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A Look Inside: November/December 2007
Plantation Flowers & Gfits |
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Written by Amanda Ryder
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When Cathy Angel became the owner of Plantation Flowers
& Gifts in 1982, she struck gold. Over the past 25 years, the
floral and giftware shop, located in Whitehorse, Yukon, has grown to
become a successful and well-known shop in Canada’s Klondike region.
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Cathy Angel (right) stands with storefront
manager Leslie Goring, who has been with
the shop for 20 years. |
In the beginning, Angel and her mother ran the business with only three other employees. Shortly after, Angel’s sister Liz Kent joined the family operation and now helps Angel run the shop. Most of the nine full-time employees and five part-time staff members who currently work at Plantation Flowers & Gifts are dedicated longtime employees, one in particular who’s been with them for 24 years. Angel says one reason her staff stay so long is because of their passion for the business. “I think they love the business like we do,” she says. The florist is located in the downtown core of the territory’s capital city and makes deliveries to all of Whitehorse and the outlying areas.
Her store features a 28-foot-long cooler with double oak doors and glass to showcase the 30 to 40 pre-made designs typically on hand for purchase. Over 3,000 square feet of retail space and 2,500 square feet in the basement gives employees a large area for designing as well as extra storage space for the product.
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| Designer Lois Holmberg has spent 17 years at Plantation Flowers & Gifts. |
Plantation Flowers & Gifts caters to the significant government and corporate population located in Whitehorse. In addition to business and office work, Angel says the store has a mix of customers and the shop doesn’t market to one specific demographic. “We have a lot of walk-in and about 60 per cent is telephone,” she says. One reason for this is because the shop does deliveries three times a day and remains open seven days a week. People have become accustomed to the idea that they can get the flowers they want, any time of the day. In order to cater to these walk-in customers, her staff prepares a high volume of cut flower bouquets in advance and Angel estimates they sell approximately 100 each week. Even on Valentine’s Day, Angel says some customers wait until the day of to get their flowers because they know the shop always has fresh product. To plan for the occasion, Angel and her staff prepare 400 bouquets ahead of time and have 1,000 cut flowers on hand specifically for Valentine’s Day. An auxiliary cooler in the back helps to store the extra product during busy floral occasions.
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| Cathy Angel tries to feature Canadian-made products and giftware in her store to set her shop apart. |
Christmas is another busy occasion for the shop. Angel hires an extra employee to deal exclusively with wire orders in December as the shop sends out over 600 orders throughout the month. The location of the business is one of the primary reasons for this because Angel says “everybody here has someone who lives somewhere else.”
When it comes to challenges, the shop’s northern location can prove problematic. When most shops across the country run out of product, they can call their local wholesaler and get fresh flowers within a few hours. But Angel says she gets most of her product from Vancouver and has to plan ahead to keep her store stocked. “We’ve had lots of challenges in getting the product. You have to read the market and have a sense of what you’re going to need. It’s a challenge to make sure we have the product when we need it.” The transport time also takes time away from the potential vase life of the flowers, so they have to make sure they handle the flowers properly when they do arrive. Just getting the product to the customer requires a little extra care as well. When delivering in the frigid Yukon temperatures, the designs often require three or four bags to protect them from the elements.
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| Angel helped design the Warm Buddy bears to promote the shop during the 2007 Canada Winter Games in Whitehorse. |
Another obstacle Angel faces is making sure she has the right product on hand. Plantation Flowers & Gifts tries not to substitute cut flowers. “I have to overbuy to make sure we have the product when we need it. We take copious notes every season on how many deliveries we make and how many roses were sold and what flowers we needed.” Angel also tries to attend as many gift and trade shows as possible to keep up on trends. She maintains good relationships with her wholesalers and talks to them about what’s new in the market.
She uses her wholesalers to keep the six designers she has on staff trained and educated about the latest designs and techniques. Her employees do hands-on training with professional designers brought in by wholesalers and whenever possible, she tries to send her staff to design shows in the area. Angel also travels to Vancouver and parts of Alberta to source products and attend trade shows. She sees magazines as a great training tool and likes to bring a variety into the shop to inspire creativity. “My staff will go through them and say, ‘Cathy we need to get this’,” she says.
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| The shop specializes in a garden style with a lot of mixed designs that emphasize both colour and texture. Angel describes the approach as “simple and outdoorsy.” |
Some of the things that have helped Plantation Flowers & Gifts become so successful are the marketing concepts and detailed business planning that happens in the backroom. The store has employed a number of promotional campaigns to raise the profile of the business in the community. The shop has two customer rewards cards. One is a VIP card, stamped with each $20 purchase, and the other is a “bunch punch card” specific to cut flower bouquets. “The program was lengthy to develop but it’s really become our signature.” Angel also hands out “bouquet bucks” at community events to encourage people to come into her shop. The business’s website through FTD allows customers to find out more information about the shop and the products it offers.
Most recently, the business worked with a local airliner on a promotion for the 2007 Canada Winter Games held in Yukon last February. Angel designed Winter Games hoodies for the Canadian-made Warm Buddy bears she sells in her giftware section. The Warm Buddies filled her display window and brought more traffic into the store. In addition, on every flight that came into Whitehorse, a hoodie-adorned Warm Buddy bear was given away. Angel and her sister also volunteered at the Winter Games and she says it was a great way to get involved. Whenever possible, Angel strives to feature locally or Canadian-made products, like the Warm Buddy, to differentiate the shop from the big box stores.
Looking back on her 26 years of experience in business, Angel says she has learned that the emotional side of the industry cannot be ignored. Her advice to other retail florists would be “to make sure they take the customers into their heart and respect the product they’re providing for that person, at that time in their life.” She says customers are coming to see a florist during some of the most important times in their lives – birthdays, anniversaries, funerals and weddings. “You can learn the finance part, the budget part, the staffing and the ordering but you really have to take the business to the heart.”
It’s this combination of emotional investment and business expertise that has made Plantation Flowers & Gifts a premier florist in Canada’s Klondike region.
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