I just looked at the pictures for the Fall Winter collections.. I think the containers are nice, for the most part.. but.. the arrangements, if you want to call them that, are all 'clutch, like in drop ship" style so I doubt there would be any incentive for the .coms to send the orders on to local florists. rather I believe they would be made in Miami and shipped in a box with the container as in direct ship. Now that is of course FTD's perogative and probably they would say it will stop the problems they have with local florists willing to accept the orders.
But it means we will not be buying any containers, no value in them for us. and the arrangments are not striking or unique or even particularly pretty.. all Martha Stewart style push as much as possible into a tight nosegay. This is what I see at our local grocery store. easy to do, well priced but kind of run of the mill. I am sure that the .coms will now be competing with our grocery store which is fine by me.
I think this is the year that the FTd new picture book will be released. I sure hope that the vast majority of design styles in this new book are appropriate for real florists. One of the remaining values of the wire service to me is to be able to show my customers nice, well designed, creative arrangements (not drop ins) and be able to show that same picture to the designing florist so that my customer has a reasonable expectation of getting something close to what they like. Unlike other florists who find their customers are satisfied with accepting their claim that the designing florist will do something nice, my customers like to have some input and control of what they spend their money on. We always have 6 monthly specials listed on our web page, on our monthly postcards,and in our spec cooler. I would like to be able to continue to find appropriate pictures from the FTD picture book to give them this option. Of course we give the standard subst. policy but if my customer is expecting a gardeny style sim. to Springtime Floral Garden basket I would be unhappy if a designer took it into his/her head to send some low, horizontal piece when we are expecting a22 inch tall basket
But it means we will not be buying any containers, no value in them for us. and the arrangments are not striking or unique or even particularly pretty.. all Martha Stewart style push as much as possible into a tight nosegay. This is what I see at our local grocery store. easy to do, well priced but kind of run of the mill. I am sure that the .coms will now be competing with our grocery store which is fine by me.
I think this is the year that the FTd new picture book will be released. I sure hope that the vast majority of design styles in this new book are appropriate for real florists. One of the remaining values of the wire service to me is to be able to show my customers nice, well designed, creative arrangements (not drop ins) and be able to show that same picture to the designing florist so that my customer has a reasonable expectation of getting something close to what they like. Unlike other florists who find their customers are satisfied with accepting their claim that the designing florist will do something nice, my customers like to have some input and control of what they spend their money on. We always have 6 monthly specials listed on our web page, on our monthly postcards,and in our spec cooler. I would like to be able to continue to find appropriate pictures from the FTD picture book to give them this option. Of course we give the standard subst. policy but if my customer is expecting a gardeny style sim. to Springtime Floral Garden basket I would be unhappy if a designer took it into his/her head to send some low, horizontal piece when we are expecting a22 inch tall basket
