The wire service legend...
There is a legend we oldtimers pass on to new florists who want to hear about the way things used to be.... it is a tale, reputed to be true, of how a wire service raised money.
The story goes that once there was a man who owned a wire service (and remember that there were MANY of them over the past 50 years). This guy was just your average schyster, not a really good guy nor a really bad guy, but whenever he needed to raise a few hundred thousand bucks to cover an upcoming expenditure, he would charge each one of his members for a particular order that did not exist. He had learned that very few shops in those days ever took the time to check their statements. The ones that did & filed a complaint got a credit, the ones that didn't....well....that's the legend. There are those who worked for the company who swore this legend was true.
Since this post was inspired by the subject matter that has gone before, I need to say that this legend was NOT about FTD, it was another company whose name has now been forgotten. At that time FTD was a members-owned co-operative that was filling a need we florists had to get flowers out of town as well as a need to support each others' businesses. That in itself is another legend of how the flower business used to be in the olden days.
And that of course is another story.
