Shop Facelift and More at Blooms and Bears

"Our main New Year's resolution last year was to remodel the retail area of our flower shop, says LuAnne Schwab of Blooms and Bears Florist and Gifts in Irvine, Calif. "It had been about 14 years since our last major makeover. We were due for a face-lift and more." They followed through fast, starting in January and finishing just in time for Valentine's Day 2007.  "We were happy with the results, and more importantly, so were our customers."

• removing everything in the retail area and disposing of "shopworn items and fixtures;"
• replacing carpet with "easier to clean and maintain" 18-inch square porcelain tiles that continue into the flower cooler;
• adding a "height-extender" to the top of the flower cooler face to give it a "floor-to-ceiling" look and painting the inside of the cooler;
• repainting walls and cooler front and replacing a wallpaper border with simple crown molding;
• re-staining and polycoating wood trim;
• replacing cool white fluorescent bulbs with "natural sunshine" bulbs;
• putting SAF and FTD posters in picture frames (with plans to rotate them seasonally); and
• reducing clutter and taking "a more selective approach" to product displays.

"The most expensive item was the floor," says Schwab, "but fortunately we were in the process of renegotiating our lease just before the remodel," so they were able to get their landlord to cover some of the improvement costs.
 
How did it go with their other resolutions?  LuAnn's husband Carl Schwab reports:

• Do more 1:1 marketing. A computer upgrade and move to the windows-based FTD Mercury point of sale system has helped a lot. They've done some marketing based on order history, and Carl says [customers] "love it when we can say 'last year you placed an order on so and so's birthday, would you like to do it again?'"
• Take a close look at delivery areas and charges. They're "doing that constantly" he says, because of the rising cost of gas. "We have lots of delivery zones based on distance and time. If you are in a rural area, a mile equals one minute." In urban locations, they had to make adjustments to allow for traffic congestion.
• Activate the delivery confirmation system.  This resolution moved up from 2007 to 2008, but it's "high on this year's list," Carl says.

 
Controlling COGs and Revamped Gift Line at Garner Greenhouse

Christopher Brown says Garner Greenhouse in Garner, Iowa, moved ahead on his goal of understanding and controlling cost of goods in 2007: "We're getting a better grip on it."  Another goal - changing to a "whole home therapy" approach in their gift line, is well underway: "We add a little bit [new to the line] each quarter - like aromatherapy stuff." This spring, they'll be including a line of spices.  One 2007 resolution, a "totally revamped Web site," started last year and remains in the works because, Brown says, "I'm actually building the site myself."
 
Business Growth Hitting the Mark at KaBloom of Erie

A 30-percent growth in business for her second year in operation was the 2007 goal set by Beth Hill of KaBloom of Erie in Erie, Pa. By last week, she was just two points (28 percent) away from hitting that mark and hoped sales in the last days of the year would help them achieve it. Meanwhile, their resolution to grow funeral business met with modest success, Hill says. Although they compete with more than 20 other local florists, their sympathy sales are up 10 percent over 2006 because they are "totally non-traditional. We do pieces that aren't typical...[for example using] roses instead of chrysanthemums and carnations" that Hill says other florists don't put in funeral arrangements.  A third resolution, to grow their business with local doctors' offices, did not succeed, primarily, she says, because there are "so many allergies, it's a deterrent."
 
Trashing Waste at Carousel Flowers

"Waste is the word for 2007," said Karen Maitland of Carousel Flowers in Elmhurst, Ill., in December 2006, and reducing it was her goal. Today, she's throwing out less fresh product because she no longer mixes newly received fresh product with existing fresh inventory. Instead, older flowers sit in buckets to the right of the rest "because people tend to go to the right," so those flowers move first and inventory keeps turning. She also wanted to eliminate wasted time created when employees get off task. "We did try to put a timing [system] in" but it didn't work — too time consuming, she says.   "We had one problem person who is gone now." So that's helped productivity. And they started rotating phone duty so "one person isn't running to the phone all the time."
 
The Masters Flowers Builds Market Awareness

Terry Mason of The Master's Flowers in Broken Arrow, Okla., said 2007 would be "the year of solidifying our position in the community." The store, which opened its doors before Mother's Day 2006, needed to get its name known.  Mason said their efforts would include a lot of networking, and they followed through by working with area businesses to "refer customers back and forth" and connecting with the most popular bakeries to generate wedding referrals.

They also parlayed his wife Glenda's status as an Oklahoma Master  Florist into some coverage in the newspaper, did in-store rose giveaways — "customers like that better than coupons," he says — and made good use of their window space to take advantage of the shop's location "right on the most [heavily] trafficked street in the Tulsa area."  Is it working? "When we moved in here the leasing company told us what [level of sales] the previous flower shop was doing," says Mason, adding that they "hit or exceeded" that mark their first full year in business.