Fireworks Shows

Every year, on the Fourth of July, millions of people in towns and cities across the United States watch the night sky light up with explosives in all different patterns and colors.

For many Americans, the fireworks show is a highlight of the summer — a source of wonder and awe. But the guys in charge of coordinating and launching them are usually more nervous than excited.

BRAU: It is a lot of pressure on the Fourth of July when you’re out there.

That’s JJ Brau. He’s a fireworks choreographer with J&M Displays, one of the nation’s leading pyrotechnics companies.

BRAU: It could only be 500 people at a country club, or it could be 50,000 people on the lake shore. All those people came out to have a good time. And they came out with their families, and they’re expecting something to happen at the end of the night. That pressure sort of builds as we approach, you know, seven, eight o’clock, eight thirty, nine o’ clock. You know, you start thinking, “I really need to get this thing to go.” It’s not, “Maybe this will go.” No — this has gotta go! And if it doesn’t, you’ll have a big problem.

JOHNSON: You push “fire” and the first thing you’re going to feel is that thump in your chest. It’s a huge relief to see that first spark hit the air. 

That’s Mark Johnson. He’s the company’s vice president.

JOHNSON: You’ve got heat, you’ve got the light, the sound, crackling fire. Pyrotechnics is just man controlling this ominous force. I mean, what greater power? Godlike, almost.

In a typical year, there are an estimated 16,000 fireworks shows around Independence Day in America. Cities and towns plan these shows years in advance, and they typically bring in professionals like Brau and Johnson. The work involves artistic design, rigorous safety precautions, and international supply chains. Because America’s cherished summer tradition is almost entirely reliant on global trade.

JOHNSON: 90 percent of fireworks are from China. We’re celebrating with communist product being shot into the air to celebrate our independence.

For the Freakonomics Radio Network, this is The Economics of Everyday Things. I’m Zachary Crockett. Today: Fireworks shows.

*      *      *

There are two sides to the fireworks industry. You have consumer fireworks — the roman candles, sparklers, and skyrockets that you can buy at retail stores and roadside stands. And you’ve got display fireworks, the larger and more powerful explosives you see in professional shows. Together, all of these fireworks make up a $2.8 billion dollar business in the U.S. And while the display side only makes up around 20 percent of that revenue, it’s the engine behind every Fourth of July celebration.

In America, fireworks shows go all the way back to the founding of the country.

JOHNSON: John Adams stated in a letter in 1776 that he thought this event should be celebrated in the future with bonfires and illuminations. And then that following year in Philadelphia was the actual first fireworks display to celebrate our Independence Day. 

Today, says Mark Johnson, the tradition has been supersized.

JOHNSON: Communities actually even compete. We want to have a bigger display than the next town over. It’s a sense of pride that, you know, “We’re being more patriotic. We’re doing bigger and better than you folks.”

For years, a lot of cities and towns handled their own fireworks shows.

JOHNSON: It used to be, fire departments or Lions Clubs, some organization, would get together and raise money throughout the year for their display. They get a permit from the local government and purchase fireworks. And they go out and fire their own display.

Some towns still do things that way. But these days, most municipalities choose to work with a private pyrotechnics firm, like J&M Displays. They take care of the entire process — sourcing the fireworks, designing the show, getting state and local permits, and orchestrating everything on the day of the event. For big display companies like J&M, fireworks are a year-round business. They work on shows for college football games, concerts, and weddings. But most of their revenue is made surrounding the Fourth of July.

JOHNSON: You’re trying to do 70 percent plus of your business within a matter of three, four days.

J&M has a full-time staff of 30 people, and a network of more than 2,000 part-time shooters — the people who are responsible for setting off the fireworks. Each year, the company puts on around 600 Fourth of July shows simultaneously across the country, from small towns to big cities.

JOHNSON: Milwaukee, St. Louis, New Orleans… They might have a four or five thousand dollar display. But we also do shows that are hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The cost of a fireworks show can range from a couple thousand dollars to millions, depending on its duration, and the size and number of the fireworks that are used. JJ Brau, the fireworks choreographer, says your average local show with musical accompaniment — say, in a place like Rapid City, South Dakota — might cost between $20,000 and $30,000 dollars all-in. J&M Displays charges a single, all-inclusive fee.

BRAU: Let’s say the client comes to us with a budget of $30,000. Insurance is typically ten percent of the show. We have to pay our shooters. And that’s generally ten percent of the show. We need a hazmat delivery driver and that’s generally about 12 percent. Then after that, we have miscellaneous costs, like hotel costs and travel costs. Once we’ve taken out all those costs, we’re left with what we call the fireworks dollars, and that’s how much money is going towards the actual product.

The bulk of the budget is spent on the fireworks themselves. Depending on the size and type, a single firework that you see exploding in the sky can cost the city anywhere from $10 dollars to more than $300 dollars. Johnson says that this cost can partly be attributed to a tricky supply chain.

JOHNSON: I’m the lead purchaser for J&M displays. We used to work with over 11 different American manufacturers. Today, there are very few American manufacturers. The bulk comes from China.

China invented the first fireworks, thousands of years ago. Today, they still control the global market for them — largely because of lax regulations, cheaper labor, and longstanding tradition. And it’s likely that the fireworks you see at your local show in America were made in one city in particular.

JOHNSON: Liuyang, Hunan, China is the capital of fireworks manufacturing for the world. You’re talking about generations of workers that have traditionally worked at a fireworks manufacturing plant. They may, during the summer season, be out tending fields, but during the fall and winter they’re making fireworks. You’ve got huge factories that weave around these ridges in these hills. Because that way if you do have an accident it’s going to blow out into the valley.

The aerial display fireworks that are made in Liuyang for commercial use are large spheres wrapped in paper. And they’re filled with pellets that contain chemicals.

JOHNSON: You’ve got a tumbler that you put some of these chemicals in and you start rolling little bitty balls of composition, like little marbles. So you line up these little marbles in this hemisphere. And you have a time fuse that is inserted into this ball, because you want this aerial shell to break at a certain height in the air. At the base of that, you’re gonna put a little pouch of black powder. When it gets ignited, it’s going to ignite that time fuse and launch that ball up into the sky like a cannon.

Those little pellets can be positioned in a number of ways inside the shell to create different patterns when they explode. They can also be made with chemicals that create different colors.

JOHNSON: You’ve got your strontium salts for red. You got barium for green. You’ve got sodium for yellow. Everyone has their copper salts for blue. 

Some colors are harder to make than others. You might notice that blue fireworks are a little less vibrant than red or green fireworks. That’s because the copper chloride used to make blue has to be burned at a very specific temperature. If it burns too low, it won’t be visible, and if it burns too hot, the color will fade to white. Fireworks manufacturers have been trying for several centuries to find a better alternative, mostly without success.

JOHNSON: This is all chemistry behind the scenes to make those colors.

Johnson visits the factories in Liuyang at least once a year to source fireworks for J&M. And he says the hardest part of the process isn’t finding them. It’s getting them back to the United States.

That’s because an estimated 80 percent of China’s exported fireworks go through shipping companies controlled by one man — Ding Yan Zhong, or as he’s known to industry insiders, Mr. Ding. His company’s representatives didn’t respond to our request for comment. But Johnson says Mr. Ding is a force that everyone in the fireworks industry has to contend with.

JOHNSON: He has a stranglehold on the shipments of fireworks. There have been some big players here in the U.S. that have gone their own way, but then he has retaliated, which has made a very financially challenging situation for some people. Our people in China will book that shipment through whatever means possible. But, yeah — it’s the same person who controls it.

As The Washington Post reported, Mr. Ding rose to power around 15 years ago, when the Chinese government decided to consolidate its fireworks exports into the hands of a few people. Today, more than 200 million pounds of fireworks move through his network of trucks, warehouses, and cargo ships into America every year. The shipping cost for fireworks is now 4 times higher than it was before Mr. Ding established his near-monopoly.

JOHNSON: Our shipping cost on a container — we’ll say $20,000 range, give or take.

The Trump administration’s vacillating tariffs on China are likely to drive up that cost even further. Johnson says that even a 30 percent tariff could put a wrench in America’s future celebrations.

JOHNSON: 2026 is the 250th anniversary of the United States. We have been taking contracts for that date for a couple years already. Many of the companies here are saying don’t ship because I don’t want to pay the tariff. When those fireworks warehouses in China get full, the Chinese government is going to shut them down. I think we’re creating our own disaster here for a shortage of display fireworks for our big celebration.

After J&M Displays has managed to get all the fireworks they need, they have to design and put on a successful show. And that has its own challenges.

JOHNSON: You’ve got to have a tremendous amount of budget to maintain attention. If you have anybody looking at their watch, you’ve lost them.

That’s coming up.

*      *      *

The fireworks that J&M Displays orders from China usually arrive at a shipping port in Long Beach, California. They travel by freight train to Omaha or Chicago, then get loaded into trucks bound for J&M’s main storage facility in Southeastern Iowa.

BRAU: We are out in the country. There’s no major city anywhere near us, and, for that matter, not any small town really near us as well. 

Again, that’s JJ Brau, who designs shows for J&M.

BRAU: If you were to do an overhead view of our facility, it might look like a trailer park actually, because we have a 40-acre facility. We probably have 50 or 60 containers, storage containers in groups of three spread out all over the facility, 300 yards apart. And when that shipping container comes in full of product, we unload that thing by hand.

Fireworks are classified by size, color, and, most importantly for audiences, visual effect. The classic spherical explosions are called peonies, or chrysanthemums. There are willows, which result in long dropping tails of sparks, strobes that flicker on and off, and dahlias that make a starfish-like shape. You have pistils, palms, brocades, waterfalls, bouquets, spinners, and even fireworks that make recognizable patterns.

BRAU: For example, rings and crosses, butterflies, hearts, smiley faces. In a perfect world, that happy face shell goes up in the air. It explodes on a perpendicular plane and we are seeing the eyes at the top and the mouth at the bottom and everyone says, “Oh, that’s a smiley face — no doubt about it. Can you believe that?” But you might also get that same smiley-face shell go up and it breaks on a horizontal plane and all you see is a line in the sky. You can’t predict something like that for sure.

Before designing a show, Brau tests and measures each type of firework.

BRAU: We’ll push the button to launch the shell and one person will time the lift of the shell. And that’s the point from when we push the buttons until the shell explodes. And then another person will time from when the shell explodes until we have all dark sky, and that’s considered the duration. We enter those into our system and associate them with each individual effect.

And getting precise reads on the lift and duration allows Brau to perfectly time the fireworks with music — something a lot of cities ask for.

BRAU: The show is designed by me on a computer with computer software and I’m able to take the music loaded up onto the software and as I feel inspired I start putting the shells into the show in certain areas to make it look cool. If the music’s really dramatic and sweeping and that kind of thing, I might use long duration shells like willows to sort of match the music. Other times you’ll have pop music, which is really moving along in a good clip, and you might go another direction with short duration shells. Or you might use all certain colors. The idea is really to create scenes in the air.

Designing a show that fits perfectly with a city’s budget is its own art form.

BRAU: You may have a community that has very little money, but they want a very long show. And so you’ll be shooting one shell at a time with five or six seconds between the shells. And you satisfy their time requirement. However, it might have been the most boring show you’ve ever been to. You kind of want to spread the shells around so you have some less expensive ones so we can get the quantities up, some really expensive ones that just do fantastic, amazing things that will make the crowd really gasp. 

Regardless of a city’s budget, there’s a general limit for the length of a show.

BRAU: It doesn’t matter how much money you have. I’m going to concentrate all those shells into 20 minutes. People get bored after 20 minutes with a firework show. They’ve seen enough.

One thing crowds can never get enough of, though, is the grand finale. Brau says it’s the most important part of the show.

It often accounts for 20 to 25 percent of the overall budget — and it has to be executed in a way that builds suspense.

BRAU: You can start small and then work progressively up. So you have lower elevation finale shells and then it goes up to higher and higher and higher. You build the sound as it goes. I oftentimes like to start the finale quiet and as it progresses, you start adding the salutes and the booms and the whistles and that kind of thing. But mostly it’s the timing of the finale. If you’re not careful, you could send up too many shells at one time and all you would see is a whiteout condition, where all these shells explode and you just get a white sky. One trick that we use are actually finale strings. Those are generally ten individual shells that are strung together, and you only have to light one fuse, and it’ll launch all ten maybe a tenth or a twentieth of a second apart.

On the morning of the big event, J&M works with a network of contracted shooters. They’re the boots on the ground, in charge of unloading fireworks on site, setting up equipment, and making sure the pre-grogrammed shows go smoothly. Here’s Mike Johnson, the company’s vice president:

JOHNSON: Day starts, you pull up with the truck, you set up with all these — we call them racks — it’s just a frame that holds all the mortars or launch tubes that the fireworks are launched out of. We load the pyrotechnics, the shells, into these mortars. We wire everything up with whatever firing system you might be using. And then it’s the hardest part of the whole display day, and that’s waiting until show time. 

Johnson says fireworks shows used to be hand-fired — and the job was much riskier.

JOHNSON: Hand firing is a completely different animal. They’re firing brimstone, you’re being covered in sparks. You’ve got people walking briskly with explosives, reloading those tubes, going back to a box to get more fireworks, as the shooter is pulling the cap, lighting that shell, backing away, and you hear that thump, and hopefully that shell’s going up.

These days, most shows are controlled wirelessly, using an electronic firing system. One push of a button on a computer can trigger an entire 20-minute show from a safe distance. But technology doesn’t mean a show is foolproof. In 2012, a computer glitch caused a fireworks show in San Diego to launch prematurely, all at once. $125,000 dollars worth of fireworks, intended to last 16 minutes, exploded in 30 seconds. The company behind the failed show, Garden State Fireworks, offered the city a replacement show the following year at no cost. Johnson knows the operator, and says he feels his pain.

JOHNSON: You know the hours of work that went into it back at the office. The hours of work went into it on the day. You’re working so many people to make this 15-, 20-minute display of enjoyment for these people and then something happens. I mean, that’s a terrible feeling.

Most of the time, though, the show goes off without any problems, and the fireworks illuminate the night sky with all kinds of colors, shapes, and patterns. But one person you won’t find in the crowd watching is J.J. Brau, the show’s designer.

BRAU: Unfortunately, my Fourth of July traditions were completely ruined when I started working for this place. Most of us are working anywhere from three to five shows in a row. I end up at a community celebration on July 3rd. On the Fourth of July, I find myself at shooting a local country club. And the next day I might be in Des Moines shooting a show there. Sleep is at a premium. But the love of it is really what keeps us all going.

For The Economics of Everyday Things, I’m Zachary Crockett.

*      *      *

This episode was produced by me and Sarah Lilley, and mixed by Jeremy Johnston. We had help from Daniel Moritz-Rabson. A lot of listeners have written in to request this topic, including Jarod Lawson, Greg Barcklow, Wade Hammond, Scott Paine, Ella Haugen, and Jerome Lecomte. If you have an idea for an episode, feel free to email us at everydaythings@freakonomics.com. Our inbox is always open. All right, until next week.

BRAU: We have test fires at night. During the week. That’s a pretty good time. The neighbors get a free firework show, you know, ten or twelve times a year.