Michael's Wholesale just shut it's doors yesterday.
New owners bought it I think about 6 months ago.
I guess the numbers didn't add up.
It's very sad, they were very nice people.
Much nicer than the person they bought the place from.
What to do in our ever changing economy?
I don't know how the wholesale houses keep their huge payrolls going.
In Denver, we've now lost three large wholesale houses in the last two or three years. Flowers Interntional, Vans, and now Michaels.
Just two left Amatos and DWF.
I guess it's shops like mine to blame. Shops that buy direct.
What else can we do to survive? I buy mostly supplies from the wholesale houses, sometimes wedding product.
I think it's going to be a "last one standing situation"
I plan to be a last one. And, standing.
My business is still doing well.
I have cut payroll down to nothing. I am virtually doing all the design work myself. I have another designer that comes in at night for a few hours a couple of times a week.
I am working so hard on my website.
I say that i's easy to have your own, but realized how difficult it was to build complete seasonal pages, to think of designs - without the WS thinking of them for us. Fall and Holidays this year has been the first times I done it completely with my stuff.
www.cherryblossomsflorist.com/Holiday.html
It has an amazing amount of work, along with everyday operations.
But, it's done. And, I will have something to start with next year.
I'm doing the holiday with two TF items, the Kincaid and the Ornament.
I checked my clearinghouse statement last night and found in horror $550.00 for the two products and for envelopes for calendars.
I spoke with Mark Freeman on Monday at CRFA's (now FAR) annual meeting. I like Mark a lot. They are all gong ho on ads being run during the Super Bowl. I told him that's nice, but get rid of their containers. It's the containers that are killing us. Of course, we know that's not going to happen. I used Bloomz's phrase - "it's about the flowers".
Anyway, it's going to be very interesting to see where we all are next year at this time.
New owners bought it I think about 6 months ago.
I guess the numbers didn't add up.
It's very sad, they were very nice people.
Much nicer than the person they bought the place from.
What to do in our ever changing economy?
I don't know how the wholesale houses keep their huge payrolls going.
In Denver, we've now lost three large wholesale houses in the last two or three years. Flowers Interntional, Vans, and now Michaels.
Just two left Amatos and DWF.
I guess it's shops like mine to blame. Shops that buy direct.
What else can we do to survive? I buy mostly supplies from the wholesale houses, sometimes wedding product.
I think it's going to be a "last one standing situation"
I plan to be a last one. And, standing.
My business is still doing well.
I have cut payroll down to nothing. I am virtually doing all the design work myself. I have another designer that comes in at night for a few hours a couple of times a week.
I am working so hard on my website.
I say that i's easy to have your own, but realized how difficult it was to build complete seasonal pages, to think of designs - without the WS thinking of them for us. Fall and Holidays this year has been the first times I done it completely with my stuff.
www.cherryblossomsflorist.com/Holiday.html
It has an amazing amount of work, along with everyday operations.
But, it's done. And, I will have something to start with next year.
I'm doing the holiday with two TF items, the Kincaid and the Ornament.
I checked my clearinghouse statement last night and found in horror $550.00 for the two products and for envelopes for calendars.
I spoke with Mark Freeman on Monday at CRFA's (now FAR) annual meeting. I like Mark a lot. They are all gong ho on ads being run during the Super Bowl. I told him that's nice, but get rid of their containers. It's the containers that are killing us. Of course, we know that's not going to happen. I used Bloomz's phrase - "it's about the flowers".
Anyway, it's going to be very interesting to see where we all are next year at this time.
