Signing up with FTD

[pfmflowermarket]

We are mostly a cash n' carry florist that offers full service florist services. Not wire service, no real desire to be. A rep came in today singing the praise of FTD. Said she could give us a really good opportunity. Only $50 a month for everything she says. She said she could give us this deal for a year. She stated to us that it usually costs $149 a month to be a member and then the books etc are extra. She said it was was like writing you a blank check. You are going to make money. She said she couldn't go into numbers but that there is alot of money in this area being spent on orders through FTD. She said if we signed up we'd be the only "real florist" who is filling orders for them. She said that because we are open 7 days a week, we'd be flocked with orders. Our local Price Chopper "Central Market Florist" is the only place filling FTD orders currently . Within 15 miles either side of us there is about 5 local flower shops th

While I'm not really interested, just curious. She said to call some FTD shops and get their story about how wonderful FTD was. I thought well hey, there must be members here on Flowerchat. We discussed a little of the 80/20 thing. Explained to her that customers that shop locally with us can't/don't want to spend the prices on some of those arrangements.

Was wondering, those of you that are members of FTD, what is keeping you in the program? Pro's n' cons of being an FTD member. With all the negative things you hear about the wire service industry, why would we want to be a member? The reps reply to that very question was "well you don't usually hear the good, FTD has so many services to offer." I'm paraphrasing but that's pretty much it. We are a smaller shop, don't do a large volume of orders, no e-commerce site, no POS. The rep stated that orders would come in via our computer printer, and if we couldn't fill the order we would have 2 hours to reject the order or we would have to pay a fee. She said that a few years ago on Valentine's Day so many thousand orders we neither rejected or filled and people were pissed. After that they made this rule/law mandatory.

She stayed and talked for like 10-15min.

 

[steve]

I just spent 1.5 hours giving her an FTD education although she has a big time back ground as she was head of Price Chopper Floral responsible for 120 stores not sure what she is doing working as a rep since her Price chopper job would have paid much more. Unless you are a big sender it makes no sense to belong to any wire service at this time. If you like to chat about it give me a call.

 

[secretgarden]

I will tell you I am not a fan of the wire services so take that into consideration when you read the rest

1. If there are not any FTD florists in your area, FTD should not be taking orders for your area. Thus those folks should look for a local florist online to fill their needs and that would be you. Why go through the middle man.

2. Go to FTD.com and see what you can see. What is the top lead sellers on their site? What is considered their "Best Sellers"? Well look at that... they are all direct ship! When you give them money to be a member they are going to use that money to market to your area. When those folks go to FTD what will they find? $39.99 Dozen Roses drop shipped in a box to their home.... why shop with you. Why buy the more expensive items that are designed by a florist? If I EVER went back to a wire service it would NOT be FTD. They do everything in their power to bypass the florist all together. Really... look at the website. It takes some time to actually find things that are not delivered in a box.

3. Now look at the items that are florist delivered. Do you have those types of containers? Do you have those type of flowers? If 5 of those items came over the Merc today could you fill those orders? Would you need to buy their containers to fill orders? If so could you move the rest of the 12 pack before they changed containers again. Would they sit in the back room and take up money and space you could use towards your own containers at a better cost? Would you have to special order flowers just to fill that order? If so could you sell the flowers to your every day customers before they went bad?'

4. Now take those same 5 arrangements. If you subtract delivery can you fill it to value with what you think is included in that vase? Now could you do all of that if you only made about 73% of that total, and still make a profit?

5. Now think about holiday time. You will need to order more product to fill those orders. You will need to order more containers to fill those orders as well, and vases. What about extra people to work the phones, plug orders into your system and design those arrangements. And trucks and drivers to delver those. But remember you are only make 73% on those orders so you will need to watch costs if you want to make a profit at holiday time.

In closing (I feel like I am writing a term paper LOL) I would say that you have to look at what is best for your business. Most of the folks on this forum will tell you. NO money in filling, all the money is in sending and the rebates. Don't let them dangle the full delivery van in front of you. So much goes into that from your end that they never have to worry about.

 

[concord]

In my opinion, if there are orders to needing be filled in your area, you'd be better off getting an independent e-commerce web site and going after those direct orders. There is seldom profit for small shops in filling discounted wire orders, and there are plenty of head aches!

 

[kt4ye]

You will be paying FTD to market in your territory and others and ship direct....look at their website and see what percentage of their site is dedicated to florist delivered VS drop shipping. Look at the prices and better still ask her what percent FTD fills orders for drop ship VS florist delivered, then you can calculate your contribution to create that percentage of orders to be delivered in your area. Don't forget about all these wonderful rules ftd created like refusing within minutes or else you get to pay....lord knows howa small florist needs to hire a computer person to man the machine.....We just dropped ftd after seeing 29.99 orders just being dumped to us after giving larger orders to roy white (now out of business and who stocked over two hundred cases of discontinued vases and sold them for .50-.25 ea...but they supported FTD wholeheartedly and later FTD let them down). Ask whole bunch of questions.....and lock them on a set price for x years, have them lend you a merc for x no of months for free and have them train y0u....ask for whole bunch of freebies...all they can say is no. good luck

 

[blumen]

In my opinion, if there are orders to needing be filled in your area, you'd be better off getting an independent e-commerce web site and going after those direct orders. There is seldom profit for small shops in filling discounted wire orders, and there are plenty of head aches!

Amen!

I say run from the offer! And I'm FTD. You want to be a sending florist, NOT a filling florist for them. We do not fill for ftd.com or any of the order gatherers. That's the recipe to stay sane and profitable.

 

[BOSS]

Disclaimer: My store was an FTD member for 60 years, I got out 3 years ago...

I had a talk with a good friend of mine at FTD last week... he's been there 14 years, upper management... cashed out his stock, put in his notice and is done this week. Reasons are several, but the main one was ethics. Like was said, try maintaining sales quotas with a declining customer base, and inferior products.

FTD is losing members at a rate never before seen, so are the other services. If they did not have coverage issues they would not be offering it for free. Which they do, you can forget the $50 too, they'll give you $29, or even free... Everything FTD has to offer, can be obtained cheaper independently... why spend the money?

There is NO MONEY in a wire service unless you send OUT more orders/dollars than you get IN... 85% of florists can't do that...

 

[Mikey the Flower Guy]

RUN, DON'T WALK...far,far away! (and I'm FTD)

 

[pfmflowermarket]

Thank you guys so much. I really appreciate your honesty. I almost want to print out your responses, but remove your names and show them to her if she comes back. Tell her that no we are not interested and here's why. This is "REAL" florists being real.

 

[bootcampguy]

Run florist run.......

From a marketing standpoint, you will be funding them to to solicit your customers or potentials away from yourself.

 

[Flowermomma]

We are mostly a cash n' carry florist that offers full service florist services. Not wire service, no real desire to be. A rep came in today singing the praise of FTD. Said she could give us a really good opportunity. Only $50 a month for everything she says. She said she could give us this deal for a year. She stated to us that it usually costs $149 a month to be a member and then the books etc are extra. She said it was was like writing you a blank check. You are going to make money. She said she couldn't go into numbers but that there is alot of money in this area being spent on orders through FTD. She said if we signed up we'd be the only "real florist" who is filling orders for them. She said that because we are open 7 days a week, we'd be flocked with orders. Our local Price Chopper "Central Market Florist" is the only place filling FTD orders currently . Within 15 miles either side of us there is about 5 local flower shops th

While I'm not really interested, just curious. She said to call some FTD shops and get their story about how wonderful FTD was. I thought well hey, there must be members here on Flowerchat. We discussed a little of the 80/20 thing. Explained to her that customers that shop locally with us can't/don't want to spend the prices on some of those arrangements.

Was wondering, those of you that are members of FTD, what is keeping you in the program? Pro's n' cons of being an FTD member. With all the negative things you hear about the wire service industry, why would we want to be a member? The reps reply to that very question was "well you don't usually hear the good, FTD has so many services to offer." I'm paraphrasing but that's pretty much it. We are a smaller shop, don't do a large volume of orders, no e-commerce site, no POS. The rep stated that orders would come in via our computer printer, and if we couldn't fill the order we would have 2 hours to reject the order or we would have to pay a fee. She said that a few years ago on Valentine's Day so many thousand orders we neither rejected or filled and people were pissed. After that they made this rule/law mandatory.

She stayed and talked for like 10-15min.

I did a trial of FTD for 6 months at their great rate... they don't tell you about the extra fees. each reject costs. each little thing costs...
I honestly would say don't do it. If you are not sending out of towns why do you need it? Do you really want to fill orders for 20% less then what you can normally get for them? DO you want to get orders that are for 30 including delivery then spend the time trying to get the price increased? only to have the other shop say well then reject it(which you pay for) and have them send it else where???

I would honestly say do NOT do it.

 

[kt4ye]

Always wonder which (idiot) florist fills up these 29.00 orders. Haven't figured out what is in it for them. We have seen an increase on orders from Merit (sp) florist, and they are totally rude.

 

[Mikey the Flower Guy]

I did a trial of FTD for 6 months at their great rate... they don't tell you about the extra fees. each reject costs. each little thing costs...
I honestly would say don't do it. If you are not sending out of towns why do you need it? Do you really want to fill orders for 20% less then what you can normally get for them? DO you want to get orders that are for 30 including delivery then spend the time trying to get the price increased? only to have the other shop say well then reject it(which you pay for) and have them send it else where???

I would honestly say do NOT do it.

THAT'S easy...set your minimums to $50.00......

 

[kt4ye]

THAT'S easy...set your minimums to $50.00......

#SIGH# If only it was so easy! Unfortunately, everyone -- including headquarters -- IGNORES the minimums!

 

[Flowermomma]

#SIGH# If only it was so easy! Unfortunately, everyone -- including headquarters -- IGNORES the minimums!

mimimus were ignored here too.

 

[bootcampguy]

#SIGH# If only it was so easy! Unfortunately, everyone -- including headquarters -- IGNORES the minimums!

Last week while "sparring" with executive of an OG, he told me that they should be considered as "opportunity gatherers" not "order gatherers". I got a little queezy, but held it down......

 

[Mikey the Flower Guy]

#SIGH# If only it was so easy! Unfortunately, everyone -- including headquarters -- IGNORES the minimums!

and I ignore FTD when they ignore my minimums...

 

[jamie]

I made some money filling for FTD. The profit margins are razor thin and the headaches are huge.

for 3 days after Valentine's day 3 years in a row, I had someone doing rejects all day long from OGs such as Merrit and JF. I am talking 100+ orders we rejected where these OGs were trying to get V-day orders filled after the fact so they could fight credit card disputes. (FTD & Dove)

M-day 2011 I had to shut down my Mercury for TWO WEEKS AFTER mother's day because FTD.com was spamming my system with late Mother's day flowers.

Do you want to associate your business with these crooks? You will have to "proudly" paste your FTD symbol on the front door.

A $29.99 arrangement from FTD.com (delivery included) costs the consumer over $55.00 after service fees and sales tax. In the old days, that was fine because the person who actually paid for the flowers didn't actually SEE them most of the time. However, smart phones and facebook are shining a bright light on our nasty little secret. Now the consumer is almost certain to see what they paid for. You better make sure they feel they got a good value.

When FTD decides to do another Groupon ( http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/13/groupon-ftd-deal_n_822360.html ) scam like they did last year, people will be coming into your store demanding that you honor the coupon. You will look like a crook. In my opinion, you will be a crook-by-association.


FYI FTD sales reps are master salesmen. I love talking to them. It's like a free seminar. Their cadence, posturing and articulation is impeccable. The next time one comes in, stop listening to the BS they spew and start watching the process. You will learn volumes about salesmanship.

 

[kt4ye]

<SNIP>A $29.99 arrangement from FTD.com (delivery included) costs the consumer over $55.00 after service fees and sales tax.<SNIP>

Unless something dramatic has happened very recently, FTD does not charge sales tax. Neither does Teleflora. 1-800 -- I'm not 100% sure.

And not charging sales tax is probably in violation of your state's tax laws. That's because FTD and TF charge their MEMBERS sales tax on goods and services that are USED or CONSUMED by the members.

No taxing authority in the nation allows a business entity to pick and choose which customers it charges sales tax. So... it seems to me that FTD and TF (at least) are involved in massive acts of tax evasion.

But when the consumer notices NO SALES TAX on an FTD or TF order, he/she ASSUMES that he/she is SAVING MONEY by buying "online" rather than buying locally. And that is almost never correct!

 

[Flowerchatter03]

Here's another factor to consider..do some research on the history to the present about FTD. You'll find out that they went from being the best known brand name when ordering flowers to about the same as FYF or JF or any of those other lame companies. You'll discover that they went public on the stock trade and has changed hands many times. Look into the business practices of the people that own FTD now.

What that rep didn't tell you was all the hidden fees, traps, and other BS they put you through like the tiny small window that you can get out of their "contract" even when you dot all the "i" s and cross all the "t"s.

Take that $50 a month and try some other type of marketing and see how you can grow your business on your own with you calling all the shots.

Before you yoke your business with another business, be sure to take the time and get to know that company very well first. If the best looking guy you ever saw stopped by your shop and told you he was completely in love with you, that he was a millionare, he would make your wildest dreams come true, take you to the most exotic places in the world, would never cheat on you, would never make you angry or upset, would do all the housework, and build you a dream home complete with a staff, however, you would have to mary him that day (and, by the way, doesn't believe in divorce), would you do it? Probably not. If you wouldn't give your hand to a stranger, don't give your shops hand to a stranger either.