DE TO TAUPE

In “Growing Wonder,” Felicia Alvarez of Menagerie Farm & Flowers muses on the versatility of roses she classifies as “multicolored and taupe.”

She wrote, “Like chameleons changing colors and tones with the seasons, the roses in this family are the most unique. From mauve to glossy purple, and a kaleidoscope of colors in between, the roses in this group always steal the show.”

Floral journalist Jill Brooke, creator of the blog “Flower Power Daily,” recently explored toffee and taupe-colored roses, calling them the new cultural rival of the ubiquitous red rose.

“These roses not only represent multi-colorism but reflect the growing trends in marriage,” she wrote, noting one international rose grower’s report that sales of “sand, toffee, and nude roses now make up 30% of the color assortment” of wedding flowers.

Floral designer Debbie Bosworth of Dandelion House Farm and Floral Design is also smitten with the neutral color spectrum. “I love trends that change, evolve, and adapt until they eventually become timeless,” she says. “The sandy-pink Quicksand rose and blushy-brown Cappuccino spray rose are two popular choices in the nude rose family and some of my favorites to work with when I'm designing a wedding with a soft, earthy, neutral color palette.”

‘HONEY DIJON’

As the darling of wedding and event floral designers, this rose’s unique mustard color and pink-streaked tips puts it in a class all by itself.

‘KOKO LOCO’

She almost needs no introduction – this crazy rose goes loco with shades of lavender-to-taupe while blooming. This rose is the sweetheart of floral designers and trendsetters.

‘DISTANT DRUMS’

As a beauty of an ombre rose, this is cherished by floral designers and gardeners alike. It produces flushes prolifically throughout the season, and is one of Felicia’s all-time favorite roses.

ORDER GROWING WONDER

FLORAL DESIGN

Dandelion House Floral Design dandelionhousefloraldesign.com

@dandelion_house

PLANNING: AMC Weddings amcweddings.com | @amc.weddings destinations.

Refine your niche and differentiate yourself as the go-to wedding expert for out-of-town couples

As a wedding florist, you want to stand out as the best choice for your clients. This sounds simple enough on the surface, but the trouble is, it’s not easy to carve your own path in the wedding business. Sure, there are some floral designers who seem to be overnight successes, creating great events and garnering a lot of press right from the start, but that’s an exception to the rule, not the norm. So how do you actually find a lane that’s best for you?

Most small businesses grow organically through word-of-mouth referrals where real clients rave about you to other potential real clients. This means if you’re looking for your own unique lane, it’s imperative that you listen to what your clients say that your company is doing especially well, and then figure out how to do more of that.

I’ve been specializing in destination weddings for more than 20 years; however, if that term conjures images of flying to a tropical island and eagerly awaiting a shipment of flowers at an airport terminal, that’s not what I mean! No, my clients are planning a destination wedding in Vermont, where I’m located, and it’s my mission to make choosing a florist easier for them.

I’ve learned to become intimately familiar with how the planning experience feels from my clients’ point of view. By leaning into the fact that I design flowers for out-of-town couples who are planning their wedding from afar, I’m able to give my customers better service, and that allows me to book them more easily, too.

WISHES + DESIRES

Here are five tips to make booking a destination wedding special:

ONE

Put yourself in the shoes of your customers to understand their experience.

TWO

Look to your customer reviews for clues to what you’re doing well. Rinse and repeat!

THREE

Do more of the actions and activities that you identify as your strengths.

FOUR

Anticipate customer concerns about their destination wedding, and address those in your marketing and customer |service process.

SLOW FLOWERS JOURNAL 45 thing that comes to mind is, frankly, a lot of uncertainty! A wedding is a big deal after all – and it’s a lot of work to plan an event of such importance, even if it’s in your own backyard – so the distance of a destination event could feel daunting.

As I listen to customers say they’ve only been to their venue once and can’t remember all the details of the layout, or they love the idea of a destination wedding, but they hadn’t considered how time-consuming it may be to interview vendors (especially if they’re in a different time zone), I can begin to see things from their point of view and help address their concerns—both in my marketing and my client management.

My priority is to help customers feel confident that I’m the right florist for them. If they’re not familiar with the venue, it’s not a problem because I am. If they’re working with a short window for meeting vendors, I make myself flexible.

It goes back to Marketing 101: What is your client experiencing? What problems can you help them solve?

How can you do it better?

If you want to stand out as the single, best choice while you carve your niche as a wedding florist, learn to specialize in something. Listen to what your current clients are experiencing, and emphasize your strengths according to the rave reviews shared by past customers. You'll not only create your own lane, but you can continue to navigate your own path towards success with a clear direction of where you plan to go from here.

Her paintings were a lasting appreciation for the gardens that surrounded her.