Easter Suprise

Today we pulled down a few boxes just for fun and this is what we uncovered. Much of it is now in the dumpster in the back of the shop. Those poor waste management guys.

Hide the children! Its the ............Easter Bunny?

Here he is clowning around with Sid...that Easter Bunny, hes such a kook!

Doesnt he know that this is no time for fooling around? Sid is trying to check his electric bill balance. Things are tight right now since going in partners in a flower shop...

If things werent spooky enough... the Easter creatures even tried to scare my own child.... (That's my daughter Reese in the background, I think she making a slashing motion at the evil wooden egg bunny.)


We were open yesterday and today doing our normal thing..picking through, cleaning and straightening. We had a huge day yesterday and racked up $1.08 in sales. (See mention of Sid checking his electric bill above). Considering we gave the little girl that bought a Christmas ornament a flower, that puts us at a wash for the day.

On the bright side, today we got three sizeable orders and things are looking brighter for tomorrow. So we push on.

My First Dozen Roses

So the time has come to put myself out there and make a dozen roses. John and I were at the shop last weekend and it was go time.

I had an hour or so to myself and dove right in. Approximately 45 minutes later my masterpiece was complete. That's right....45 minutes. I'm no accredited florist but I have to tell you that I at least know that this was downright pathetic and if I ever want to see a penny of profits I need to work on my efficiency.

I made at least three different cuts to the stems (each) afraid to cut too short the first time, then again the second until it was juuuuuuuuuuuuust right. Then it came to the arranging.. at the end it was satisfying to look at what I created but why did I feel so anxiety ridden? I felt like the creative process became some sort of mental test. What will Hubert think, did I cut them too short? Did they look balanced? Were there enough greens? Is he going to laugh me into oblivion? Or worse than that...were they "Fast-Crap"? (This is Huberts phrase for "florists" who get their design certificate piece of paper at the community college and churn out careless work.)

My floranxiety is driven by the fact that creativity is something that I have but I have to work at it. It does not come naturally and unfortunately I know that so I tend to over think, overanalyze and generally drive myself into a florenzy.

In the end I got an atta-girl from Hubert which made me feel incredible. He only had to touch up the greens slightly before it could actually leave the shop. Not bad for a fledgling! ;)

By the way, I haven't posted a pic of my masterpiece because due to unfortunate circumstances, I have lost my camera. This is something that we will delve into in future posts when we explore my terrible ADHD and scatterbrained traits.

13 Years Worth of Dirt/Fur

Floral things first...we are continuously working on tweaking our Teleflora Web Page. Be sure to check it out as we have a new "About Us" page. Shop picutres should be forthcoming.

Now for the dirt....

So we have spent all the free time we have had cleaning, cleaning and throwing away stuff that was left behind in the flower shop. The former owner was here for 14 years and accumulated a mass of things that are unexplainable. From the non-working items that were just put in the back of the store (a coffee pot, a microwave, a refrigerator that had been re-purposed as a television stand, an old printer, two phones and a fax machine, just to name a few) to the 1000+ spools of ribbon, hundreds of baskets, etc. It has been an adventure just digging through what was in the back room.

Among some of my favorite things have been my new shop mascot (see picture left). I'm not sure if you can really see how hideous and filthy this thing is but I can only hope. I can tell you that this would frighten any new mother if received as a gift. If you take a closer look you can see how disproportionate its feet are too. Its like that episode of Seinfeld with the man-hands. Except this baby has man-feet. I think that you can kind of see the fur that has begun to grow on its tuft of hair in the photo. Its reminiscent of the kind of fur you see on the ceiling of a smoky bar.

Not to be outdone, the spooky baby troll has a friend, the scary furry dog/seal. I'm not sure if it was supposed to be a dog or a seal. Its feet flip back like a seal but he has a dog like tail. Another unsolvable shop mystery. At first glance, it looks like hes cute and furry but that's not a cute soft cuddly fur. That is the same nasty ceiling dirt-fur that has accumulated from not cleaning....EVER. He used to be white from what I can tell and has since been adopted by our local waste management service.

At any rate, I just thought I'd post these before I forgot and hope that you enjoy them as much as I have.

Nicole

Here we are....

So here is my first attempt at blogging....ever.

I think it would be interesting (maybe even slightly humorous) to document the process that we have started in buying a flower shop.  

Here is a a little background on us.....

Its been a long standing dream of mine to own a flower shop.  I thought it would be a great family business to own as it would allow us to bring children into the business giving them a good foundation and learn discipline and a good work ethic.

Over 20 years later I meet my boyfriend John and we constantly talk about opening up a small business.  One fateful afternoon we were going to stop by the American Legion Post for a beer and found them closed.  We took a detour and drove past a shop with a For Sale sign in the window.  

As a lark, I told my boyfriend to call on it.  We talked it over, brought our friend into the mix and found ourselves an experienced florist to run the shop for us.  So three weeks after we saw the sign and made the call, on October 1, 2008,  we signed the papers and became the proud owners of Andre's Flower Shop which we promptly renamed Blooms on the Square.

So with zero floral industry experience we plunged head first into turning around a failing flower shop.