Ever looked at those bottles of bubble solution that kids play with and wondered why nobody has made colored bubbles? Apparently it’s much, much harder than I assumed.

I never would have thought that creating a colored bubble solution which disappears and does not stain would be such a challenge. It took one man plus a hired chemist $500,000 and 11 years to pull-off! This story gives a somewhat in-depth look at just how much work it took to create the disappearing colored bubbles.

As I read the story, I found the bit about how he had created a “washable” colored bubble and was testing it with kids and then realized that washable was not enough – the kids, sidewalk and dog were all blotched with the remnants of the bubbles – very funny. It’s one of those “yeah, I guess that would be a problem” type things that’s not immediately obvious.

The initial product, the children’s (and adult’s!) toy will be called Zubbles. However, the concept of a disappearing dye opens-up some interesting ideas from temporary hair dye to paints that fade so you can see if you like a particular color in your house.

Now that you know the work involved in creating Zubbles, you’ll be able to fully appreciate just how cool such a simple thing is!