Together they moved onto a Sausalito barge with Jak Simpson, who in 1954 founded a business named the "Boobam Bamboo Drum Company". Wheat, who was also working on the President Lines cruises to the Orient as a bass player, would buy large-diameter giant bamboo in the Philippines and bring them back on the ship to build the South Pacific Island bamboo drums, which they manufactured in Mill Valley, California, as Boobam's, ('bam' and 'boo' switched around). The drums fascinated several jazz groups, which added them to their percussion sections. In 1956, Chet Baker's Ensemble used them to perform on the Today Show.