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Shrink Your Waste
Reducing costs on the design bench |
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Written by Bernice Klassen
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As the owner of a flower shop, it’s your job to know what’s making you money and what’s cutting into your profits. One of the greatest threats to your bottom line can be found in the back room of your shop – on the floor, in the garbage bins and even in the arrangements you send out to customers. It’s wasted stems and it’s both a common problem on the design bench and a point of contention between owners and floral artists.
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Wasted stems will reduce the profitability of your designs and ultimately cut into your bottom line.
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When your talented designers are creating, it’s easy to add an extra bloom here and there to make a beautiful bouquet. Sometimes a flower head is snipped off and is thrown out, when it had the potential to be used elsewhere. Many employees don’t realize how quickly these practices can cut into profitability. It’s your job to let your staff know how to create value in a design while at the same time controlling costs to ensure it’s a profitable item.
Give designers input
As hard as it is to comprehend, as owners, you do not know everything. The best thing you can do to encourage dialogue on this issue is to sit down with your designers and your shop staff for a brainstorming session on how to be more profitable on your design benches.
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Illustrate lost profitability with numbers:
One idea is to have your designers create a poster on lost profitability with each extra flower they add to a design. Here is an example:
Scenario 1)
1 extra stem at 70 cents a stem in 10 designs = $7
$7 x 30 days = $210 a month x 12 months = $2,520 lost profit per year
If you have two designers, that’s $5,000.00 lost profit per year.
Scenario 2)
1 extra stem at $1.50 a stem in 10 designs = $15
$15 x 30 days = $450 a month x 12 months = $5,400 lost profit per year
If you have two designers, that’s $10,800 lost profit per year.
Staggering numbers when put into this context,
aren’t they?
Do this with several different price point products and post these charts in the design area or lunchroom as a great reminder.
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Let your designers know that it’s OK to think outside the box and to use product in a different way. True creativity means using what’s available and making it beautiful. That doesn’t mean your designers settle for inferior quality. It means they work with what is on hand. Allow them to have fun with designs and try something new, such as turning your containers upside down to put a unique spin on things. Encourage them to set aside broken stems for a future piece and to use the bits and pieces lying on the design bench.
Don’t assume that your designers know what you’re thinking. Review policies and guidelines that you think are common sense because they could be things that have never been executed! Product quality and proper rotation is one procedure that should never be overlooked. Designers are often the first people in contact with floral product and can be the first to notice inferior quality. It’s their job to report any defective product so it can be dealt with. Receiving immediate reimbursement for poor quality is a must for profitability at shop level.
Having strict rules for using product based on date delivered is a conversation every shop owner needs to have with every employee. Each item that is discarded should be accounted for on a sheet and added up in cost at the end of the week. Make note of the dollars of product that had to be discarded on a weekly basis so all employees begin to understand the importance of rotating the product in the cooler.
Another idea you can use in your shop is to make five different arrangements at the same price point. Verify that the correct margins are taken and start a recipe box of ideas at the basic price points. Whenever you are creating a design based on price, I always suggest working “down” rather than “up.” Start with the price point required and subtract down to zero instead of starting at zero and adding up the price of each stem to come. Don’t forget to take into account embellishments such as birds, ribbons, glitter, jewel pins – everything that goes into the design has a value.
Conduct a discussion on time management with your designers. A basic design should be a 15-minute job. For events such as weddings, the design should be quoted based on time, as well as markup. The designer should be consulted as to the time it will take to create the design and be required to take ownership of that slot of time. If the designer is creating intricate, time-consuming pieces, the final quote should reflect that regardless of the cost of the product used in the piece. Time is money!
Provide designers with incentive
Speaking of money, when it comes to incentives, nothing speaks louder. Negotiating a percentage bonus monthly, quarterly or yearly based on the company’s profitability will not only keep your employees loyal to you but make them more interested in saving you money on the floor. I recommend quarterly rather than monthly or yearly. The problem with monthly is that it allows employees to quit as soon as they receive their bonuses and go elsewhere. Providing bonuses annually forces employees to wait a long time before they see any results. Quarterly is effective because it strikes a good balance in terms of how long they wait. When employees see that extra money on their paycheque once, they will work even harder to ensure it’s there the next time.
Allow designers to invest in the product
Your employees need to take ownership of their work and the quality of the products. Every arrangement we did when I worked at a shop in Winnipeg had a sheet attached to it where you wrote down the following:
- floral product used and the cost of each stem
- the amount of labour hours used to create the design
- what greens were added to the arrangement
- the container used
- the final price.
You learned to do three or four designs at the same time and put the finishing touches on each one. At any time, the person in charge could pull up the sheet and check for errors. When a design looked too big (or too small) for the price, it was easily verified. Not only was it good for keeping things in check, but also, if someone ordered the exact design that Mrs. Smith received, you had the information stapled to Mrs. Smith’s order and could go back and replicate.
To manage your design room and to ensure your profits aren’t falling to the backroom floor, you need to ensure that the lines of communication between you and your designers are wide open. Be clear about your expectations and let them know how wasted stems affect the business. Together, you can create beautiful, profitable designs for your customer one stem at a time.
M.G. Bernice Klassen is experienced in nearly every aspect of the floral industry, including retail, wholesale and grocery chain. Armed with a business administration degree, with a specialty in marketing and management, Bernice is now offering her services as a floral consultant to the industry. Contact Bernice directly at
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