It’s beginning to feel a lot like summer!

Let’s celebrate the season with the lei and flower crown, a Hawaiian tradition with thousands of years of history. Flower artist and lei maker Ocean Dreamer (ocean_dreamerr on Instagram) has a feed full of gorgeous lei and flower crown designs for weddings and all occasions we’d like to spotlight today.

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Pink Pua Melia lei for this Aloha Friday Pa’ina . #classic #pink #plumeria #bumbucha

A post shared by Floral lei Artist (@ocean_dreamerr) on May 24, 2019 at 9:14pm PDT

The Origins of Leis

Leis have been constructed of various materials including flowers, shells, leaves, nuts, feathers, and bone, but a braid of green Maile vine has been at the center of the lei all along.

The lei was introduced to Hawaii by the ancient Polynesian voyagers who first settled the islands. For centuries leis have been worn as garments to beautify the wearer, exchanged by leaders to seal peace agreements, and served a ceremonial purpose in religious rites and celebrations.

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Love… Aloha… & lots and Lots of Plumeria 💛 Bumbucha Pua Melia Lei. #graduationLeis #plumeriaSeason #puaMelia

A post shared by Floral lei Artist (@ocean_dreamerr) on May 11, 2019 at 12:31am PDT

In the colonial era and later on as tourism to the islands expanded, lei vendors sold their wares to British and American visitors, and the lei took on another meaning as a form of greeting. It became tradition to throw one’s lei into the waters if departing Hawaii by ship.

Today there are few hard rules about when and where to don a lei—it is an all-occasion garment, but because of their great beauty and use of fresh flowers, leis are most often worn during celebrations.

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Fall in love with Taking care of yourself. Fall in love with the path of deep healing . Fall in love with becoming the best version of yourself, but with patience,with compassion and respect to your own journey. 🌺Happy Aloha Friday🍃 @kimi_swimmy x @keepwildco pic @instaclamfunk 🌱 #fbf #1yrago #kimiswimmy

A post shared by Floral lei Artist (@ocean_dreamerr) on Feb 1, 2019 at 1:39pm PST

Ocean Dreamer’s Leis and Flower Crowns

Ocean Dreamer herself is a designer in Hawaii with a strong social media presence. That alone is something to admire these days, but her designs are all spectacular and if you check out her feed you can find them adorning wedding chuppahs and arches as well as being worn for everyday use and celebrations. She even includes some process pictures as she works to get just the right look.

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First Blue Jade Lei Po’o I made, With pohinahina , plumeria, Bombax & orchids 🌱from our garden. 🦋 #nofilter #leigarden #LeiAlohaFriday #allnatural #wahine

A post shared by Floral lei Artist (@ocean_dreamerr) on Mar 29, 2019 at 9:43pm PDT

Florists, have you received any requests for leis or Hawaiian style flower crowns? Let us know what you think in the comments below!

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Floranext makes great florist software. Florist websites, floral POS, florist wedding/event proposal software, and florist technology. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.

Mother’s Day is just around the corner! Is your business ready for this busy floral holiday?

Having a plan in place to make the most revenue during Mother’s Day is critical to earning the rewards of this bustling, blossoming occasion. Read on for an agenda to help you plan and organize your shop for the upcoming Mother’s Day holiday.

1. Promote Your Floral Business!

Begin by using your floral website and social media profiles to start marketing your floral arrangements and your business. It’s not too late!

Images & Products

• • Post high-quality photos of your work or any specials you are offering during Mother’s Day on your website or social media platforms.
  • Don’t forget to link your social media posts to your website! You want to make it as easy as possible for customers to make a purchase—this also means that advertising your social media heavily on your website can actually lead customers away from making a purchase.
  • Mother’s Day products should be prominently displayed and easily accessible throughout your website.

Hours & Policies

• Clearly post your shop’s business hours on your website and social media.
• Having clear policies on delivery, returns, and substitutions will alleviate any headaches for you and your customers and help head off negative customer experiences.

Promotions & Discounts

• Increase traffic to your store by offering deals or discounts on pickups rather than deliveries.
• List special promotions. This is a great way to encourage customers to shop early, before Mother’s Day week.
• Don’t forget to update your product pricing to cover your costs!

Note: “Promoting” does not always have to mean offering discounts. Remind customers why they should order flowers through your business.

2. Staffing, Scheduling and Duties, Oh My!

Making sure you have enough coverage can be overwhelming during the holiday rush. Not to worry, take a deep breath and follow these tips!

Hiring

• If hiring extra help, have them come in on a day before Mother’s Day week to go over their responsibilities and training.
• If hiring extra drivers, discuss with them whether you require them to use their own vehicle.
• If you can, keep a standby driver at the shop to handle new orders for delivery.

Employees

• Have an employee meeting and discuss what is expected of them during Mother’s Day.
• Make sure to explain how important everyone shows up and does what is expected of them.
• Encourage and praise your employees and floral designers. Its always better to be positive than negative.

Scheduling & Duties

• Have your Mother’s Day week scheduled out two weeks in advance. That way there are no surprises to your staff and you have time to make adjustments and improvise as needed.
• Go over job descriptions with employees—it’s always useful to remind everyone what their responsibilities are.
• Assign sections for the delivery drivers in specific areas. Add finished flower arrangements to this area with the date of delivery that is bold and clear.

3. Don’t Forget your Flowers & Supplies

Making sure you have enough flowers and supplies to get through the holiday is important.

Supplies

• Start looking around for supplies, containers, baskets and vases weeks before Mother’s Day.
• Visit your local supplier. However, don’t forget to visit discount home stores and dollar stores. You can find some great unique items.
• Don’t settle! Shop around for the best deals on supplies and florals.

Flowers

• Start ordering your Mother’s Day flowers early to get the best value.
• Don’t forget to shop around if you buy from multiple wholesalers.
• If you are comfortable, get your flowers through a floral auction. A great opportunity to get some discounts when purchasing in large quantities.
• Make sure to order flowering plants, orchids, and dish gardens. These are big sellers and require very little work.

Note: If you are new to the floral industry, Mother’s Day spans for a week, not a day. So order enough flowers!

4. Start Prepping & Showcasing your Flowers!

Stay ahead of the game with these prepping and showcasing tips during the busy holiday rush.

Prepping

• Prep your flowers when they arrive.
• Teach your front of store staff how to wire flowers to help cut down the time.
• Cut ribbon and make bows ahead of time.
• Green any vases, baskets or containers.
• No wastefulness! With the abundant supplies and flowers in the shop, it is easy to get sidetracked and be super wasteful. Everything thrown on the floor that can be used should be. Wasting or throwing out even a good pin or wire is considered money out of your pocket. Please be sure to express this to your employees.

Showcasing

• Gather up all your add-ons and gift items and display them prominently in the store.
• Make sure you re-stock your impulse buys on your front counter to sell in addition to flower arrangements.
• Make sure your flower shop and displays are clean and have an inviting atmosphere.
• Remember: If employees have time to lean, they have time to clean! Breaks are important but it doesn’t take much energy to tidy up.

Work Ahead

• Work a day ahead. Fill any orders for next day the day before. Working a day or two ahead will allow you flexibility just in case there are any last minute orders.
• Place premade orders in a cooler tagged with date of pickup or delivery.
• Mark any time-sensitive orders and bring those to the front of your cooler.

Note: It helps to have a system that works best for you. However, working on orders per day can feel overwhelming, so staying ahead of the game is always best.

5. Take Care of Yourself

It is important to take care of yourself during this busy Mother’s Day week.

• Wear comfortable clothes and shoes. Avoid open-toed shoes, as this can be an insurance liability in some areas.
• Make sure you eat! Breakfast, Lunch, and dinner are important—don’t skip meals!
• Get enough sleep. No one is at their best with lack of sleep.
• Take mandatory breaks.
• Do not sweat the small stuff. Regardless of how hard you try, there may be a complaint here or there. Do not let this get you down. It’s the nature of the business. The world can’t survive without florists!
• Try to enjoy Mother’s Day week by keeping a journal of all the funny things that happen or mishaps that take place to reflect on for next year.

Tip: Bring in extra shoes and store them in your cooler to remedy those aching feet. 

We would like to wish all florists a very successful Mother’s Day!

Florists, do you have any great Mother’s Days tips to share with our readers? Please post any of your Mother’s Day tips or feedback below.

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Floranext offers great florist software, florist POS, florist websites and florist wedding proposal software. Our florist technology products are built by florists, for florists. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.

Check out this season’s hottest floral trends!

Image via Haute Photography

Ah, September is almost here. For some florists, September is welcomed busier season than the long summer days. Long-sleeved shirts and beautiful rustic blooms, right? Hold on tight, because some of this year’s autumn flower trends on social media are quite surprising.

From unique flower combinations to exquisite new blooms, autumn is a season that encompasses all that is wondrous.

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Floral Wreaths

Composed of dried or silk, these are a fall must-have for shoppers. High-end home decor stores are offering these at a premium price and cashing in. How about whipping up some beautiful floral wreaths for sale at your shop and ecommerce website?

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Ribbon + Wrappings = Sales

If you are not high-styling your wrapped bouquets, you are missing out some social media buzz. Complete the look with beautiful silk ribbon.

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Cotton Floral Arrangements

I know what you’re thinking: amazing. Just remember this—cotton with the stems are available from supply wholesalers at a great price. Cotton is super hot for fall and just exquisite for the holidays. Incorporate some cotton in all arrangements. This cotton trend will not be going away anytime soon.

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Sweet Ranunculus

Oh, ranunculus, how I love thee! And so does everyone else, this is a highly sought-after bloom and among the top five favored on social media. Get your ranunculus on!

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Chocolate Cosmos 

With a name like chocolate cosmos, we knew they would be tempting. This isn’t a new flower stem for florists, but it’s being used so frequently and the number 1 wildflower choice for social media followers. Chocolate cosmos bloom mid-to-late summer, so they’re a perfect addition to your high-style garden-picked arrangements.

Check out this close-up of a chocolate cosmo flower. Aren’t they just beautifully perfect in every way?

Image via Shutterstock

Florists, what are your thoughts on these trends for Autumn? Have you incorporated any of these trends in your flower shop? Please share your feedback or questions below in the comment section.

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Floranext makes great florist software. Florist websites, floral POS, florist wedding/event proposal software, and florist technology. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.

Promoting on Instagram is a great way to gain new customers and grow your floral brand!

So why aren’t more floral professionals taking advantage of the Instagram community to market their flower business? Perhaps because some floral professionals don’t know how to utilize Instagram to its fullest advantage.

With Instagram reaching 1 billion active monthly users this past month, it’s important to understand this audience. Instagram is a trendy social media platform with a lot of influence. Read on for some easy ways to get started promoting your floral business on Instagram.

Image via Shutterstock

Create an Instagram Floral Business Account

If you haven’t already done so, create a business Instagram account. Having a business account allows you to link to your floral website, connect your business Facebook page, and display shop contact phone numbers and email addresses.

Make sure to include your website link to direct users to your floral website. There is only one option for a link, but this “backlink” does help build your SEO visibility as well.

Image via Shutterstock

Be Clear On Image Quality

Creating a post on Instagram does require a little bit of time and effort. Make sure your images are clear, composed properly, and look professional. On Instagram your marketing is primarily visual. Appealing images will gather you more followers, so invest some time in taking quality images of your floral products.

Image via Shutterstock

Engage Other Users

In order to build your brand and credibility, you must be an active participant on Instagram. Be sure to follow your followers back as well as other businesses, mentors, and other floral professionals to engage in conversation and gain more visibility to those users’ followers.

Image via Shutterstock

Get #Hashtaging

Hashtagging has never been more important to the Instagram platform than it is today. makes sure to use relevant hashtags on each post, don’t just copy and paste the same hashtags to all of them—Instagram’s algorithms demote successive posts with repeated hashtags as a measure to cut down on spam.

Instagram users can now also mark hashtag they don’t want to see, which helps Instagram’s algorithms show them other new content. This is yet another reason to use a variety of hashtags, in case a user is filtering out one that you use.

Remember, hashtags are a way of organizing content, and many users do search through a given hashtag, they’re not just for decoration.

Facebook and Instagram: Two Peas in a Pod

Facebook owns Instagram, so it helps to think of them as closely related. Connect your Facebook business page (not your personal Facebook account!) with your business Instagram to enable double-posting. This will boost your visibility to reach a wider amount of users between the two platforms.

Image via Shutterstock

Start a Contest Trend

Contests are direct marketing with a twist, and have broad appeal to many Instagram users. Invite users to interact with your page with posts like “Share your favorite flower” or “Your pet with flowers” and so on. The possibilities are endless, and sharing on both Instagram and Facebook is a sure way to gain as many participating users as possible.

Image via Shutterstock

Showcase Your Floral Operations

Posting your floral arrangements is great, however it is helpful to mix it up with other image posts that are personal to your floral business. This gives your followers a sense of knowing who you are, and a more personal connection to you and your floral business. Create postings for your employees, shop pets, floral designs in progress, and silly fun images to allow followers a glimpse of daily life around the shop.

Florists, do you have any important advice for florists on Instagram? Please share your feedback any related questions in the comment section below!

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Floranext offers great florist software, florist POS, florist websites and florist wedding proposal software. Our florist technology products are built by florists, for florists. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.

You’ve adjusted your branding to attract Millennials, but is your flower shop ready for the rising Generation Z?

According to Forbes, by 2020 Generation Z—people aged 22 or younger—will account for 40% of all consumers. If you start planning your Gen Z marketing strategy now, you’ll be ready when this generation starts entering the workforce and expanding their consuming habits.

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Engaging Gen Z

Gen Zers are known for their ability to multitask with their devices. It is important to take this into account when doing your floral marketing—a simple social media ad or promotional Youtube video may not be impactful enough to grab their attention. Ironically, this means Gen Zers have a higher tolerance for social media ads than previous generations.

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Getting To Know Gen Z

Knowing your consumers is the most important part of marketing to them.

As a generation, Gen Zers are diverse and culturally open-minded. They downplay traditional gender roles and want to make a difference. They also have goals—some call them “dreamers,” but often in a positive way—they will not let anyone stop them from following their passions.

So what can the floral industry do to grab their attention? You can start by brushing up on their preferred social media. Gen Z uses different social media platforms for different kinds of activity.

• Facebook: Used mostly for information
• Instagram: Displaying their ambitions—Instagram is the most popular platform for building a personal brand and for brand discovery
• Snapchat:  Sharing snapshots of daily life
• Twitter: News source
• Youtube: Entertainment and instructional/tutorial videos
• Pinterest: Inspiration

Instagram and Snapchat are sometimes called “intimacy builders,” making these platforms the best way to showcase your floral ads, with Facebook close behind.

Knowing the ways in which these social media platforms work for the Gen Zers is a way of tailoring your marketing to work for them. Remember to always be authentic as well!

Image via Shutterstock

An Open-Minded Generation

Gen Z is one of the most open-minded and diverse generations, with a famously nonjudgmental mindset and a spirit of tolerance. Floral professionals should take note and create captivating social media ads that are socially diverse.

Image via Shutterstock

Mobile-Friendly Floral Websites  

If your floral website is not responsive or otherwise mobile friendly, get it optimized as soon as possible. Gen Zers spend lots of time on their mobile devices, and other devices (including computers!) are secondary. Make sure your floral website is mobile responsive.

Image via Shutterstock

Gen Z Do-Gooders

Gen Z is all about making a difference, from helping the environment or buying for a cause. Gen Z likes doing good for the economy, the environment, and their community.

Image via Shutterstock

Let’s face it, branding flowers is not always easy. However, with social media sites like Instagram and Pinterest the floral industry is making huge waves, and in the last few years the growth has been tremendous.

Gen Zers are taking notice of the beautiful floral designs on tablescapes, events, and birthdays.  Gen Zers appreciate flowers and inspiring designs, it’s up to the floral professionals to update their marketing and flower shop for this tech-savvy generation. Lacking social media will certainly affect your floral business in years to come. Online floral branding is key for the survival of your flower business.

Floranext offers great florist software, florist POS, florist websites and florist wedding proposal software. Our florist technology products are built by florists, for florists. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.

We all know how significant reviews are for our floral businesses—over 85% of customers base their purchases on reviews they see online.

Unfortunately, many satisfied customers will not leave a review, but you’ll always hear from the naysayers. This is why florists pull their hair out over negative reviews. Our goal is to encourage you to proactively seek customer reviews, not wait for them.

Online reviews are here to stay, and good or bad reviews are overwhelmingly important for the success of your flower business, the only way to grow your flower business is with reviews, and the best way to combat negative online reviews is with positive reviews.

With some florists now entering their slower months of the year, now is a great time to start building a strategy for garnering more online customers reviews.

Image via Shutterstock

1. Offer Discounts for Floral Reviews

The power of a discount, don’t believe me, try it for your self. The task can be as simple as adding a notice on your counter or florist website. The sign can say something along the lines of, “Google & Yelp On-the-Spot Reviews get $5 off.” If you really need the reviews, offer a $10 discount. Remember, this is all part of marketing and can be written off.

Good to Know: While at a big box home store, at the end of the sale I was invited to leave my cashier an online review for a chance to win $500 gift card. Although the chances I would win this gift card were slim, it did encourage me to leave a review and the store only foots the bill for a single gift card.

Image via Shutterstock

2. Be Direct—Request a Review!

While we’re thankful for the customers that give us positive online reviews without asking, let’s face it—most of the time customers are not privy to online reviews or aware of the impact they have, therefore we must be direct and simply ask.

• Ask customers after a sale, either by phone or in person
• Be sure to ask customers on your floral website
• Email customers with a link to review your flower shop with website order confirmation
• Be blunt and post links on social media to your review pages asking for reviews

Image via Shutterstock

3. Make Leaving a Floral Review Easy and Accessible

We all think customers know how to leave reviews online, the fact is that some do and most don’t or rather not take so much effort. Make the process for reviewing your floral business easy and we mean as easy as ultimately possible.

• Have a direct link on your website to your review page; the home page is great, however using this link on multiple pages improves visibility
• Have an iPad or another device at your counter with your review page open and ready for action
• Send monthly or quarterly emails to your customers to review you with a direct link to your review page
• Add your social media address to your business cards—make sure your social media has all the appropriate links to your review pages

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4. Be Responsive When You Get a Floral Review

When getting reviews—good or bad—you must respond either with a grateful “thank you,” or with your version of the story. Nothing entices customers to leave a review more than when they see the business is acknowledging your interactions. Feeling they got the owner’s attention and feedback can be very gratifying to customers.

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Some Ways Reviews Help Your Floral Business Thrive

• High SEO impact, making your brand stand out from competitors on search engines
• Reviews can show on online search engines lists raising your placement
• Influences consumers into making a purchase
• Offers business credibility

Getting a Bad Review

This all said, we don’t want you to dwell on the occasional negative review. Yes, they can be annoying and even flat-out untrue, however having a good balance actually ranks your brand best. The key is a few poor reviews, with appropriate non-defensive response with good reviews, makes your business look legitimate, and also shows you care enough to respond and ultimately that is what customers want to see. Click here to learn more about the ways bad reviews can be helpful.

 

For florists who would never think of asking for reviews, it good to start building reviews into your everyday business tactics, just like asking a customer if they would like an add-on or upgrade. We cannot emphasize enough how important these are in building your online reputation and brand.

Florists, do you have any advice or questions regarding online customer reviews? Please share your feedback, tips, or questions in the comment section below.

Floranext offers great florist software, florist POS, florist websites and florist wedding proposal software. Our florist technology products are built by florists, for florists. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.