky without anyone noticing is a logistical challenge in itself. Ultimately, we did several rounds of testing with Amberman at a farm south of the city - we suspect there were a few confused cows - before we knew he was ready to take to the skies over Melbourne's CBD.
Amberman’s big debut
Three years in the making, we’ve finally made it to launch week and we couldn’t be more excited to see Amberman take to the skies. If you’re in Melbourne CBD, keep your eyes peeled for this towering green tube person breaking out his moves amidst the city skyline. If you see him you’ll know it’s a great time to use cheap renewable energy to run your home appliances, or charge your EV!
It doesn’t end here for Amberman
We’re happy to report that beyond his performance this week in Melbourne, Amberman will live on.
First, in the form of mini “Ambis”: the most recent manifestation of the “Amber lamp” obsession we told you about earlier. Specially designed to commemorate Amberman’s debut, these miniature 3D-printed Ambermen light up and change colour to show you when it’s the best time to use cheap renewable energy. After sending a selection out to Amber customers this week, it looks like we might not be the only ones who love this idea. Let us know if you’d like one too and we'll see what we can do! No promises just yet.
Secondly, we’re also taking suggestions from the public on where to take Amberman next. If you’ve got an idea of where you’d like to see Amberman shake a tail feather to help people make the most of cheaper, greener energy, let us know here. Amberman could be coming to a location near you soon!
Yet another opportunity to embarrass our CEO, Chris
If for any reason Amberman can’t fly, we do have a Plan B: Chris, our ever up-for-it CEO, in an Amberman costume. Here’s some behind the scenes footage of Chris doing his best giant inflatable impression in a car park. He had a whale of a time. We’d be lying if some of us weren’t secretly hoping that Chris ends up having to do this live at the Amberman launch site.
(Chris went from this shoot to an investor meeting. Unconfirmed whether he was still wearing the Amberman suit when he arrived there).
Thanks for checking out Amberman! Check out the rest of our site or get a quote if you'd like to learn more about Amber's model and how much you could save by using energy when cheap renewables are powering the grid.
