mary11 ... Hi!

Good question ...

I will assume that you have a source, and an area available for design and storage for your fresh flowers. Weddings and banquets are rewarding endeavors, to be sure. Transport is a factor too! As you know, it takes an assembly-line productivity to be profitable.

Had a successful flower shop in Long Beach, CA. for 23 years. Now retired in OH.

If it were me ...
New to an area, and the local current trends I would make-up some arrangements and take one of them to each of the most local to your location up-scale restaurants and hotels. Don't approach just one. 5 or 6 minimum. Then you don't sweat rejection, plus you will have a follow-up plan to re-visit and re-visit, so might as well make the rounds with your 'surprises' in one trip.

Perhaps an appointment to give a sample of your work to the Banquet Host/Hosstess would by an opportunity to ask if your style would be appropriate and possibly of interest to those hiring their banquet rooms. Could they recommend you? Would they? Could/would they offer your display book of your own work to their clients? Perhaps, probably, they will have a commission structure to present your display book, rather than just handing out your cards.

Whatever the outcome, even if they are cold and almost rude, hit them with a 'thank you' arrangement, including your business card, for their office (or the cashier's/reservations desk) once a week for something like two months in a row. Deliver it personally with a big, big smile and say something like "just wanted to present this to you for your thoughtfulness when I came calling". Be on your way out ... fast. Do NOT re-hash your offer ... until and if asked.

If your pitch, friendliness and product doesn't get any business by then move on. (A retail shark like me, may have them tied-up already, but sometimes, after repeated 'surprise' arrangements, they may very well give you a second look OR they may suddenly know someone else that knows someone that is looking for YOU. Trust me, it works!)

My credentials:
As a kid worked in restaurants, so I learned to work fast and knew the floral needs of the establishments going in.
Wedding, reception, and home(s),two, decor for the Wrigley wedding on Catalina Island. Flowers and truck shipped over on barge. Three-day set-up.
Four, five, sometimes six Weddings a week-end, in season, from our shop. Timely delivery was always a bear!
Many, many large and smalll banquets locally.
Many socialite and awards banquets at the Beverly-Hilton Hotel, even tho it was 30 miles and probably 32 other flower shops away.
Competitor and Winner at the Las Floristas Headdress Ball. (Not a money-maker, but the publicity and new socialite business was great! Some socialite biz is painful - drop them.)

If you have further questions email me ...
Advertising and promotion (and fast production) was what I most enjoyed!

Best to you in all you do!

P.S. Don't ... Do not advertise in the yellow pages!
Gave a popular industry seminar as to why.

P.P.S Funeral flowers are the m-o-s-t profitable
product to make ... if you have the interest/experience.
The above approach works on them too!

Do you have good, high-quality photos of previous arrangements? To group your best together to form a portfolio to show potential clients would be a good idea, especially if you're new to the area and many people do not know specifically what you're capable of doing.

-Audric

Thanks for the good tips Dick and Bonsai! Well, I know from starting my last business I'll have to burn alot of money to get going. Probably even more out here. It will be harder to get my foot in the door because back there, my friends helped market my goods as well. One of my best girlfriends started her own catering business when I started my florals, so we worked together alot. That was nice. I don't know a soul out here. I do have lots of photos, but sure wish I had taken the time to take even more. One thing I discovered today, is that some wholesalers here are open to the public. This means to me that the demand for arrangements isn't going to be as great. Why pay for them if you can arrange them yourself? I do remember my son's old private school mothers wanting me to just give them my tax I.D. and let them do the flowers as my "donation". I did this once, and found that they tried to open an account for the school. So much for philanthropy. However, my old wholesalers were pretty tough about a person having to have a tax I.D. in the industry. This protects everybody. I do miss designing very much, however. It's going to be competitive, but I'm going to give it my best shot. There is a woman across the street who introduced herself to me when we moved in. She's an event planner for a local country club. Do you think I should make something great and just walk over there and give it to her?

Yes, I do think you should make something great and walk over and give it to her. Make sure you have some business cards with you, and give her more than one. Make sure you have a card with the flowers that says compliments of your business or something. You could also add a small penciled retail price on that card somewhere.
Could be destiny.
Could be pointless.
Best of luck brave girl.

Indeed. Saunter right over there and get to know her! As an event planner for a country club, it sounds like she meets people who live an affluent lifestyle. Networking is the key.

-Audric

Dick (not a hick!), that was a fabulous, generous post. Thank you. Anyone interested in doing business should re-read what you have written and digest it. I'm doing that myself...

Write me quick.

I've owned large flower shops on both coasts, in Washington D.C., where hand-held was The Bomb, and in Marin County, where Nature Rules.

Will be glad to share what insights I have. Now I'm in L.A. where Glamour Rules and am designing gardens instead.

It's all about the mind-set, and the East Bay mind-set has plenty of room for your style and espertise. You just need to market to the right communities.

I wish I were in your shoes. You're in a GREAT place for your kind of business.

Mia

As a former design slave to big retail.... I think it might do you some good to contact the special event and visual design departments of the up-scale department stores.

High class florals are always needed for instore events and fashion shows. With tighter AD budgets it is harder for brick and mortor florists to give them a big bang for the buck... so it should be easy for you to "wow them" and still be competative and still make your profit. The spring clothing lines are starting to be introduced so this is one of the busy seasons for fashion retail to be using florals.

good luck,

Hap