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Did you receive flowers this Valentine’s Day? You weren’t alone. Flowers make up 79% of sales for the holiday. About half of these flower purchases are roses, which leads to approximately 250 million roses grown in anticipation of Valentine’s Day shopping.
While Valentine’s Day is the top holiday for flower purchases, the cut flower market in general is thriving right now.
Individuals and businesses alike are purchasing bouquets to spread cheer and beauty as the pandemic drags on. And this is creating opportunities for industry.
Outdoor dining in major cities often means sharing a sidewalk with passersby on their phones, dog walkers with five furry friends trailing behind them, and messenger bikes whizzing past to deliver takeout. When city restaurants expanded from the sidewalks to the streets, they constructed tents, shacks, igloos, and solariums.
But let’s face it — as creative as some of these solutions are, it’s still sometimes felt like you’re bundled up in a jacket on a loud street with cockroaches probably scurrying around your feet — not to mention, the threat of vehicles crashing into the flimsy outdoor dining solutions.
Floratorium has been credited with helping New York City survive the pandemic. The flower and art studio creates large-scale floral installations for restaurants, as well as retail businesses, creating “immersive visual experiences.” Diners feel ensconced in a field of flowers, giving them a respite from their cramped studio apartments that have had to serve as bedrooms/offices/home gym/panic rooms amid the pandemic. Flower canopies and arches were able to draw diners back to restaurants when many were turning to food delivery.
Just listen to the way Flower Power Daily waxes poetic about the business: “Floratorium’s innovative and transformative work creating gorgeous floral outside installations helped over 60 restaurants survive scaffolding, freezing cold and makeshift structures during the dreary days of the pandemic – restaurants including Marea, Cafeteria, Sola Pasta Bar, Vicolina, Lola Taverna and others – which made Floratorium not only a brand to be admired but contributed to NYC’s survival in providing light to the darkness.”
While it makes financial sense for restaurants to want to attract and delight guests, there has also been a growing movement of mundane locations from trash cans to construction sites decked out in surreal cascades of flowers. These scenes can fill even the busiest, most cynical city dweller with awe and appreciation.
Lewis Miller Design launched 20 years ago, and while it blossomed quickly into one of New York City’s top floral design houses, what’s made the business a household name outside of the industry is Miller’s creation of The Flower Flash. Designed using flowers repurposed from events, The Flower Flash is pop-up street art installations in the most unexpected of places: spilling out of parked ice cream trucks, winding up street signs, and adorning subway entrances.
As retail florist Kelly Perry explains: “His main vision and goal is to create an emotional response through flowers—to brighten and beautify someone’s day and to make them smile, the way one smiles when they witness a random act of kindness.”
Lewis Miller Design says: “The Flower Flash is our gift to New Yorkers.”
The pandemic has been particularly devastating for individuals who live in nursing homes. COVID-19 spread widely throughout nursing homes, causing illness, death, fear, and isolation. For example, as we reported back in 2020, the owner of Adams Tree Preservation jumped into his company’s bucket truck, which has an arm with a reach of 80 feet, just so that he and his mother could see each other through her third-story nursing home window, when visitors were being restricted due to social distancing.
Even prior to the pandemic, though, Jessica Powell, florist and owner of DeLuxe Floral Design, recognized the vulnerability of those in nursing homes. Four years ago, she began the Let Kindness Bloom campaign, which accepts donations through the company’s Facebook page from the community to sponsor bouquets of flowers to be given anonymously to those in nursing homes.
In 2021, 400 people sponsored flowers that were distributed across 10 local facilities. This year, the goal was 750 bouquets.
The global cut flowers market is expected to grow 5.2% from 2020 to 2027, reaching $43.8 billion. In the U.S. alone, it was estimated to be $6 billion in 2020.
The growth could be attributed to a number of factors.
More people are spending time at home amid COVID-19. This has translated to an increase in home renovation projects and caused a spike in lumber prices and a shortage of fencing materials. Flowers brighten newly renovated kitchens and home offices. They’re also a budget-friendly home upgrade for those not investing in renovations.
As friends, family, and colleagues have been sick, lost loved ones, and struggled with mental health during the pandemic, sending flowers is a popular expression of sympathy.
Even prior to the pandemic, though, plants had become an obsession of millennials. In 2018, younger households had achieved an all-time high in their participation in gardening. That year, Americans spent a little over $500 on lawn and garden retail sales, which was about $100 more than the previous year. As monikers like “plant parent” and “plantfluencer” and the motto “plant lady is the new cat lady” have risen, it may be bleeding over into the cut flower market for those without green thumbs.
The cut flower supply chain requires a wide range of professionals to grow, transport, and sell flowers. It relies on HVAC professionals, automatic sprinkler manufacturers, pilots, gardening app designers, corrugated box manufacturers, and more. And while flowers have been around longer than humans have been, they are still subject to trends.
Greenhouses — Fully heated greenhouses allow flowers to be grown all year long. The commercial greenhouse market is expected to grow 8.5% from 2020 to 2027, reaching $49.31 billion.
The Flower Cold Chain — To keep them from wilting, fresh flowers must be transported quickly through a cold chain. Flowers are cut at farms and then transported in refrigerated units on trucks, boats, and planes.
Dedicated Flower Flights — It’s estimated that six days of the week seven flights a day come in from Latin America that are dedicated to flower delivery, and that 85% of flower imports come through Miami International Airport to get to the U.S.
Ocean Flowers — Although 99% of flowers arriving to the U.S. come by airplane, industry experts predict that it will become more popular to transport flowers by boat. This less expensive alternative is becoming possible thanks to improvements in chilling technology.
Floral E-Commerce — Traditional flower shops have declined 40% in the past 15 years in the U.S., even though the cut flower market is growing. That’s because shoppers can now buy online any time they’d like. The U.S floral e-commerce market is $5.3 billion in 2022.
Flower Subscriptions — Flower subscription services are becoming more popular. Businesses are differentiating themselves through initiatives such as sustainable flowers, single flower bouquets, Bulb of the Month Clubs, flowers from local indie florists, and, inspired by the home meal prep kit craze, flower-arranging kits.
Image Credit: Dragon Images / Shutterstock.com
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