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Care & Handling: October 2006
Engage Your Floral Customers |
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Written by Gayle Smith
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Engage Your Floral Customers
Flowers rock – they impress and deliver a lot of bang
for the buck. Is it our need for natural beauty in today’s frazzled
world or the subtle, although powerful message(s) flowers convey? Hard
to say, but it is easy for people to get fired up about flowers.
So why then do we need to encourage consumers to realize it’s OK to purchase flowers simply because they like what they see? First, it’s important to acknowledge as consumers, we are reluctant to purchase items we can’t name or worse, cannot determine the quality level. Top that with not knowing how to care for the product or what we can expect for our money and you have an intimidating purchase scenario. Industry warriors unite! The mission is clear: engage floral customers by making them flower smart.
Let’s focus on a few cool blooms that engage consumers at first glance like tuberoses, protea, spray orchids, gerbera daisies and heliconias with intriguing names like ‘Sexy Pink’ or ‘Lobster Claw.’ Vibrant colours, weird shapes, little or no confusing foliage, fragrance, long vase life, easy care and handling and most importantly – über-impact! As my wonderful mother taught me years ago, “...it’s not the steak, it’s the sizzle!”
Gerbera success revolves around two basic issues: bacteria and Botrytis. Botrytis is a non-specific (air-borne) fungal disease that loves all flowers, fruits and veggies. It attacks cut flowers as readily as potted azaleas and strawberries. Control outbreaks by keeping flower heads dry. Avoid moving gerberas in and out of coolers because even a micro-layer of condensation on the flowers is enough water for spores to germinate.
Controlling bacteria is slightly different – it’s all about working clean. Sanitize tables frequently – as well as tools, display shelves, choppers and buckets. Sanitizing involves cleaning and scrubbing surfaces with an antimicrobial solution – preferably one suited for flowers. Those hairy gerbera stems are magnets for bacteria so clean solutions are super critical.
Tropical Flower Care:
This category is many things to many people, so let’s start by defining the tropical cut flowers and foliage group. Tropical flowers include anthuriums, spray orchids, all kinds of heliconia species, cut foliages like Ti leaves, ginger species – flowers grown in tropical environments of Hawaii, Mexico, Thailand, Costa Rica or Ecuador. Tropicals fare best in solutions that are slightly acidic (pH +/- 4) and contain antimicrobial ingredients to keep bacteria in check. Your tap water is not acidic and cannot control bacteria blooms so process these beauties in a hydration solution (no sugar) or a low sugar display solution. Both solutions contain ingredients that boost pollution-free solution into stems for six to seven days. Keep in mind that sugar provides energy for buds to open, stabilizes colour and enhances fragrance potential if it exists. Since tropicals arrive fully coloured and open – sugar is not especially beneficial, but they still need a solution that stays clean and flowing. Therefore tap water just won’t cut it.
Most florists know that tropicals are chill-sensitive – especially heliconias and gingers. Heliconias prefer temperatures no colder than 65F and the entire group does not fare well at temperatures lower than 50 to 55ºF (9 to 12°C). In fact, cold temperatures are downright detrimental to most tropical flowers. The tricky part about chill damage (appearing as dark discolouration or blackening on flowers) is that it does not show up until about 24 to 36 hours after exposure. So the flowers may look fine when you unpack them, but appear stressed the next day. Waxy tropical blooms thrive on high humidity and enjoy a daily spritz of water on their faces when displayed outside the cooler. Fill your spray bottle with distilled or bottled water to avoid any damage from high salts that might be present in your tap water.
A Few Tropical Flowers Walk the Line:
Birds of Paradise are pretty chill-hardy as long as the orange ‘bird’ part of bloom is encased in the green bract. If flowers are still inside bract, it’s OK to store as low as 40ºF, but if orange flowers are emerging, store Birds a little warmer. Callas are not cold sensitive and can be stored in your cooler with other flower types. Notice a problem of ‘black pig-tails’ on calla blooms? You are seeing a symptom of a soil-borne bacterial disease, not a response to cold temps. Protea, often lumped in with the tropical family, are not tropicals at all. In fact, Protea originate from South Africa and are perfectly happy stored in cold temps of 36-40ºF. For Protea, care and handling ‘issues’ are their need for high light and sugar which helps keep the foliage from turning black. Protea are also BIG drinkers. On arrival, process protea in full sugar flower foods. Place buckets in high light areas and keep lights on in the fridge. Finally, tuberoses are also sugar-lovers and need to be processed in the same food you use to soak foam or fill containers. These flowers prefer temperatures between 45-50ºF.
Orchids:
Are you taking advantage of the huge upsurge of popularity that catapulted orchids to centre stage over the past few years? Why not? These flowers are long-lived and easy to care for if you keep in mind a few specifics. Process stems (or refill tubes) into a fresh display flower food solution (not water) on arrival. There are mixed messages out there about soaking orchid blooms on arrival, but I recommend keeping flower petals dry to avoid any Botrytis outbreaks. Remember that most varieties are rather ethylene sensitive so make sure stems are pre-treated with STS at farm level. Avoid exposing orchids to ethylene sources like cigarette smoke, fruits and veggies, exhaust fumes or buckets of dirty water.
Hear the Knock of Opportunity?
The American Floral Endowment has amassed information on why consumers don’t buy flowers and plants and found that 42 per cent of those surveyed say “flowers don’t last very long.” Answer the knock to cash in on this opportunity! Become your customer’s flower expert! Sharing information develops an engaging link with customers. Educate them on how to maximize vase life at home. Give information on how flowers articulate fashion trends and provide suggestions for using flowers as inexpensive home décor objects. Connect customers directly with your flowers. They may like what they see, but still need encouragement (a connection) to buy.
Use smart handling methods, step up sanitation protocols and fine-tune treatments to match specific flower needs. Happy selling!
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