Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/01/29/florists-com-is-the-smarter-wa.html
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Florist’s what now?
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Fixed. Thanks.
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“… do Valentine’s Day”
Hmm. Romantic.
“Let’s do this thing already.”
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most of us still end up rushing to the florist and paying through the nose for a bouquet of flowers on February 14th
{{citation needed}}
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Seriously, dear. You shouldn’t have.
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Counterpoint: DON’T use florists.com. My best friend’s wife is a longtime Florist and I’ve helped out doing deliveries and such over the years, I guarantee you’ll pay less and get better flowers (which means a happier receiver) if you call a local florist directly and order flowers yourself, even from a random shop chosen from google-searching your area. And the earlier ahead of time you order the better. Never EVER use a 3rd party ordering service to order flowers, it screws over everybody involved except (surprise surprise) the 3rd party ordering service. There’s a few reasons for this:
Flowers ordered through a service like florists.com or 1-800-flowers are usually more expensive than the same arrangement ordered at a shop, so it costs you more to order the same damn thing. And even though you pay more for the same flowers, the florist still makes less money than the same arrangement ordered directly for cheaper, usually a LOT less. On a busy holiday like Valentines and Mothers Day, they’re going to work much harder to keep their regulars happy vs some new customer that filled out an online one-off order. They’ll never admit that, but trust me, it’s how it goes down.
Also, florists get their flowers from centralized distribution, and the sheer volume of orders on holidays means that both the distributors themselves and and the florists are forced to use old, bad flowers they’d normally reject at any other time. The distributors don’t want to sell the bad flowers, and the florists don’t want to use the bad flowers, but it’s better to fill an order that will be complained about and later remade then to lose out on an order. The best flowers usually go to the earliest orders, the later your order, the worse choice of flowers are left over to make it from. Again, if it comes down to a regular getting the better roses than a one-off internet order, it’s an easy guess for who gets the better product.
Also Also, When you pick a picture off the internet, it probably contains a lot of popular (and possibly off-season) flowers that will look awful no matter who arranges them, just because the good stuff is long sold out and the florist is left trying to salvage what they can of the dregs they were supplied with. If you speak to the florist themselves, they will happily offer advice on what’s going to be fresh and look great vs what’s going to be awful leftovers. I mean, there’s no real substitute for a dozen roses, but if it’s the night before and you’re just now thinking to order, then something in her favorite colors might be better than sad wilted roses
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Great point. It’s the same problem with sites that publish restaurant menus and offer online ordering without the business owner’s knowledge or consent.
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I’d have to agree. I used florists.com to send flowers to my mother a few years ago. It was an inconvenient disaster. She was frustrated instead of pleased.
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Seriously has anyone ever bought anything from the boing boing store? Ever? It’s like sharper image meets the home shopping network.
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I buy flowers in bunches from my local grocery store and arrange them in vases and pitchers at home. Simple, cheap, and the flowers are always beautiful and in great condition. Not ideal if you want to send flowers to a loved one far away, but in my book, a phone call or video chat is much better.
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Great advice. My mother has owned her flower shop for 40 years and she would agree with you and yours 100%. These services take a significant cut so typically $50 spent will equal $25 in flowers delivered. She despises all of he teleflora, ftd, 1800 Flower etc. All they’re interested is taking their cut and externalizing all of the cost and expenses possible.
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The smarter way to do Valentine’s Day is not to do Valentine’s Day.
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I would go as far as: This is even the smartest way!
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No, no. You’ve got it all wrong. It’s filled with “mostly wonderful things” ™.
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Lol, no it’s not.
Just tried it. Code does not work. Submitted a support claim. Support basically said, “oh well.” Hmm…
EDIT: it’s been resolved. thanks.
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