debbiequintana Intro

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debbiequintana

New Member
Apr 23, 2009
10
21
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San Jose
State / Prov
CA
www.thebestgourmetgifts.com
www.thespiritofwellness.com
www.giftbasketassociation.com

7 years
no formal floral education
Sarah@Pioneer Wholesale
Learn more about the industry and the relation with gift baskets; learn how your forum works.
I'm pretty saavy at business, technology and consumer driven products. I hope I can help others :)
Both.
 
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Hi Debbie and thanks for answering the questions on the intro page. Please tell us more about you, your business and how you work from home and a commercial space.

V
 
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Welcome to Flowerchat! I look forward to hearing more about the gift basket business as it intrigues me and eludes me as well!

Sandy
 
Thanks for the warm welcome!

Wow, this is really neat. Ok, so about me. I own two gift basket companies, Gourmet Gifts and The Spirit of Wellnes. I live in San Jose, California. I partner with a few florists in our area so we can support one another and just love the whole idea of bringing glorious products to the market. We also incorporate live plants into a lot of our gift baskets so I really am looking to learning a lot from all of you.

On April 1st, I launched a company called The Gift Basket Association. It's designed to bring a community of gift basket companies and suppliers together in the spirit of support and collaboration. It's really an exciting adventure for me.

I am excited about this forum. It's so lively, exciting, easy to understand and I'm dying to stop typing right now so I can go explore!
 
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I hope I'm answering the thread properly! Let's see...so in my home, I have a full gift basket workshop, office and storage facility. My staff and I work out of there daily. I work full time for Cisco so Dawn and Nicole handle the business during the day and I pick it up at night and on the weekends as appropriate. They're both wonderful. All production that is under 100 gifts as well as our design is done there.

In a neighboring city, I contract with a non-profit organization that employs adults with challenges and they do all of my assembly. They are VERY detailed oriented, fast and handle all of the regular gifts that we sell on a weekly basis. I love supporting them and they love the assembly work. We do a lot of small gifts. For example, right now we have an order for printed post-it notes in a cello bag with printed ribbon. Once I get the post it notes from my printer, I'll give it to them with the bags, printed ribbon and my labels and they'll assemble them. I'll have 100 bags back within a 24 hour period. That's how good they are.

Lastly, I have a team that is "on call" so when we have unexpected spikes in sales/production, they're already trained and ready to come in to help at any given time.

Deb
 
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You answered everything just fine Deb... you are a full fledged member of this wacky wonderful community. Enjoy and if you have questions... ask away.

V
 
How did you go about partnering with local florists (a great idea by the way)?

V
 
I actually had a florist approach me several years ago near Valentine's Day. She wanted to have gift baskets available so she bought 12 and they all sold. And, conversely, I get a lot of requests for florists so I send business her way too. We just created a program where the florists could add a few of our gift basket to their sites and when they get the orders, we ship them/delivery them, under their name. This way, they don't have to come out of pocket buying supplies, can offer customization to their clients and its done quickly. I haven't had a lot of time to work on the marketing of it but with the few that we have worked with, its been a nice partnership.

Thank you for asking, by the way.
 
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Thanks for being so forthcoming Debbie. The reason I asked is because it's an idea I've been kicking around in my head for a while.

There is so much potential in that practice I think... and rather a win win for all participants. Particularly since so many florist really don't like to carry inventory for the gift.

V
 
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