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A ‘used’ but ‘perfect’ Scabby the Rat inflatable is for sale in Philly on Facebook Marketplace

As Hot Labor Summer turns to fall, this inflatable rodent could be yours for a few thousand bucks, a Facebook Marketplace ad offers.

Giant rat put in place by LiUNA Local 332 protesting outside the worksite at laborers start their day. Another day of slow demolition of St. Laurentius at Berks and Memphis is Fishtown section of Philadelphia on Monday, August 22, 2022.
Giant rat put in place by LiUNA Local 332 protesting outside the worksite at laborers start their day. Another day of slow demolition of St. Laurentius at Berks and Memphis is Fishtown section of Philadelphia on Monday, August 22, 2022.Read moreALEJANDRO A. ALVAREZ / Staff Photographer

If you’re in the market for a giant rodent, perhaps to draw attention to a union protest, you’re in luck. Someone in Philadelphia appears to be selling a 12-foot-tall Scabby the Rat inflatable on Facebook Marketplace.

The listing prices the “used but in perfect condition” blow-up-able at $5,000, noting that it inflates in two minutes, has straps for tying down to a location, and stands up on its own.

According to the listing it’s a bona-fide Scabby, meaning it was manufactured by the Midwest-based inflatables company Big Sky Balloons & Searchlights. (It’s unclear from Big Sky’s site how much a brand new Scabby would cost.)

The seller did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Scabby was born in the early 1990s, according to various media reports, after union leaders came up with the idea of a large rat that would serve as a mascot. It started with humans dressed in rat costumes and a fleet of yellow “rat patrol” cars, according to an historical account by In These Times. Big Sky then translated the idea into an inflatable form, and later debuted a slew of other union mascots.

The name “Scabby” is a play on the union term “scab,” used to describe a worker who declines to join a union or crosses the picket line during a strike.

Big Sky co-owner Peggy O’Connor told Vice Media in 2013 that the company was selling about 100 rats a year at the time, ranging in size from 6 feet to 30 feet, and they often heard of labor unions borrowing Scabby inflatables from one another. When they first developed the design, O’Connor told Vice, organizers insisted on a “snarly” image.

Some have argued that the mascot is too unsightly, but just a couple years ago, the red-eyed rodent won acknowledgement of its First Amendment protections from the National Labor Relations Board. The board’s reasoning: the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld free-speech protections for “far more offensive” expressions than a massive, air-filled rat with yellow fangs and bloody scabs on his belly.

The rat is not an uncommon sight around Philadelphia, where it’s been used by unions to protest companies using non-union labor. Local union leaders have boasted in the past about the multiple Scabby inflatables they have on hand for just such an occasion.

The Facebook Marketplace listing has been up four weeks, according to the site. On the heels of a so-called #HotLaborSummer, it’s a wonder it’s lasted that long.