Florist News

Hi all, Not sure whether to close the floristry side of the shop down or to keep on throwing money in the bin? We have been open for over 7 months now and been with flowergram aswell since July. I know I expected it to be slow but not this slow, the other side of the shop does ok it pays the bills, (but it could be better). For the last couple of weeks we are lucky if we sell a bunch of spray cars. (how sad is that). We have advertised in local papers, leaflet dropped and done the freebies bit. Yes I know Christmas is just around the corner. But here is the question I need help with as flower go up in price for us to buy do I stick with it and buy them and give it a go and maybe do ok or just be left with all the stock again just to throw it in the bin. I am at the moment looking for another job to do in the evening for some extra money. I also need to pay mortgage and bills at home oh yeh and to eat aswell lol. But any advice would be appreciated. ?????????????????????????????????????????????????? Thanks all

hello, so sorry to hear your dilema, what do you sell in the other part of your shop? where is it situated,in a high street or a shopping parade? I know from previous experience, if my shop was quiet, I would gut it!! Take all the stock off the shelves,place it safely around, clean everything,and somehow the public thought we were busy,because the shop was messy!! sounds mad,but our motto was a busy shop is a messy shop. Even now, if we have a quiet day, we move everything round, and bingo, we always seem to sell something we've had in stock for ages. Do you have gifts to go outside. We always start the day with at least two £25ish hand tieds outside, £10 bunches, cheapy arrangements,oh so many questions!! As I said in an earlier post, the best money we ever spent, was sign written vans, hope this helps

Hi flowerfairy, Once again thanks for your reply ( to all my posts) Yes I do that every few days, we have bq outside, gifts wrapped, plants, and all the other stuff I mentioned the only thing we dont have is a sign written van. The thing is we have paid for everything ourselves with no bank loans or anything simply because if things dont work out for us we can walk away (sadly) with no debt. But maybe I should look into a bank loan or an overdraft. The shop is situated on a quiet row of 5 shops but very busy traffic wise, just not a lot of walking public buying except for what seems like hundreds of workmen from 7 in the morning till 2 in the afternoon going to the butty shop next door. Hope I can last til Valentines day that should be great. fingers crossed. Will keep you posted. Thanks again.

Same question Stelorac....what are you selling alongside the flowers?
There is something drastically wrong if you are only selling a few spray cars!
I know from experience that some locations are a complete waste of time and feels like flogging a dead horse. Doesn't matter what you do, they never take off. A few years back we had four shops within 5 miles of each other. Two of them were dead ducks and the other two were gold mines. There wasn't a lot of logic in it. Just that people tend to shop in one place in preference to another. Everyone has a different reason. How do you work out why people aren't shopping in your neck of the woods?

Hi we also sell arts and crafts and model kits (airfix type) we split the shop down the centre linking the two halves together using the arts and crafts on an isle down the middle which actually works quite well. We have started to get to know the other shop owners on the parade and they all say they a down a lot on this years takings. We have potential customers coming in and say they only live around the back and didnt know we were there. (So much for all my leg work on the flyers dont people read them ?).Then they say there just popping in to have a browse or its somewhere to shelter from the rain while they wait for their dinner from next door. great