It’s 2024~ Welcome to a New Year! This is the 10th year we’ve produced the Slow Flowers’ Floral Insights and Industry Forecast, which originated in 2015 as a series of media presentations that we also shared with members and listeners.
This episode is accompanied by two important, free resources. First, a video report that I recently recorded with Robin Avni, creative director of BLOOM Imprint, our Slow Flowers publishing venture. This is the video companion to today’s podcast. Click above to watch.
We have also produced a 38-page digital magazine-style report, filled with deeper analysis of each of our 2024 insights.
Here’s a bit more about Robin Avni. She is a creative veteran in the media and high-tech industries whose experience includes 15-plus years in the publishing industry and eight years at Microsoft in design and creative management. Robin has successfully managed innovative, award-winning design teams and high-profile projects and she has received numerous national design and photography editing awards for her own work.
Robin has produced more than 15 books, including seven titles created for the BLOOM Imprint catalog. In 2004, following Microsoft, she founded bricolage*, a consultancy specializing in creative strategy, content development, and trend analysis focused on the home and garden. She has worked with Fortune 500 companies, national advertising agencies and award-winning media properties, applying timely actionable insights to their businesses.
Let’s jump right in and embrace 2024 – we’re calling it The Year of Simplicity! I can’t wait for you to learn about each of the insights and the people who have influenced and inspired us to identify them.
The Slow Flowers Summit Early Bird Registration campaign has come to a close and we congratulate the folks who took advantage of the money-savings opportunity to grab early registration! Ticket sales continue through June – and if you’re already a Slow Flowers member, you’ll still receive $100 off your registration, which is the equivalent of the Standard annual membership, so it basically pays for itself! In the coming weeks, we’ll be highlighting more of our speakers and more about some of the special experiences associated with joining our community in Banff, Alberta, Canada – June 23-25th!
One more item of note! If you missed the January Slow Flowers Newsletter that dropped a few days ago, click the link below to read it. This edition is filled with lots of floral goodness, free resources, news, and more.
Our Sustainable Wedding Expert: Jessica Stewart of Bramble & Blossom
Join us on Friday, January 12, 2024 — when we welcome Slow Flowers member Jessica Stewart of Pittsburgh-based Bramble & Blossom — We’re calling this session our “secrets of a sustainable wedding florist.” Jessica will share her philosophy around communication during the sales process, including describing how you design for seasonality by sourcing from local flower farms; how to make this clear in contracts + proposals; and how she sources and plans for weddings and installations. Her expertise is priceless and you’ll want to join us and bring your sustainable wedding questions! We hope to see you in the Zoom room!
Thank you to Store It Cold, creators of the revolutionary CoolBot, a popular solution for flower farmers, studio florists and farmer-florists. Save $1000s when you build your own walk-in cooler with the CoolBot and an air conditioner. Don’t have time to build your own? They also have turnkey units available. Learn more at storeitcold.com.
Thank you to Red Twig Farms. Based in Johnstown, Ohio, Red Twig Farms is a family-owned farm specializing in peonies, daffodils, tulips and branches. Learn more at redtwigfarms.com.
Thank you to Seattle Wholesale Growers Market, a farmer-owned cooperative committed to providing the very best the Pacific Northwest has to offer in cut flowers, foliage and plants. The Growers Market’s mission is to foster a vibrant marketplace that sustains local flower farms and provides top-quality products and service to the local floral industry. Visit them at seattlewholesalegrowersmarket.com.
Best Wishes for a Prosperous and Peaceful New Year!
Let’s bring our best to 2024. It has the potential to be a challenging year in so many ways, and I believe staying mindful of your values, and focused on your personal mission are important ways to manage the uncertainty. Remember – we’re committed to simplicity and not chaos! I hope today’s forecast will inspire your intentions!
Thank you for joining me today! The Slow Flowers Podcast is a member-supported endeavor, downloaded more than one million times by listeners like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much. As our movement gains more supporters and more passionate participants who believe in the importance of our domestic cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too. If you’re new to our weekly Show and our long-running Podcast, check out all of our resources at SlowFlowersSociety.com
I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Show & Podcast. The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. The content and opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone, independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization. Next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more Slow Flowers on the table, one stem, one vase at a time. Thanks so much for joining us today and I’ll see you next week!
Music Credits:
Drone Pine; Horizon Liner; Turning on the Lights; Gaena by Blue Dot Sessions http://www.sessions.blue
With 2023 here, it’s fitting to say goodbye to 2022 as we review the year’s highlights. All I can say about 2022 is that after slogging through the pandemic in 2020 and its aftermath in 2021, this past year felt like a sprint, not a marathon. The year seemed to race by so quickly, week by week, month by month, and the march of time propelled our beautiful and inspiring Slow Flowers community through the year, as we sought fulfillment, prosperity and peace — and balance in all things, right?! We lived our values, communicated our message, and supported one another in our shared mission. But wow, as much as the word *slow* is at the heart of all we do here, 2022 was anything but *slow*.
Yet, the annual ritual to pause, review, evaluate, and celebrate – as well as learn from — the lessons and experiences from our past year are activities I wouldn’t miss – and I want to share with you!
One personally meaningful major milestone was the 10-year anniversary of the book that started us off on the Slow Flowers journey — The 50 Mile Bouquet. When it was published in 2012, The 50 Mile Bouquet was the first book to spotlight a major cultural shift and a transformation around how cut flowers are grown, designed and consumed, closely mirroring the culinary world’s locavore/slow food revolution.
“Brimming with Blooms” documents the origins of the Seattle Wholesale Growers Market in The 50 Mile Bouquet.
One decade ago the floral industry was just beginning to ask for changes, seeking alternatives to imported, mass-produced and chemical-laden flowers. The 50 Mile Bouquet introduced some of the innovative voices of the dynamic new Slow Flower Movement: the organic flower farmers, the sustainably-motivated floral designers . . . and the flower enthusiasts who were increasingly asking, ‘Where and how were my flowers grown, and who grew them?’
Melissa and Tutta Bella appeared in The 50 Mile Bouquet
The 50 Mile Bouquet included documentary-feature reporting and full color photography to bring readers into the farms and design studios of Slow Flowers practitioners. As the book that coined the phrase “Slow Flowers,” its relevance today is more important than ever, considering issues around climate change, supply chain limitations, and equity and inclusion in the floral marketplace.
Fast-forward, here we are wrapping up 2022, and the issues around flower sourcing are just as timely and more important than ever! From my original storytelling in the pages of The 50 Mile Bouquet, the Slow Flowers Movement emerged, with the launch of the Slow Flowers Society and so many meaningful conversations through the Slow Flowers Podcast interviews and our other programs, content, advocacy and outreach to floral professionals and flower lovers alike.
Let’s take a look at our Membership!
We know that joining Slow Flowers Society as a member takes a financial commitment, a modest one that I believe offers incredible value for anyone in the business of communicating their brand in alignment with slow, seasonal, local and sustainable.
2022, for some, was a challenging year, as flowers continued to be bought and sold in a marketplace that is often based on cheap and convenient. Against that backdrop, we are so grateful to welcome 75 new flower farmers and floral designers who joined Slow Flowers Society as members in 2022. One Hundred percent of our focus is to add value to your investment in this organization. Since launching Slow Flowers in 2013, all of our revenue from membership subscriptions and partner sponsorships are poured right back into building Slow Flowers Society into a relevant and significant presence in the floral marketplace. Our strength in numbers has earned Slow Flowers a place at the table in mainstream floral circles, in the media, in conversations about the future of floriculture and floristry. That is priceless!
In the past year, Slow Flowers Society has produced hundreds of hours of educational resources for you, from the weekly Slow Flowers Show and Podcast (and supporting blog posts) to our monthly Virtual Membership Meet-Ups, and info-packed monthly newsletters, to stories you read on slowflowersjournal.com and in our quarterly digital magazine Slow Flowers Journal, to the feature reports we produce with Johnny’s Selected Seeds for their newsletter – and more. It’s all about education, from growing and design advice to small business and marketing resources. When you add it all up, that’s incredible value for a small membership subscription.
In 2021, we hosted 10 Meet-Ups on a variety of topics important to our members, beginning with our January session when I co-presented our2022 Slow Flowers Insights and Industry Forecast with Bloom Imprint’s creative director Robin Avni and closing up the year recently with our December Meet-Up focusing on value-added flower farm product development with Natasha McCrary of 1818 Farms and Sarah Wagstaff of SUOT Farm & Flowers.
Thousands have watched the replay videos with close to 8,000 impressions our YouTube channel! This is evergreen educational content always available to you and you can find the YouTube link to search all of our 2022 videos from the homepage of SlowFlowersPodcast.com.
October was our membership appreciation month, with our focus to highlight members and their floral stories ~ all across the continent. During October, we brought weekly member conversations to IG Live and the Zoom Room, with even more opportunities to learn and hear from our members — people at the heart of the Slow Flowers Movement. The social media exposure was incredible, generating thousands of views and impressions. You met and heard from October 4th: On Farm Events with Chelsea Willis of @sweetdelilahfarm and Misty VanderWeele of @all_dahliad_up who shared how they stage on-farm events; we discussed retail floristry with Jill Redman of @forageflorals + Angela Turner of @belfiorefarm; Pam Parker of JP Parker Flowers led a tour of her retail flower shop and discussed being a farmer-florist, and wedding designer Jessica Stewart of @bramble_blossom_pgh shared her tips for keeping your studio sustainable.
We also produced a new Member Benefits Booklet with discounts and coupons from Slow Flowers Society and our sponsors. If you can’t find the link to the booklet, please reach out and we’ll be happy to share it with you. Speaking of reaching out, our membership services gained a boost this past September when Tonneli Gruetter joined us as community engagement and member manager. A flower farmer herself, Tonneli has jumped right in to connect with you, and enhance membership engagement — if you have a question or suggestion, she’s your front-line contact and you should feel free to reach out to her at membership@slowflowers.com.
In November, we surveyed the Slow Flowers community – an annual exercise that informs our planning and forecasting for the year to come. Here are some highlights:
We asked Members how they engage with Slow Flowers Society and about their participation in the long list of benefits and features for 2022; Our Members cited the original benefit of joining Slow FlowersSociety, dating back to the launch of slowflowers.com as an online directory in 2014.
Nearly 70% of you mentioned the value of your Slow Flowers directory business listing found at slowflowers.com. 43% of you use our Slow Flowers badges and logos on your businesses’ branding and communications. One-third of you value being featured in Slow Flowers’ social media posts as a popular feature.
When it comes to Member Benefits
Respondents ranked top member benefits as follows:
69% Business listing on Slowflowers.com
43% Used Slow Flowers badges and logo on business branding/communications
34% Featured in social media post @slowflowerssociety
28% Purchased discounted tickets for Slow Flowers events
20% Attended Slow Flowers virtual meet-ups
20% Collaborated with other Slow Flowers members for special projects
18% Interviewed as guest on Slow Flowers Podcast
12% Participated in American Flowers Week
11% Participate in Slow Flowers Facebook Community
Where do you fall on this list? Are you missing out on features and programs available to you as a Member?! Take a moment to align our services with your floral enterprise! In 2023, we will continue these features, so if you’re not participating, that means you’re missing out on all the benefits of your membership!
Relating to Member Value, I’m so encouraged with these numbers:
81 percent of you rate the value of your Slow Flowers membership as high value or very high value – up from 75% in 2021 and 82 percent of you are very satisfied or extremely satisfied with their Slow Flowers membership, up from 78 % in 2021
We asked members to share key ways in which they find value in their Slow Flowers member benefits. The top items:
80% of you say: I want to Align my business with the values of the Slow Flowers Movement and Show my support for the mission of the Slow Flowers Movement
70% of you say: I want to connect with like-minded floral professionals and Educate myself and/or my staff about the importance of Slow Flowers.
We chose two thank-you gifts for our name drawing of those of you who completed our survey – and congratulations to our winners! On December 14th, I drew the names and announced the winners during an IG Live with Niesha Blancas, our social media manager:
For 2022, eight creative Slow Flowers individuals and teams participated in designing and producing ourAmerican Flowers Week botanical couture collection! These stylish and artistic floral fashions engage viewers with flowers and nature in new ways. We marvel how each look in the American Flowers Week Collection is unique to the location and season where it was produced and photographed — elevating flowers and foliages as works of art.
On June 29th, we invited the creatives who participated in our Botanical Couture collection to appear in the Slow Flowers Show and discuss their designs. And in conjunction with our American Flowers Week 2022 campaign, Slow Flowers Society and its publishing partner, BLOOM Imprint, released a special digital issue of Slow Flowers Journal, available for free download. The Summer 2022 edition featured our botanical couture collection and the stories of each designer, flower farmer and the floral ensembles designed with iconic American-grown botanicals. We already have five designers lined up to create looks for the 2023 American Flowers Week campaign so get ready to be wowed! And keep an eye out for more details on how to participate when we unveil our 2023 artwork next February.
In 2022, we produced an ambitious, fifth Slow Flowers Summit, as the 3-day gathering moved to lower Hudson Valley outside New York this past June. Since its inaugural conference in 2017, the Slow Flowers Summit has given attendees a chance to learn from artists, innovators, and thought leaders whose commitment to domestic flowers is at the heart of the Slow Flowers Movement. This past year gathered more than 125 progressive and sustainably-minded floral professionals from 25 states and two Canadian provinces.
Guests heard from seven inspiring presenters and enjoyed a farm tour, five design demonstrations, an interactive day of hands-on floral design, and a immersive maker-artisan experience. On Day One, attendees convened at The Red Barn at Maple Grove Farm in Bedford, New York, a private farm owned by local philanthropist George Bianco. On Days Two and Three, the Summit moved to nearby Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture and its Arts & Ecology Lab, which develops sustainable uses for all that a farm produces. Thank you to our partners, speakers, sponsors, and to all who attended this magical conference.
Here are a few Raves from our members:
“I wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed the Slow Flowers Summit. From the beautiful day of flowering at Red Barn at Maple Grove Farm to the inspiring presenters and classes, to the impeccable Stone Barns Center with its amazing grounds and delicious farm-to-table food, it was a tour de force to be sure! I know the Slow Flowers team put in countless hours to make the Summit a wonderful experience for all and it really was. I feel like I have found my tribe in my fellow Slow Flowers members! Your spark of an idea has become an incredible movement!”
“I learned so much from fantastic speakers and presenters. My favorite part was meeting and getting hands-on (experience) working on installations with those experts and the wider community of attendees. I’m feeling inspired and I’ve picked up some new tricks of the trade!”
“We are so inspired by all of the growers, artists, florists and ALL of the amazing people we met at the Slow Flowers Summit and we had a great time learning and connecting with other like-minded farmers and designers! Beyond excited to be part of the Slow Flowers Society and the Slow Flowers Movement!”
The ambitious programming continues for 2023, with an expanded list of speakers, topics, and experiences taking place over two days at Bellevue Botanical Garden in the Seattle area, June 26-27, 2023. You’ll be hearing much more about the 2023 Summit in the coming months, but save the date and we hope to see you there.
Slow Flowers communicates with our members through many channels, and we learned through this year’s Survey which of our methods are most used.
Ninety-five percent of members follow Slow Flowers Society on Instagram, while more than 40 percent engage with us via Facebook. The metrics for social media are easy to track, and they are impressive:
On @slowflowerssociety on Instagram, we have close to 41k followers, with an annual reach of 1.3 million. New in 2022 our social media manager Niesha Blancas launched reels on our @slowflowerssociety IG account, generating more than 165,000 views; clearly our most popular social media feature.
We also launched a member texting service and we use it judiciously, not over-spamming, but utilizing the channel to get useful and timely information at your fingertips. We know people can gain their flower farming and floral design news in many ways, through many channels, and we want to make it easy for our members to receive what they want, when they want it.
Our Slow Flowers monthly newsletternow reaches 3.6k subscribers, both members, followers, and fans who are interested in this Movement. We love producing the info-packed newsletter as it gives me a way to stop and reflect on all that has happened in any given month — chronicling everything from hosting our Slow Flowers podcast guests to featuring new promotional opportunities for members. The newsletter is a popular resource for our members – in fact, in the recent survey, more than two-thirds of you tell us you usually or always read it. You can always go back and read the archives from month to month; the archives are easy to find in the link at the bottom of slowflowers.com.
SLOW FLOWERS JOURNAL
Earlier, I mentioned the special botanical couture issue of Slow Flowers Journal, published last June, that issue served as the launch of our quarterly e-zine. The digital magazine is co-produced with BLOOM Imprint, and our goal is similar to our book publishing efforts: to support stories by and about Slow Flowers members. The subscription to Slow Flowers Journal is free to our members, as a member benefit. In 2022, we shared the issue widely, as an introductory promotion. In 2023, we will charge a market-rate subscription for nonmembers, either on a per-issue or annual basis.
Earlier this year, I’m proud to say that Slow Flowers Society and BLOOM Imprint received the GOLD Medal of Achievement for Slow Flowers Journal in the Trade: Special Projectcategory. The e-zine was published in June 2021 via Americanflowersweek.com and features the cover fashion and photography of Niesha Blancas of Fetching Social Media and model Jada Cruz.
BLOOM Imprint, our floral lifestyle book publishing arm, continued its ambitious publishing schedule for 2022, producing four titles, including:
Black Flora in February Growing Wonder in March Small Farm, Big Dreams in April and House + Flower in June.
Each of these books shared the beautiful message of a flower-centric life, and the expertise of authors and those featured in the pages.
These titles and our authors generated impressive attention in the media, and just to mention a few here: Veranda, Washington Post, Sunset Magazine, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Better Homes & Gardens, Architectural Digest, Flower Magazine, New York Times, House Beautiful, Cottage Journal, Apartment Therapy, Garden Design, Canadian House & Home, The American Gardener, Homes & Antiques, Cultivating Place on Public Radio, Central Texas Gardener on Public Television, Martha Stewart Online, Seattle Times and Cottages & Bungalows, among others. This type of attention underscores the significance and relevance of the books BLOOM Imprint has been producing — and we’re so proud of this work.
For the past 2 years, Slow Flowers has partnered with the National Gardening Association and gardenresearch.com to include cut flower questions in their annual National Gardening Survey.
The 2022 survey expanded on the 2021 findings, revealing that consumer awareness, attitudes and behavior about domestic and local cut flowers has only continued to increase.
In the 2021 survey, 58 percent of respondents said it is very or somewhat important that the flowers they purchase are locally grown. In 2022, that number climbed to 65 percent — nearly 2/3rd of respondents prefer locally-grown flowers.
The attitudes about American-grown flower purchases is also trending up — from 57% of respondents in 2021 who said it’s very or somewhat important that the flowers they purchase are U.S. grown, to 61% preferring domestic flowers in 2022.
Slow Flowers will again participate in and sponsor the National Gardening Survey that is conducted this month, with results ready to share this coming April. I can’t wait to see the needle continue to move up on this positive trend, so stay tuned!
Slow Flowers Podcast Earlier I mentioned that 2022 was the 10-year anniversary of the publication of The 50 Mile Bouquet. During this year, 2023, we will celebrate the publication of the book Slow Flowers. Its publication in the spring of 2013 led to the launch of the Slow Flowers Podcast, with the first episode appearing on July 23, 2013.
Since that date, the Slow Flowers Podcast has defined this Movement. It was the first ever podcast about flowers, flower farming and floral design, and is an award-winning weekly program known as the “Voice of the Slow Flowers Movement.” Airing consistently, without fail, each week for more than 9 years, this important gift to the floral marketplace focuses on the business of flower farming and floral design through the Slow Flowers sustainability ethos.
Our lifetime downloads have now exceeded one million episodes, and in 2022 alone, due to a major distribution expansion that came along with changing our syndicate hosting platform, the Slow Flowers Podcast was downloaded more than 500,000 times.
On top of this, we have produced a full year of Video episodes, bringing you flower farm tours, studio tours, Q&As, design demonstrations, and a visual immersion into the podcast conversations. You can find the video episodes, which we post each week as the Slow Flowers Show on Youtube, FB Live, Linked in Live and IGTV. Our viewership continues to grow and further enhance how we share the Slow Flowers Movement with you.
The Slow Flowers movement aspires to change how consumers and professionals in the floral marketplace view their flower purchases. The movement involves every facet of the floral distribution pipeline — from breeders and growers to wholesalers, to florists, to consumers — as they ask for domestic, seasonal, and sustainably-grown flowers.
We value our members, partners, sponsors and others who pursuing similar values and goals.
In 2022, Slow Flowers Society sponsored the Black Girl Florists Conference and sessions at the Association of Specialty Cut Flowers Conference. We provided scholarships to BIPOC florists and flower farmers to attend the Slow Flowers Summit and others who pursued continuing education.
We provided educational presentations at CalFlowers’ FunNSun, and spoke about the Slow Flowers Movement at the FREESIA Summit, the Great Grow Along conference, the Madison Square Park Conservancy Lecture Series, the Hardy Plant Study Weekend, King County Library’s Literary Lions, GardenComm International, Northwest Flower & Garden Festival, and for numerous garden clubs around the country.
We contributed to and provided quotes for national and major market media, including stories that appeared in Cottage Journal, Veranda, Better Homes & Gardens, Business Traveler, The Oregonian, Society of American Florists, Johnny’s Advantage Newsletter, BizWoman Magazine, Mayesh Blog, and Avocado Magazine, and appeared on the Blooming Good Time Podcast and the Cut Flower Podcast.
All of these activities continue to elevate the idea and values of the Slow Flowers Movement; they are your ROI – your return on investment – for joining this organization; and these benefits ripple across the industry and inspire the consumer mindset about local and seasonal flowers. It isn’t a direct line but a multidimensional force that builds a network of support for you and your own floral enterprise each and every day.
As we wrap up this year-in-review, I want to take a moment to thank all of our sponsors, including our lead Sponsor: Farmgirl Flowers, who has generously returned as our 2023 Lead Sponsor.
Our Major Sponsors for 2022 included: Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers The Gardeners’ Workshop Johnny’s Selected Seeds Longfield Garden Red Twig Farms, Seattle Wholesale Growers Market and Flowerfarm.com
Our Channel Sponsors for 2022 included: CalFlowers CoolBot Details Flowers Software DoorDash Mayesh Wholesale Florists and Scenic Place Peonies
Coming up in 2023, you’re invited to join our Slow Flowers Member Virtual Meet-Up on Friday, January 13, 2023 — when we welcome Emily Ellen Anderson of Curious Lola, a Slow Flowers member and business coach for artists and creatives — she’ll help us with a New Year re-set and you won’t want to miss it!
In late January, Bloom Imprint’s Robin Avni and I will co-present our 2023 Slow Flowers Floral Insights and Industry Forecast in a webinar format, produced in conjunction with the publication of our winter 2023 issue of Slow Flowers Journal. We’ll announce that date soon.
Thanks so much for joining me today. The Slow Flowers Podcast is a member-supported endeavor, downloaded more than one million times by listeners like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much. As our movement gains more supporters and more passionate participants who believe in the importance of our domestic cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too.
If you’re new to our weekly Show and our long-running Podcast, check out all of our resources at SlowFlowersSociety.com
Thank you for listening! Sending love, from my cutting garden to you! (c) Missy Palacol Photography
I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Show & Podcast. The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. The content and opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone, independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization. Next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more Slow Flowers on the table, one stem, one vase at a time.
Music credits:
Chymique; Game Hens; Gasland; Glass Beads; Lissa; Spindash; Yarrow and Root; Turning on the Lights; Gaena by Blue Dot Sessions http://www.sessions.blue
Today, I want to share a bonus episode with you — an updated lecture originally created for the FREESIA Summit, held in September 2022. FREESIA is an acronym for Florists Recognizing Environmental & Eco-Sustainable Ideas & Applications and the online conference was produced by Hitomi Gilliam and Colin Gilliam.
The presentation is called “Walking the talk” and it examines our Slow Flowers’ values and concepts and discusses how our members are putting them into practice. In this episode, I’ll introduce you to several Slow Flowers Society members and highlight their stories. You can have all the theory you want, but implementing these values is what will help you build a sustainable brand for your business.
This SLOW FLOWERS image was designed by Nancy Cameron of Destiny Hill Flower Farm
I first started writing about the concept of Slow Flowers more than 10 years ago, coining the phrase “Slow Flowers” as a way to describe the values of slow, seasonal and domestic flowers. We defined the term Slow Flowers and what it reflects as a cultural shift: “A movement that encourages consumers to purchase locally-grown flowers and connects them with the source, from the flower farmer to the floral designer.”
During one of the open chat sessions during the FREESIA Summit, an audience member commented: “We have to find a network of like-minded professionals to gather together and support our work,” and I had to pause and say: “That’s what Slow Flowers is!” That’s our laser-focused mission. Specifically, the Slow Flowers Movement has two audiences. We have the floral industry and we have consumers, and really, our message is constantly talking about the benefits of local, seasonal, and domestic flowers. And we want to influence floral buying practices of both groups.
Some people say, “Is it mainstream yet?” According to Keyhole, a social media tracker, in a recent 365-day period, the hashtag #slowflowers, created 67 million social media impressions. the term is now being used worldwide to really communicate and convey sustainability. Our members use the Slow Flowers affiliation to elevate and amplify their branding and marketing. They use it to telegraph to their customers and clients what they’re all about.
An important model for the Slow Flowers Movement is the Slow Food Movement. Many of you know about Slow Food, that phenomenal organization founded in 1986 by Carlo Petrini in Italy, as an organization that promotes local food and traditional cooking and really. Slow Food was an anti-fast food response to what was happening in the culinary world. We took similar inspiration to shine a light on what has happened over the past 3 decades in the floral marketplace. Yes, I blatantly borrowed the adjective “slow” and added the word “flowers” to it.
Slow Food has a manifesto and so I thought it be only fitting if Slow Flowers had one, too. I wrote our Slow Flowers Manifesto in 2017, as a call to action and to help our members define the spirit of their work and their own mission.
Let’s talk about the six values that are featured in the Slow Flowers Manifesto, and I’ll break them down by theme and what our members are doing to really reflect those values.
The Slow Flowers Challenge (c) Debra Prinzing
Our first value is “To recognize and respect the seasons by celebrating and designing with flowers when they naturally bloom.”
As a guiding principle, we are influenced by what we see in the Slow Food movement, where people are saying, “To really celebrate flavor and the best food available is to eat it in season.” The strawberry’s lack of flavor in January is a frequent example given, but if you get it right off the vine or right off the plant in the middle of summer, there’s nothing more pure as the essence of season.
Similarly, we see this in the flower world. I think the idea of seasonality is universal and relatable to gardeners, and it certainly makes sense to me, since I come out from horticulture as a garden writer. During the pandemic, we saw something like 23 million new people who entered gardening during the shut-down. Having conversations about seasonality is important, because people are understanding they need to connect to nature more than ever.
The phrase “Slow Flowers” first appears in my books. I wrote The 50 Mile Bouquet in 2012 and used the phrase Slow Flowers throughout that book, kind of as a shorthand to explain to people what the topic was about.
The following year in 2013, I wrote a follow-up book called Slow Flowers, in which I set out to create a bouquet each week from my cutting garden in Seattle, using what grew there in season. It was a experiment to say, “You know what? There’s a dormant season in winter; it’s quieter, my design palette includes twigs and conifers. I asked: Can I create an arrangement as aesthetically pleasing as an expression of the current season, with as much excitement as I might during the peak of summer when everything’s exploding?”
The Slow Flowers book stimulated wonderful responses. There was a Slow Flowers Challenge in 2014 that started when one of my readers began using the hashtag #theslowflowerschallenge and sharing it on social media, asking other gardeners to join her. Inspired by her effort, we took it upon ourselves to create an opportunity for everybody to post and share images of their seasonal, garden-inspired arrangements. Flower lovers, gardeners, and florists joined in to create an arrangement every week, posting and sharing — it really exploded.
While I was out presenting lectures and presentations at flower shows, garden clubs, and other venues, I heard from audiences who said to me, “Okay, Debra, I’ve drunk the Kool-Aid; I believe in what you’re talking about, but how do I find farmers and florists who are sourcing locally?”
I was asked the same question by my peers in the media who were interested in the renaissance that was taking place in our floral marketplace. In response, I launched Slowflowers.com in 2014, and began to use the platform to highlight our members as sources for local flowers.
Flower farmers and florists joined Slowflowers.com very early on to be part of the Movement. For example, farmer-florist Beth Syphers of Salem, Oregon-based Crowley House Flower Farm, joined as a member. She uses her association to promote the unique garden roses and other amazing crops her farm grows for the floral trade.
I was really fortunate, at the very beginning of this journey, to partner with local flower farmers in the Pacific Northwest, including those who formed the Seattle Wholesale Growers Market in 2011, including Crowley House Flower Farm. I like to say I was their embedded journalist.
The farmers of the Seattle Wholesale Growers Market are focused on bringing premium couture flowers to the florists of their region. They have differentiated local flowers from imported flowers and commercially-grown flowers.
I attribute the secret of their success to specializing in flowers that can’t be shipped or only bloom for a short period of time, like the beautiful lilacs which are grown by Jello Mold Farm in Washington’s Skagit Valley. Jello Mold is pictured on the cover of The 50 Mile Bouquet and you heard owners Diane Szukovathy and Dennis Westphall on this podcast recently. As a storyteller, by partnering with the Growers Market and its farmers, I focused more people’s attention on locality of flowers.
The natural evolution of interviewing flower farmers led to connections with their customers, who are the florists, like Melissa Feveyear of Terra Bella Flowers, based in Seattle. She highlights seasonal flowers in her shop and educates her customers about her farm sources as part of her branding, such as her Instagram post: “Support Local Growers.” In fact, Melissa was a founding member of the Seattle Wholesale Growers Market, the only florist to join with the growers in launching the co-op.
These actions inspired other florists. Tammy Myers, of First & Bloom, also in the Seattle area, specializes in locally grown and American grown everyday flowers. She is rebranding for 2023 with the “eco-florist” tagline. After 9 years in business, her mission hasn’t changed.
Melissa and Tammy are among 850 florists and flower farmers, farmer-florists, retailers, wholesalers, and designers who are Slow Flowers Society practitioners.
Above: Adam O’Neal of PepperHarrow Farm in Winterset, Iowa (c) PepperHarrow Farm
Clearly, we all can see the benefits of supporting local flowers –our first mandate. These concepts inform value number two, which is really all about the transportation footprint.
In the past decade especially, as our community of flower farmers and floral designers, consumers and floral enthusiasts is gaining momentum, we are seeing people who view their floral purchases in the same way they spend their food dollars, with the goal of sourcing our flowers as close to home as possible. In North America, that’s obviously a challenge, because many areas have winter weather conditions, and so that’s where we really rely on flowers from warmer states like Hawaii, California, Florida, or even Oregon and Washington, but local is clearly the value that segues into this issue of the flower transportation conversation.
We wanted to know consumer attitudes about the correlation between where their flowers are grown and how they are purchased.
There hasn’t been a baseline understanding of consumer attitudes and behaviors for a long time, in terms of understanding their concern about local. In 2021, we partnered with the National Gardening Association and their annual National Garden Survey, which conducts a scientifically accurate survey of 2,500 households across the US, mainly asking them about lawn and garden trends and purchases and behaviors.
For two years, we have asked, “How important is it to you that the flowers you purchase are locally grown?”
In 2022, 65% said it is very or somewhat important; and that is up from 58% in 2021. This is very encouraging. We’re going to keep asking this question and measuring how the trend line is going.
We asked a second question, “How important is it to you to buy US grown cut flowers?” The response was not quite as high as the question around local flowers, but it’s still impressive, with 61% of respondents saying it is very or somewhat important; and that is up from 57% in 2021.
The National Gardening Survey is consumer-focused, which is why we also survey Slow Flowers members every year on issues and concerns that relate to their businesses. As I mentioned earlier our members include flower farmers, florists, studio and wedding and event florists, retail florists, and also people that define themselves as farmer-florists, as well as wholesalers and suppliers.
This past year, we asked, “What type of local support are you currently experiencing?”
89% of our respondents said that more customers are interested in my floral enterprise because it’s local.
45% said more customers are requesting locally grown flowers for their designs, so that’s really affirming.
Let’s talk about some of the things that we are seeing in context of the transportation footprint. The old-fashioned, original dictionary definition of FLORIST is one who is in the business of raising or selling flowers and ornamental plants. It’s a concept that’s having a comeback because of the Slow Flowers movement and an interest in locally grown flowers.
So, we asked our members, “What percentage of the flowers used in your designs do you grow yourself?”
A very large percentage, 55%, said that they grow 76 to 100% of the flowers used in their own designs. Only about 10% of our respondents saying they don’t grow any of their own flowers.
As an extension, we asked, “How important is it to you and your business to purchase US made products for use in your floral designs?” This relates more to the whole issue of hard goods and accessories. A year ago, we hadn’t quite felt the pinch of supply chain.
Now, we’re seeing an increased focus on reusing vases, recycling, repurposing — a lot of innovation is taking place in fighting supply chain challenges. I just wanted to mention one interesting example of this way to address supply shortages. Tammy Myers, of First & Bloom, who I mentioned in the first section recently partnered with an organization here in Seattle called Ridwell. Ridwell is a private recycling company that takes items that municipalities don’t have a recycling method for, including light bulbs and batteries and plastic bags. Tammy created a pilot project with Ridwell to recycle glass vases that homeowners have collected under their sinks or in cupboards. I believe they ran this project in two neighborhoods with an overwhelming response.
Tammy has created vase collections of these recycled vessels, by shape and size, from bud vases to centerpiece sizes, and is re-selling them at an affordable rate to cover her costs to supply local florists who need a regular quantity of vases and have had trouble sourcing them. We’ll be following this story as it unfolds. It’s encouraging to see how one person has diverted used glass vases from landfills.
To understand local, we wanted to explore flower sourcing and that goes back to the farm and the wholesaler. What does local mean? Some of the things that people would consider local include growing your own cutting garden; wild-gathering, buying farm-direct, or ordering from a farm one or two state away, or shopping for Certified American Grown flowers. I like to describe it as the pebble in the pond approach, with the goal of sourcing as close to home as possible.
When I wrote The 50 Mile Bouquet, I was very much inspired by the food mile, so I started my own cutting garden. I like to call it the five-step bouquet, because it is right outside my backyard.
Major wholesalers are responding to florist requests for local and American grown flowers, like a poster that Mayesh Wholesale Florist hung in their Portland branch, which reads: “Mayesh is Proud to Offer Local + American Grown Product,” and they’ve used this graphic on some of their sponsorship branding with Slow Flowers.
We know, good or bad, that grocery accounts for 50% of all floral sales and grocery customers want locally grown flowers. But not all grocery stores put a priority on supplying domestic or local flowers. We are thrilled that Town & Country Markets, a family- owned grocery chain in the Seattle area with six stores, are Slow Flowers members. Every year, Town & Country produces a special floral department promotion during American Flowers Week to highlight the local flower farms, which, of course, we love.
Whole Foods, certainly before their Amazon ownership, and even now, region by region, partners with local farmers. Our members Chet and Kristy Anderson of The Fresh Herb Company in Boulder, Colorado, for example, supply all of the Whole Foods branches in the Rocky Mountain region. Their program is so big, they’re delivering flowers to the Whole Foods distribution center, which supplies something like 12 stores across the Rocky Mountain region.
Individual Whole Foods stores also partner with growers to bring hyper-local flowers to their customers. For example, the Williams family of WilMor Farms in Metter, Georgia, supply the Whole Foods outlet in Savannah, Georgia. They support WilMor Farms with in-store signage, at the point-of-purchase and on bunches and bouquet labels.
I encourage people to define local on their own terms. If you put in the work, you can find local flowers everywhere. Yet LOCAL is a rather elusive term. We researched whether there was a U.S. Government definition of “Local.” The USDA’s Consolidated Farm and Rural Development Act defines local as a maximum 400-mile distance between where a product is produced and where it is consumed, or in the state in which the product is produced.
Local flowers – From the garden and farm (c) Debra Prinzing
Okay, let’s talk about Value Number Three. “To support flower farmers small and large by crediting them, when possible, through proper labeling at the wholesale and consumer level.”
When we see florists including “local messaging” into their branding, we know it captures the imagination of clients who care about how their money is spent. By supporting farmers small and large when we credit them, it helps everyone who is in the business of selling domestic and local flowers. This is very much about transparency in labeling. When people join Slow Flowers Society as a member, we say to them, “You don’t have to be 100% local or domestic in your sourcing, you just have to be willing to be transparent with consumers. If someone’s asking for local flowers in a particular category, for example, and you can’t supply it because you only have imported, you just have to be honest and tell them.” Through education, we’re encouraging flower farmers to develop relationships or partnerships with wholesalers. With strong farmers, with an increase in flower farming as a viable economic enterprise in agriculture, the equation benefits us all.
There has been a huge explosion of regional wholesale models, including collectives, cooperatives and other marketing networks. Inspired by the Seattle Wholesale Growers Market, which opened in 2011, regional hubs are popping up across North America, as farmers open their own wholesale operations to sell direct to florists.
Every single week I receive an inquiry from somebody who wants resources on how to start their own collective in their region, perhaps with as few as three flower farmers coming together with a central location to sell their flowers. You can learn more in the webinar that we produced with Johnny’s Seeds in 2021, called Producer Cooperatives for Small Scale Farms, which is available for free to watch on their website.
There are also new online selling platforms emerging to help flower farmers with technology, so Gather Flora is out of the West Coast in California, Rooted Farmers is based out of the East Coast. Each of these models has unique proprietary software, created by people who saw a need for a platform that allows farmers to upload their inventory and make it easy for florists to shop from multiple farms at once, so this is a real connection, a missing link. When I started slowflowers.com, I envisioned that Slow Flowers would be a tool to help consumers and florists find flower farmers, but I’m not an eCommerce expert and I never wanted to do transactions through the site, so I really applaud these groups that are coming together to solve that pain point to help flower farmers sell their product professionally to florists.
I mentioned earlier the benefit to florists who base their brands on local sourcing, and here’s just one florist I want to highlight. Pilar Zuniga is based in the Oakland area. Her studio is called Gorgeous and Green and her online store prominently offers local flowers.
Not only do I think this is really important, we often see florists who feature their farm sources on their blogs and websites. For example, Grace Flowers Hawaii on the Big Island, owned by Allison Higgins, recently posted a story about Daisy Dukes Farm, which is one of their local flower sources, which we love to see. These are simple things anybody can do, in terms of just educating your customers about your values.
Hometown Flower Company, our members based on Long Island, is another example. Owner Jaclyn Rutigliano is a third-generation florist, whose family were conventional florists. She has reimagined a new model for floristry, saying, “I want to focus on local.” One of the ways Hometown Flower Company communicates this brand attribute is through a map of Long Island that shows exactly where their flower farms and partners are located along the island. It’s really fun to see this map and realize that one little business is supporting a lot of flower farmers.
Back to our Slow Flowers member surveys, we captured florists’ increasing desire to go to the source, which is completely disrupting how flowers are sold. We asked our members, “What percentage of your cut flower purchases are through farm-direct channels?” Almost 40% report that it’s 76 to 100% of how they buy flowers. I just want to comment that this trending pattern is exactly one of the reasons why wholesalers are ramping up their focus on local-sourced flowers within their branches, using signage and labeling to telegraph that they, too, are working with local florists.
In last year’s member survey we also asked, “If you purchase from conventional wholesale florists, are you finding more American grown and local options than in the past?”
70% of our respondents said yes, so I think that’s just something that we’re going to see more of across the board. And this is an encouraging trendline.
Value number four: “To encourage sustainable and organic farming practices that respect people and the environment.”
You can see a great example of this value on the homepage of Le Mera Gardens, in Ashland, Oregon. Joan Thorndike has operated Le Mera Gardens for more than 30 years. Long before Slow Flowers was even a term, Joan sought organic certification. She says, as a mother who always had her children on the farm with her, she wanted her children to be safe, but she also wanted her florists and their children to be safe and their consumers to be safe.
We discussed florists who feature the farms they source from – as a way to inform their customers. Joan has flipped it around and she lists the florists who carry Le Mera’s local flowers. Joan wants to let people know, “Here are the florists who buy their flowers from our farm; please go patronize them.” I love this reciprocity.
In terms of Sustainability, there are many definitions, but one widely used example is a definition from the United Nations: “Meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”
So, what does it mean in the floral trade? I love a little sign I found years ago on a counter of a flower shop in Portland that reads: “We compost all floral cuttings.” It’s just a simple sign that goes a long way to communicate sustainability. That particular florist was located next to a farm-to-table restaurant, which made a big deal about composting their food waste, so she felt like she wanted to get in on that act, and it was a small but smart gesture. Kelsey Ruhland of Foxbound Flowers in Eugene, Oregon, recently shared that she weighs her flower waste every single week before putting it into the municipal compost collection, because she’s trying to document, over the course of a year, how much flower waste she’s composting, which is an extra step. Clearly it takes work – and intentionality – to be sustainable. But letting your market know what you’re doing is important.
Staging open houses or farm tours clearly nurture organic, in-person connections between consumers and local flowers. The Seattle Wholesale Growers Market, especially before COVID, regularly held open days at their member farms. Usually held on a Sunday, families were invited for a day of festivities, and a lot of florists came for the country experience and to see where the flowers that they buy, week in and week out, were grown.
There are a few other sustainable themes I’d like to discuss. As a home gardener who is 100% organic in my own backyard, I understand sustainable farming practices. While I don’t plant cover crops, there are some practices I emulate, such as rotating planting areas and harvesting rainwater.
Not all flower farms can achieve a USDA organic certification. There are other third-party designations that evaluate sustainable practices, such as the Certified Naturally Grown program, a peer-to-peer farmer evaluation that was formed because of all the rigor and difficulty of becoming certified through the USDA.
In the Pacific Northwest we see farms seeking Salmon-Safe certification. This is a label seen on Oregon and Washington wines as a way to telegraph to consumers that their vineyard farming practices have been designated to be safe for salmon habitat. The flower farmers at the Seattle Wholesale Growers Market have gone through this evaluation and they view it as another way to communicate to consumers that they’re serious about their practices.
At Jello Mold, Diane Szukovathy and Dennis Westphall have also hosted floral departments from local grocery stores, so that the staff gain product knowledge and education. At Right Field Farm in Maryland, outside of Washington, D.C., David Brunton and his family send a weekly email to their CSA customers. The email tells everybody what’s happening on this small family farm; what they’re growing; something unique about a particular variety that’s available that week; where people can also buy their flowers at the local natural grocery store. The highly personalized communication nurtures authentic connections between people and flowers.
Myriah Towner, documentary producer of Black Farmer Stories
We added Value Five in 2020. This was an important action, in response to our desire to proactively pursue equity, inclusion and representation in the floral marketplace with as much support as we give to environmental sustainability.
Personally, I was inspired by one of my mentors, a Black horticulture professional and friend through the gardening industry; She pointed out that the missing component of sustainability so often overlooked is human sustainability.
We believe that supporting environmental sustainability is only part of the equation. We have to show we care as much about representation, inclusion, and equity in the floral industry as we do our environmental choices, so this value five is really important.
Slow Flowers is committed to expanding our inclusion, representation and diversity, including through our partnership with Bloom Imprint, which is our book publishing venture owned with Robin Avni. Earlier in 2022, Bloom Imprint published Black Flora by Teresa J. Speight, which features top Black farmers and florists across the U.S.
Black Flora amplify the voices of not only floriculture professionals, but agricultural and horticultural professionals. Why is it important to feature Black florists and flower farmers? When young and emerging floral professionals see someone who looks like them practicing professionally, it sends such a important message about the values that we have. Among the many other inspiring floral entrepreneurs, you’ll want to meet Dee Hall of Mermaid City Flower Farm in Norfolk, Virginia. She started Black Flower Farmers last year as a community group for specialty cut flower growers across the U.S., and we really want to support this expanding farming group.
Flower farmer Aishah Lurry owns Patagonia Flower Farm, and she is both a Slow Flowers member as well as active in the Black Flower Farmers group. Aishah has created an incredibly vibrant local business in a market that, honestly, never had local flowers, in Tucson, Arizona, so she’s really changing people’s definition of what’s local. When you see that she’s growing lisianthus and tulips in the high desert, it’s kind of mind-blowing. She’s just a real leader in the industry.
By supporting Black floral professionals and other people of color in the floral industry, we all benefit from connections and shared values. One leader is Valerie Crisostomo, an Atlanta-based wedding and event florist. She started Black Girl Florists in 2020 . It’s an organization much like Slow Flowers, a network of Black florists across the US. They’ve become a real important resource for each other and to share a unified voice. Black Girl Florists had their first conference in 2022, it included wedding and event professionals, as well as florists and flower farmers.
One of the other groups recently emerging on Instagram is Florists of Color, a feed to be celebrated. It’s hosted by Pilar Zuniga of Gorgeous and Green; I mentioned her earlier. A Latina florist, Pilar has expanded representation of all Florists of Color, including indigenous and Asian and Pacific Islanders and all Black and brown florists and flower farmers through the Instagram account. I encourage you all to join me in elevating and promoting representation and justice in the floral marketplace. Let’s ensure the growth and sustainability of the people in our profession.
Organically-grown flowers from the Slow Flowers Cutting Garden (c) Debra Prinzing
Let’s wrap up with our last value, value number six, “to eliminate waste and the use of chemical products in the floral industry.”
We just have to look at the media coverage around Queen Elizabeth’s recent funeral to see that the topic of floral industry waste is a global issue. I illustrated this point with a story published in September by CBC News in Canada, critiquing the amount of plastic wrapping accumulated from all the bouquets that were left at Buckingham Palace and other places to commemorate Queen Elizabeth.
Perhaps all those flower bouquet purchase were good for flower retailers, but the criticism generated by scenes of plastic trash by the container loads was disheartening, especially since most of that cellophane is not recyclable. One of our members, Becky Feasby of Prairie Girl Flowers, was quoted in the article questioning whether there are other ways that packaging can be changed to reduce plastic.
On a positive note, it was encouraging to also read coverage about the flowers in the wreath placed on Queen Elizabeth’s coffin — and the fact that they came from gardens that were important to both her and to King Charles III. I love this sentence that caught my eyes: “At His Majesty’s request, this wreath is made in a totally sustainable way, in a nest of English moss and oak branches, and without the use of floral foam.” I think we have Shane Connolly to thank for that influence on King Charles III.
Increasingly, people are concerned about the single-use plastics in the floral industry. In last year’s Slow Flowers Member Survey, we asked, “What percentage of your design work uses alternatives to floral foam?” 75% of our respondents said 75 to 100% of their work is foam-free.
We also asked our members to identify the foam-free mechanics they used. 95% of our respondents identified chicken wire, which, of course, we know about. The other top ones were pin frogs, hairpin frogs, Holly Chapple’s Syndicated eggs and cages, chicken wire and moss, taped grids, and other organic mechanics like branches.
Another organization you’ll want to check out is The Sustainable Floristry Network. Founded by Australian florist Rita Feldmann, SFN features several of our Slow Flowers members as ambassadors, including Susan McLeary, Becky Feasby, Pilar Zuniga, and Tobey Nelson. Slow Flowers has joined on as an advisor. One of their statements really moves me. It says: “We can’t wait for the day the Sustainable Floristry Network closes its doors. On that day, floristry will be carbon neutral, non-toxic and waste-free, with safe and fair conditions for all working in the industry. We’ll get there when all sides of floristry come together, creating a system that equally supports our passion, our livelihoods, and the planet
Another beautiful Slow Flowers vignette, created by our friends at Johnny’s Selected Seeds
Slow Flowers supports this statement and Slow Flowers is synonymous with local, seasonal, and sustainable, and inclusive floristry and flower farming. Since our origins more than a decade ago, we have been advocating, often quietly and often seen as a fringe element in the marketplace, and now, it’s so gratifying to see what an influence we have brought to the industry, changing the conversation, and bringing our values into the mainstream.
I think everybody who gardens will find the mental health benefits of growing their own flowers. And when that happens, the floral consumer is enlightened and engaged in sustainable issues that relate to our profession.
There is so much more to share, and I hope you’ll get more involved, whether you’re already a member or if you wish to learn more. Click here to join us as a member!
Download PDF of the Walking the Talk slideshow below:
This show is brought to you by Slowflowers.com, the free, online directory to more than 850 florists, shops, and studios who design with local, seasonal and sustainable flowers and to the farms that grow those blooms. It’s the conscious choice for buying and sending flowers.
Thank you to our lead sponsor, Farmgirl Flowers. Farmgirl Flowers delivers iconic burlap-wrapped bouquets and lush, abundant arrangements to customers across the U.S., supporting U.S. flower farms by purchasing more than $10 million dollars of U.S.-grown fresh and seasonal flowers and foliage annually. Discover more at farmgirlflowers.com.
Thank you to CalFlowers, the leading floral trade association in California, providing valuable transportation and other benefits to flower growers and the entire floral supply chain in California and 48 other states. The Association is a leader in bringing fresh cut flowers to the U.S. market and in promoting the benefits of flowers to new generations of American consumers. Learn more at cafgs.org.
Thank you to Store It Cold, creators of the revolutionary CoolBot, a popular solution for flower farmers, studio florists and farmer-florists. Save $1000s when you build your own walk-in cooler with the CoolBot and an air conditioner. Don’t have time to build your own? They also have turnkey units available. Learn more at storeitcold.com.
Thank you to the Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers. Formed in 1988, ASCFG was created to educate, unite, and support commercial cut flower growers. Its mission is to help growers produce high-quality floral material, and to foster and promote the local availability of that product. Learn more at ascfg.org.
Thanks so much for joining me today! The Slow Flowers Podcast is a member-supported endeavor, downloaded more than 900,000 times by listeners like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much. As our movement gains more supporters and more passionate participants who believe in the importance of our domestic cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too.
If you’re new to our weekly Show and our long-running Podcast, check out all of our resources at SlowFlowersSociety.com
I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Show & Podcast. The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. The content and opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone, independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization. Next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more Slow Flowers on the table, one stem, one vase at a time.
It’s great to be here today to share our 8th consecutive floral forecast for the Slow Flowers community. The audio you’ll hear was recorded during our Monthly Member Meet up on January 14th and those who attended got an early, sneak peek at the report. We recorded the session and I’m sharing the edited version with you today.
This report has become an important gauge for our members, as well as for the greater floral marketplace and business media, as we evaluate prevailing cultural shifts, notable changes, and breakout ideas influencing flower farming, floral design and consumer attitudes about flowers.
The Slow Flowers Floral Insights and Industry Forecast debuted in December 2014 when I first compiled my top predictions for 2015 and shared them with the media and the floral profession. The Forecast continued through 2021, as I gathered intelligence over the course of each year, conducting hundreds of magazine and podcast interviews, and soliciting feedback through the annual Slow Flowers member survey.
For 2022, I’m so pleased to be joined in this endeavor by Bloom Imprint’screative director Robin Avni. Robin has contributed her unique point of view and expertise in developing this year’s forecast with Slow Flowers — and much of what I’ve learned about forecasting has come from past collaborations with Robin. Robin has successfully managed innovative, award-winning teams and high-profile projects as well as receiving numerous national design awards. She has worked with Fortune 500 companies, national advertising agencies and award-winning media properties, applying timely lifestyle insights to their businesses.
I want to get right to the juicy parts of our presentation, so let’s jump right in and learn about 2022’s Floral Reawakening. Download a recap of this REPORT: Slow Flowers Floral Insights & Industry Forecast for 2022.
There is so much to unpack in the nine insights we’ve discussed today and so you can expect to hear more as I dig deeper into these themes and the people in the Slow Flowers Community who are leading these major shifts and who can speak to us for extended stories and interviews. And please reach out to let me know what you think about them! You can always write to debra@slowflowers.com.
I can’t believe we’re already at the end of January — it has been an insanely rapid start to a New Year, one with continued uncertainty about our health, our communities and our planet. I believe we are stronger together when we can draw inspiration and comfort from one another.
I hope to see many of you in the coming weeks, as I host six of our members who will be teaching at the upcoming Northwest Flower & Garden Festival, February 9-13, in Seattle at the Washington State Convention Center. Slow Flowers Society is again producing the Blooms & Bubbles Workshops with some fantastic presenters — all Slow Flowers members, including Bethany Little of Charles Little & Co., Beth Syphers of Crowley House, Kiara Hancock of K. Hancock Events, Kim Gruetter & Tonneli Gruetter of Salty Acres Farm and Tobey Nelson of Tobey Nelson Events.
Head’s up because Next Week, we’ll have our ticket giveaway for five sets of two tickets to attend the flower show as my guest. You can also find the details starting February 1st at @slowflowerssociety on IG.
Thank you to our Sponsors!
This show is brought to you by Slowflowers.com, the free, online directory to more than 880 florists, shops, and studios who design with local, seasonal and sustainable flowers and to the farms that grow those blooms. It’s the conscious choice for buying and sending flowers.
Thank you to our lead sponsor, returning for 2022, Farmgirl Flowers. Farmgirl Flowers delivers iconic burlap-wrapped bouquets and lush, abundant arrangements to customers across the U.S., supporting U.S. flower farms by purchasing more than $10 million dollars of U.S.-grown fresh and seasonal flowers and foliage annually. Discover more at farmgirlflowers.com.
Thank you to Johnny’s Selected Seeds, an employee-owned company that provides our industry the best flower, herb and vegetable seeds — supplied to farms large and small and even backyard cutting gardens like mine. Find the full catalog of flower seeds and bulbs at johnnysseeds.com.
Thank you to Mayesh Wholesale Florist. Family-owned since 1978, Mayesh is the premier wedding and event supplier in the U.S. and we’re thrilled to partner with Mayesh to promote local and domestic flowers, which they source from farms large and small around the U.S. Learn more at mayesh.com.
Thank you to The Gardener’s Workshop, which offers a full curriculum of online education for flower farmers and farmer-florists. Online education is more important than ever, and you’ll want to check out the course offerings at thegardenersworkshop.com.
Thanks so much for joining us today! The Slow Flowers Podcast is a member-supported endeavor, downloaded more than 808,000 times by listeners like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much. As our movement gains more supporters and more passionate participants who believe in the importance of our domestic cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too.
If you’re new to our weekly Show and our long-running Podcast, check out all of our resources at Slow Flowers Society.com and consider making a donation to sustain Slow Flowers’ ongoing advocacy, education and outreach activities. You can find the donate button in the column to the right at debraprinzing.com
Thank you for listening! Sending love, from my cutting garden to you! (c) Missy Palacol Photography
I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Show & Podcast. Next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more Slow Flowers on the table, one stem, one vase at a time. The content and opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone, independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization.
The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. You can learn more about Andrew’s work at soundbodymovement.com.
It’s that time again — our chance to review and reflect on all we achieved and experienced in the year that’s just come to a close — this time, 2021. I’m joined by two key members of the Slow Flowers Team — Karen Thornton, our operations and events manager, and Niesha Blancas, our social media manager, who helped review our highlights and wrap things up for 2021. As historians have taught us, you can’t plan for the future without knowing the past, right?!
Karen and Niesha are such valuable members of our team and I’m so grateful for their talents and commitment to the Slow Flower Mission! This year, rather than taking a chronological, month-by-month walk through 2021, we thought it would be useful to touch on each of our programs, channels and activities by topic.
Membership:
In 2021, we achieved our highest level of membership since the launch of Slowflowers.com in 2013 — 880 members in all 50 states and most Canadian provinces. What a wonderful growing community of progressive, sustainably-minded, flower people.
Our monthly Member Meet-ups were a highlight for me — beginning last January when we hosted Rachel Johnson of Simply Grounded, who led our session on Sogetsu Ikebana. The monthly meet-ups averaged 50 attendees all year long — some more, some less. Sometimes we had a number of presenters; other times we included break-out sessions. The meet-ups began in 2020 as a way to connect with each other during the early days of the COVID pandemic. None of us realized how valuable these Zoom calls would become over the ensuing months. In 2021, we averaged 50 attendees each meet-up, and the replay videos have been watched more than 1,200 times.
Continuing with Membership, one of my favorite accomplishments of the year was designing and producing the Member Marketing Toolkit, a digital 42-page booklet that answers all the questions our members might have regarding ways to participate and get the most out of your membership. And more recently, during October Member Appreciation Month, we produced a special Member Benefits Booklet with discounts and coupons from Slow Flowers Society and our sponsors.
Member Survey:
The Slow Flowers Member Survey informs our planning and forecasting for the year to come. Here are some highlights:
Annual member survey
4.6 satisfaction rating
2021
75.26% (73 people) rate the value of their Slow Flowers membership as high value or very high value
78.35% (76 people) are very satisfied or extremely satisfied with their Slow Flowers membership
82.48% (80 people) are very likely or extremely likely to renew their membership in the upcoming year
Congratulations to our Winners! Everyone who completed the Survey and shared their details was included in a special drawing for two prizes.
Complimentary Slow Flowers Premium Membership for 1 year ($249 value): April Vomfell, Flathead Farmworks
Free Slow Flowers Dinner at Blue Hill at Stone Barns – June 27, 2022 in Pocantico Hills, New York ($350 value): Jennifer Kouvant, Six Dutchess Farm
Slowflowers.com
At Slowflowers.com, our original home online, we invested in some important upgrades to the software platform. Just unveiled in December, we’re calling it Slowflowers.com 3.0. It was our goal to improve user experience for the consumer and functionality for our members. We are planning a virtual “spring cleaning” later in January to share some of the ways our members can maximize their profile and brand through Slowflowers.com 3.0, so keep an eye out for that in the coming weeks. We’ll be sure to record the tutorial for replay viewers.
American Flowers Week
American Flowers Week – June 28-July 1
12 botanical couture looks
# of downloads of the Botanical Couture Webinar: 45
local and national press generated
Plus, we celebrated Canadian Flowers week – 7 day Instagram series July 15-21, 2021
The American Flowers Week looks were featured in the digital edition of Slow Flowers Journal “Botanical Couture.” This was the debut of a digital flip book, and we’re excited to launch the quarterly magazine in 2022, with our winter edition coming later this season. Our members have contributed articles to the slowflowersjournal.com website over the past few years — a popular feature — and now we expect to get more members involved in the new project, which we’re publishing in conjunction with BLOOM Imprint (more on that later).
Slow Flowers Summit
Two years in the making, the Slow Flowers Summit was our 4th annual gathering. When I asked Karen to share her feedback, she gave it in one word: Wowzer
What a memorable and successful gathering last June at Filoli Historic House & Garden in Woodside, California.
I have to thank Niesha Blancas for going to Filoli in June 2020, during what would have been our Summit there, and taking beautiful video and photography, as well as filming a design session with Emily Saeger and my IG live interview/tour with Jim Salyards — all while masked, of course! You pulled of a social media feat in 2020 and again in 2021 when the rescheduled Summit took place!
We are especially grateful to our friends at Filoli, who were incredibly supportive in welcoming Slow Flowers and the Summit to their amazing grounds.
Social Media and Communications
Ninety-one percent of our members follow Slow Flowers Society on Instagram, while more than 45 percent follow us on Facebook.
We renamed our Instagram home: @slowflowerssociety
Followers: 39.1K
Reach: 2.4 Million
Impressions: 2.6 Million
We launched a new Instagram account: @slowflowerssummit
Reach: 18.5K
Impressions: 17K
New Video
There are so many ways that we share inspiring news and resources with you. In 2021, we invested in a short 3-minute Slow Flowers video to introduce the organization to potential members, strategic partners and supporters. The video was filmed and edited by Alayna Erhart of Alayna Erhart Studio. It features me clipping flowers in the Slow Flowers Cutting Garden, the fabulous gathering of members at Filoli Historic House & Garden at the recent 2021 Slow Flowers Summit and a visit to the UW Farm with member Riz Reyez of RHR Horticulture. Special thanks to the members who share their voices of endorsement and support, including Sarah Reyes of Wildflower & Fern, Tobey Nelson of Tobey Nelson Events and Design and Laura Gonzales of Swallows Secret Garden! Look closely – do you see yourself here in our community!? We’re ready to welcome you as a member!
Storytelling, Newsletter, Original Content
We love producing our monthly newsletter to send to you at the beginning of each month. The Slow Flowers newsletter is a popular resource for our members — in fact, in the recent survey, more than 3/4 of you tell us you usually or always read it! Our content is rich, informative and inspiring — and newsletters keep you up to date on events and PR opportunities available to members. I like to treat the newsletter as a chronicle of all we’ve achieved from month to month, and the archives are easy to find in the footer of slowflowers.com.Subscribe to the newsletter here.
Stories about our Members: Whenever I’m asked to write for another floral or farming publication, I make it a priority to feature our members and their expertise as my sources. In 2021, that meant including you in several articles for Johnny’s Seeds’ newsletter called JSS Advantage; a guest piece for Details Flowers Software; guest articles for Florists’ Review, Growing for Market and Longfield Gardens, among other outlets.
You could file these stories under Slow Flowers advocacy and outreach, and I’m especially excited about our partnership with the National Gardening Association and GardenResearch.com to include cut flower questions in the 2021 National Gardening Survey.
The findings were published in April, revealing encouraging national attitudes about local and domestic cut flowers. And in 2022, we’re joining with NGA to dig deeper into attitudes and consumer behavior — this time about where people buy their local and domestic flowers — can’t wait to share with you!
Our ongoing commitment to Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
Ongoing support of women business owners
Updated Slow Flowers Manifesto
BIPOC and LGBTQ+ presenters and speakers at meet ups and Summit
Female BIPOC AFW artist
BIPOC botanical couture models
To proactively pursue equity, inclusion and representation in the floral marketplace, intentionally valuing Black floral professionals (farmers, floral designers and vendors) in our business practice with as much support as we give to environmental sustainability.
new Slow flowers manifesto statement (2021)
Education
In addition to our Monthly Member Meet-Up, other educational offerings include offering you free access to webinars with our partners, including Johnny’s Seeds, Bloom Imprint, AIFD and Fleurvana Floral Summit. We also taught the Slow Flowers Creative Workshop in January and helped so many aspiring writers flex their writing muscles and learn new skills.
BLOOM Imprint
In 2021, we launched our publishing branch of Slow Flowers — BLOOM Imprint. As a boutique publisher, we are committed to producing floral lifestyle books by and about our Slow Flowers members.
Where We Bloom published (May)
Virtual book launch
Garden Design magazine webinar
Mornings with Mayesh webinar
A Life in Flowers published (Oct)
Growing Wonder & Black Flora coming up and more books to follow with Slow Flowers members like Adam and Jennifer O’Neal of PepperHarrow Farm and Cynthia Zamaria of House + Flower
Slow Flowers Podcast
Finally, we must note all of our Podcast achievements. If you watched this conversation that Niesha, Karen and I are having on Facebook Live or YouTube, you’ll realize this is one of our new initiatives for 2021 — since our 8th anniversary in late July, we have added video interviews aka Vodcasts to the mix.
This is the weekly podcast about Slow Flowers and the people who grow and design with them. It’s all about making a conscious choice and I invite you to join the conversation and the creative community as we discuss the vital topics of saving our domestic flower farms and supporting a floral industry that relies on a safe, seasonal and local supply of flowers and foliage.
This show is brought to you by Slowflowers.com, the free, online directory to more than 880 florists, shops, and studios who design with local, seasonal and sustainable flowers and to the farms that grow those blooms. It’s the conscious choice for buying and sending flowers.
Thank you to our lead sponsor, returning for 2022, Farmgirl Flowers. Farmgirl Flowers delivers iconic burlap-wrapped bouquets and lush, abundant arrangements to customers across the U.S., supporting more than 20 U.S. flower farms by purchasing more than $9 million dollars of U.S.-grown fresh and seasonal flowers and foliage annually. Discover more at farmgirlflowers.com.
Lead Sponsor: Farmgirl Flowers Major Sponsors: Longfield Gardens, Johnny’s Seeds, The Gardener’s Workshop, FlowerFarm.com, Red Twig Farm, Seattle Wholesale Growers Market, the Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers, and Rooted Farmers Channel Sponsors: Mayesh Wholesale, CalFlowers, Roadie.com, Details Flowers Software, CoolBot and Scenic Place Peonies.
Thanks so much for joining us today! The Slow Flowers Podcast is a member-supported endeavor, downloaded more than 804,000 times by listeners like you. I value our loyal members and supporters! If you’re new to our weekly Show and our long-running Podcast, check out all of our resources at Slow Flowers Society.com and consider making a donation to sustain Slow Flowers’ ongoing advocacy, education and outreach activities. You can find the donate button in the column to the right.
Thank you for listening! Sending love, from my cutting garden to you! (c) Missy Palacol Photography
I’m Debra Prinzing, host and producer of the Slow Flowers Show & Podcast. Next week, you’re invited to join me in putting more Slow Flowers on the table, one stem, one vase at a time. The content and opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone, independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization.
The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. You can learn more about Andrew’s work at soundbodymovement.com.
Thanks so much for joining us today and I’ll see you next week!
Music Credits:
For We Shall Know Speed; Turning on the Lights; Gaena by Blue Dot Sessions http://www.sessions.blue
Today’s conversation was originally broadcast in late May by “Sustainability Champions,” an investigative podcast series made for the environmental stewards of the world, produced and hosted by Daniel Hartz. The series defines Sustainability as “the avoidance of the depletion of natural resources in order to maintain an ecological balance” and Champion as “one who supports or defends a cause.” We can all get behind that, right?
Host and founder of Sustainability Champions, Daniel Hartz is an American based in London. He started Sustainability Champions to showcase people around the world working hard to heal the planet through business innovations, community organizing and individual messages of optimism.
Sustainability often makes financial sense and the future of the environment is bright.
daniel hartz, sustainability champions
I am so grateful he invited me to share the story of the Slow Flowers Movement on Sustainability Champions.
In celebration of the Slow Flowers Show’s 8th anniversary, we launched our new, live-stream video format with the goal of sharing the faces and voices of our members, as well as tours of their farms, their shops and their studios — and most of all, their flowers. You can subscribe to our YouTube Channel here.
This show is brought to you by Slowflowers.com, the free, online directory to more than 880 florists, shops, and studios who design with local, seasonal and sustainable flowers and to the farms that grow those blooms. It’s the conscious choice for buying and sending flowers.
Thank you to our lead sponsor for 2021, Farmgirl Flowers. Farmgirl Flowers delivers iconic burlap-wrapped bouquets and lush, abundant arrangements to customers across the U.S., supporting more than 20 U.S. flower farms by purchasing more than $9 million dollars of U.S.-grown fresh and seasonal flowers and foliage annually. Discover more at farmgirlflowers.com.
Rooted Farmers. Rooted Farmers works exclusively with local growers to put the highest-quality specialty cut flowers in floral customers’ hands. When you partner with Rooted Farmers, you are investing in your community, and you can expect a commitment to excellence in return. Learn more at RootedFarmers.com.
Johnny’s Selected Seeds, an employee-owned company that provides our industry the best flower, herb and vegetable seeds — supplied to farms large and small and even backyard cutting gardens like mine. Find the full catalog of flower seeds and bulbs at johnnysseeds.com.
Mayesh Wholesale Florist. Family-owned since 1978, Mayesh is the premier wedding and event supplier in the U.S. and we’re thrilled to partner with Mayesh to promote local and domestic flowers, which they source from farms large and small around the U.S. Learn more at mayesh.com.
(c) Mary Grace Long Photography
Thanks so much for joining us today! The Slow Flowers Podcast has been downloaded nearly 750,000 times by listeners like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much. As our movement gains more supporters and more passionate participants who believe in the importance of our domestic cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too.
I value your support and invite you to show your thanks to support Slow Flowers’ ongoing advocacy, education and outreach activities. You can find the donate button in the column to the right at debraprinzing.com
The content and opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone, independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization.
The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. Thank you so much to Andrew for helping me set up our new Video Podcast platform and teaching me the technology! I’ll be relying more on his talents in the coming days. You can learn more about Andrew’s work at soundbodymovement.com.
From left: Lorene Edwards Forkner, Christin Geall, moderator Jennifer Jewell and Debra Prinzing at the Northwest Flower & Garden Festival
Jennifer Jewell—Creator and host of the public radio program (and podcast) Cultivating Place, is a past guest of this podcast.
Now, she is also an author and is on tour to promote her book, The Earth in Her Hands, which has the subtitle: 75 Extraordinary Women Working in the World of Plants.
This past week, Jennifer was in Seattle to speak at the Northwest Flower & Garden Festival and, among other appearances, she led a panel discussion that we recorded for today’s episode.
Hot off the Press: Jennifer Jewell’s new book, “The Earth in Her Hands”
In writing The Earth in Her Hands, Jennifer
learned how the women profiled creatively navigated the challenging ideal of
work-life balance. The main lesson? Balance is not a destination but an ongoing
and highly dynamic process.
NWFGF Panel, from left: Lorene Edwards Forkner, Christin Geall, Jennifer Jewell and Debra Prinzing
In the panel, of which I was a part, Jennifer focused our
conversation on many common challenges, coping mechanisms, and solutions that
follow women through their careers in the plant world.
Along with me, the panel included two other past guests of this podcast, so the voices and personalities may be familiar to you. You’ll also hear designer and author Christin Geall, of Cultivated (who I invited on the podcast just a few weeks ago), andLorene Edwards Forkner, author, artist, and Seattle Times garden columnist, and creator of the #seeingcolorinthegardenproject.
These women graciously agreed to this recording and I’ll
just jump right in and let you listen as if you were in the Northwest Flower
& Garden Festival audience last week.
Jennifer Jewell, creator and host of “Cultivating Place: Conversations on the Natural World and the Human Impulse to Garden”
Jennifer Jewellis host of the national award-winning, weekly public radio program and podcast, Cultivating Place: Conversations on Natural History & the Human Impulse to Garden, Jennifer Jewell is a gardener, garden writer, and gardening educator and advocate.
Particularly interested in the intersections between gardens, the native plant environments around them, and human culture, she is the daughter of garden and floral designing mother and a wildlife biologist father. Jennifer has been writing about gardening professionally since 1998, and her work has appeared in Gardens Illustrated, House & Garden, Natural Home, Old House Journal, Colorado Homes & Lifestyles, and Pacific Horticulture. She worked as Native Plant Garden Curator for Gateway Science Museum on the campus of California State University, Chico, and lives and gardens in Butte County, California.
Christin Geall of Cultivated by Christin, designing with a no-foam method
Christin Geall lives on Vancouver Island, along the western edge of Canada. She is a gardener, designer, writer and teacher who grows flowers and shares her designs through Cultivated by Christin, a creative studio launched in 2015.
Christin’s eclectic background includes pursuits that are equal parts physical and intellectual. She apprenticed on a Martha’s Vineyard herb farm, interned at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and homesteaded on a remote island in British Columbia. Academic studies in ethnobotany, environmental science and a creative writing MFA led to editorships, university-level teaching and a regular gardening column for local newspapers.
Today, Christin’s artistic focus centers around her urban flower farm-design studio in USDA Zone 8, the tiny hub of a multifaceted floral business.
Lorene owned a popular and beloved boutique specialty nursery in Seattle for more than a decade, called Fremont Gardens; she has served on the boards of a number of horticultural organizations, has edited a horticulture journal and is the designer of two gold medal display gardens at the Northwest Flower and Garden Festival.
Most recently, Lorene’s creative life can be found on Instagram, where @gardenercook she shares a series called “Seeing Color in the Garden.” She started this project on April 3, 2018 as part of #the100dayproject as #100DaysofSeeingColorintheGarden. She continued her series with #Another100 DaysofSeeingColorintheGarden.
Thank you so much for
joining today’s episode featuring Jennifer Jewell and two women, who along with
me are featured in The Earth in Her Hands,
Christin Geall and Lorene Edwards-Forkner.
As a special bonus, we’re giving away a copy of The Earth in Her Hands, courtesy of Timber Press, Jennifer’s publisher.
To enter, please leave a comment below about an Extraordinary Woman who influenced your personal relationship with plants. We’ll draw one recipient from among the posted comments on Sunday, March 8th and announce the winner in our March 11th episode. Please note: this giveaway is open to U.S. and Canadian entrants.
Clockwise from top, left: Susan Mcleary, Kellee Matsushita-Tseng, Molly Culver, Lorene Edwards Forkner, Debra Prinzing, Jennifer Jewell, Pilar Zuniga and Emily Saeger
If you liked the subject of this episode, you’re invited to dig deeper with two of the panelists because they are coming to the Slow Flowers Summit in the SF Bay Area at Filoli- the historic garden and home that is hosting us on June 28-29th. Jennifer Jewell will be our Slow Flowers Summit capstone speaker – and she will speak more expansively on women’s role in shaping our plant world and beyond, as well as sign copies of her new book. Lorene Edwards Forkner will also be one of our Slow Flowers Summit presenters and I’m so excited for you to experience seeing color in the garden through her eyes as you develop your own sensibility and observational skills, learning from color in the garden — from the landscape to the centerpiece.
It will be a special experience and I can’t wait for you to join us!
The Slow Flowers Podcast has been downloaded more than 583,000 times by listeners like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much.
As our movement gains more supporters and more passionate participants who believe in the importance of the American cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too. I value your support and invite you to show your thanks and with a donation to support my ongoing advocacy, education and outreach activities. You can find the donate button in the column to the right.
THANK YOU TO OUR SPONSORS
Florists’ Review magazine. I’m delighted to serve as Contributing Editor for Slow Flowers Journal, found in the pages of Florists’ Review. It’s the leading trade magazine in the floral industry and the only independent periodical for the retail, wholesale and supplier market. Take advantage of the special subscription offer for members of the Slow Flowers Community.
Longfield Gardens provides home gardeners with high quality flower bulbs and perennials. Their online store offers plants for every region and every season, from tulips and daffodils to dahlias, caladiums and amaryllis. Check out the full catalog at Longfield Gardens at longfield-gardens.com.
Mayesh Wholesale Florist. Family-owned since 1978, Mayesh is the premier wedding and event supplier in the U.S. and we’re thrilled to partner with Mayesh to promote local and domestic flowers, which they source from farms large and small around the U.S. Learn more at mayesh.com.
Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers. Formed in 1988, ASCFG was created to educate, unite, and support commercial cut flower growers. It mission is to help growers produce high-quality floral material, and to foster and promote the local availability of that product. Learn more at ascfg.org.
I am in love with my greenhouse, designed and built sustainably by Oregon-based NW Green Panels (c) Missy Palacol Photography
The content and
opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone,
independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization.
The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. Learn more about his work at soundbodymovement.com.
Karen Marshall and Tina Barkley of Fleurs de Villes
In Seattle, we have a rite of springtime called the Northwest Flower & Garden Festival, which always takes place in February when everyone craves the fragrance of flowers (not to mention the scent of potting soil), and the unfurling of foliage, fronds and petals as seen in the excellent garden displays that cover the floor of the Washington State Convention Center.
I’ve been involved in one way or another with this amazing experience for more than two decades. In fact, in 1989 when it was launched by founder Duane Kelly, I covered the story for the local business newspaper where I was a staff reporter. I recall then thinking that I so wanted to join Duane’s world. For years, I covered the Flower and Garden show as a journalist and editor; then, when I made the leap to home and garden writing, I actually spoke at the show in 2002, beginning a recurring gig every year since.
In the past few years, though, instead of speaking, I’ve produced and hosted the Flower Stage at the NWFGF. This role has allowed me to invite Slow Flowers members to participate and engage flower show audiences in the conversation about floral design, local and seasonal botanicals, and more.
Blooms & Bubbles instructors will appear at the Northwest Flowr & Garden Festival’s DIY Floral Stage
This year, we’re again producing Blooms & Bubbles, a daily DIY workshop series with American-grown and locally-grown “blooms” and a glass of champagne aka “bubbles.” Five Slow Flowers members are teaching and I want to give them a shout-out right now so you can follow along on social as we post workshop images of their classes and students.
They include Thomasi Boselawa, CFD, Tiare Floral DesignStudio; Erin Shackelford, Camas Designs; Maura Whalen, Casablanca Floral; Carolyn Kulb, Folk Art Flowers; and Teresa Engbretson and Katie Elliott of My Garden Overfloweth. Tickets are going fast but you might be able to snag a seat to join us! And PS, even if you aren’t able to sign up for the DIY workshop each day at 2 p.m., there is public seating and you’re invited to watch along! The dates: February 26-March 1.
Because I’ve been able to work closely with the management at Marketplace Events, the current owners of the Northwest Flower & Garden Festival, I learned last fall that FLOWERS were taking center stage at the 2020 show. Operations manager Courtney Goetz and I met for lunch and she pulled out a few images to share the secret with me. It’s no secret anymore — and today’s guests will tell you all about the phenomenom called Fleurs de Villes. That’s Fleurs with an “S” and Villes with an “S” – as in “Flowers of the Cities.”
As soon as Courtney showed me photos of flower-clad female mannequins, I knew I had seen the images on my Instagram feed. I soon learned from Courtney that this woman-owned company was based just a few hours to the north of us – in Vancouver, B.C., and that the Northwest Flower & Garden Festival had invited Karen Marshall and Tina Barkley to bring Fleurs de Villes here to Seattle.
I’m so exited to bring you today’s
conversation with two event and marketing experts. Karen and Tina are elevating
flowers in a way that feels fresh, fashion-forward, and inventive.
Much like the response people have when they see the photo shoots of real models wearing botanical couture for our American Flowers Week campaigns that Slow Flowers began commissioning in 2016, the botanical couture on Fleurs de Villes’ three-dimensional mannequins takes floral fashion to a new level. That level is different in one key way from what I’ve been doing with American Flowers Week. And it is a feat to pull off, I can tell you. That’s because Tina and Karen are gathering more than a dozen mannequins, each designed and created by an area florist, and each on display for the full run of the Northwest Flower & Garden Festival. I am in awe of the theatrical levels achieved by Fleurs de Villes.
I want to jump right into this
conversation, but first, a bit more about Fleurs de Villes and its founders:
FLEURS DE VILLES combines the love of flowers, local design talent, and bespoke, utterly unique displays, for experiential events like none other. The name speaks to that – Fleurs de Villes – flowers of the cities. Connecting with each city we launch in, we work with top local florists, designers, growers and nurseries, to showcase that city’s world-class talent and create stunning displays of art. Fleurs de Villes not only showcases artful flower displays, we create engagement – with audiences viewing our events, and with the partners who support us, from leading sponsor brands to local and national media, as well as community-based groups. We believe in the power of partnerships and the amplification of messaging that comes when audiences have an experience of the senses. Our team of highly professional individuals is dedicated to ensuring every touch-point is on brand to deliver an event experience people will be talking about – and sharing – for a long time to come.
Floral mannequins from past Fleurs de Villes events
TINA BARKLEY is one of Vancouver’s best known lifestyle experts regularly working with Chatelaine Magazine, Today’s Parent and appearing on TV cooking, styling, decorating. Tina has also been a serial entrepreneur for over 25 years, researching, structuring and building businesses. Creating a brand and building a solid product, strategic partnerships, operational structure, marketing and sales are all areas Tina thrives in. As an effective event builder and planner, Tina has a ‘knack’ for making it happen, and empowering everyone around her.
KAREN MARSHALL has a long term international career in publishing and the digital space. She is a strategic thinker with a laser focus on partnership cultivation. With a belief that no brand is an island she has put together countless programs bringing key organizations and media together to create outstanding promotions. Working for some of the largest media brands in the world and in Canada and within the luxury space with numerous consumer brands across a broad spectrum, her focus is on quality engagement and experiential offerings for all partners.
Thanks so much for joining me today. Find and follow Fleurs de Villes at these links below:
You can find details about the Seattle Fleurs de Villes display — February 26-March 1st at the Northwest Flower & Garden Festival
Future schedule to see Fleurs de Villes around North America and beyond.
As promised, here are the local florists and designers participating as Fleurs de Villes artists. Each will create a floral garment to adorn the lifesize mannequin. It’s no surprise, but a number of them are Slow Flowers members!
First of all, I am thrilled that Melissa Feveyear of Terra Bella Flowers & Mercantile is designing the Slow Flowers-sponsored mannequin featuring all local and domestic botanicals. We are so grateful for Melissa’s longtime membership and support and I can’t wait to see what she creates!
Of course, as anyone who is committed to sourcing domestic and local flowers in the Pacific Northwest in February, which faces a dormant growing season that many of you also experience, I want to just acknowledge what a feat it will be to bring a Slow Flowers sentiment and values to an undertaking like a botanical garment made entirely from fresh and natural materials. I’ve heard anecdotally from several Slow Flowers members as they’ve planned their creations and I know they are committed to sourcing a good percentage of their looks with domestic crops. Let’s cheer them on and see what they create. Including Melissa of Terra Bella, nine Slow Flowers members are participating as Fleurs de Villes designers — more than half of all the dresses you’ll see! They include:
Other Fleurs de Villes florists include: a Natural Design; Fena Flowers; Seattle Floral Design; Zupan’s Markets; Leah Erickson; Ondine; and you’ll see supporting floral installations by Apotheca Design and Soren Events.
Jennifer Jewell is the author of The Earth in Her Hands, which includes a profile of Lorene Edwards Forkner, Christin Geall and Debra Prinzing, among many others.
Jumping ahead to future events . . . the clock is ticking along as we continue to finalize details for the 4th Annual Slow Flowers Summit – June 26-28, 2020 in San Francisco Bay Area at Filoli.
We only have 50 seats
left so I urge you to follow the links in today’s show notes and reserve your
space with the Slow Flowers tribe! Your Ticket Includes: All-Day Sunday, June 28 + Monday, June
29 with 5 Presentations + 7 Fabulous Speakers, all meals,
refreshments and evening cocktail receptions;
Floral Design Demonstrations; an Interactive Floral Installation; Author Book-Signings; Cool Take-Home Gifts . . . and then, on Tuesday Morning, June 30th, a behind the scenes tour at Farmgirl Flowers HQ where you’ll enjoy a Light Breakfast + Coffee, and meet our good friend Christina Stembel of Farmgirl Flowers.
I can’t wait to see you
there!
(c) Mary Grace Long photography
The Slow Flowers Podcast
has been downloaded more than 578,000 times by listeners
like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much.
As our movement gains more supporters and more passionate participants who believe in the importance of the American cut flower industry, the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too. I value your support and invite you to show your thanks and with a donation to support my ongoing advocacy, education and outreach activities. You can find the donate button in the column to the right.
Thank you to our Sponsors
Florists’ Review magazine. I’m delighted to serve as Contributing Editor for Slow Flowers Journal, found in the pages of Florists’ Review. Our partnership with Florists’ Review is such a valuable one, providing a forum for beautiful and inspiring editorial content in the #slowflowersjournal section – month after month. Take advantage of the special subscription offer for members of the Slow Flowers Community.
Mayesh Wholesale Florist. Family-owned since 1978, Mayesh is the premier wedding and event supplier in the U.S. and we’re thrilled to partner with Mayesh to promote local and domestic flowers, which they source from farms large and small around the U.S. Learn more at mayesh.com.
FarmersWeb. FarmersWeb software makes it simple for flower farms to streamline working with their buyers. By lessening the administrative load and increasing efficiency, FarmersWeb helps your farm save time, reduce errors, and work with more buyers overall. Learn more at www.farmersweb.com.
Our next sponsor thanks goes to Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers. Formed in 1988, ASCFG was created to educate, unite, and support commercial cut flower growers. It mission is to help growers produce high-quality floral material, and to foster and promote the local availability of that product. Learn more at ascfg.org.
The content and opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone, independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization.
The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. Learn more about his work at soundbodymovement.com
Music Credits:
Le Marais; Symphony 40 in G Minor; Via Verre; Gaena; Glass Beads by Blue Dot Sessions http://www.sessions.blue
A late December 2019 planning session for Trend Summit — held at Hitomi Gilliam’s home. Clockwise from top left: Hitomi Gilliam, Francoise Weeks, Rebecca Raymond and Debra Prinzing. (c) Colin Gilliam
Hitomi Gilliam, AIFD, is a Vancouver, B.C.-based floral design educator and innovator, as well as a fellow contributor to Florists’ Review. In 2011, she launched a collaborative, inclusive conference called Trend Summit, designed as an immersive trend discussion led by a team of influencers, covering a variety of topics including wedding flower trends.
Trend Summit has taken place every two or three years since, mostly in Vancouver (with one year being held in Dallas). The Summit has grown and evolved to the point where it’s almost a full week with numerous floral design workshops and demonstrations — all sorts of ways to draw you in, engage you and connect you. This year it takes place March 12-17, 2020, at United Floral, where the famed Vancouver Flower Auction is based outside Vancouver.
Listen to Hitomi Gilliam as she discusses Trend Summit and how trends take shape.
Hitomi is one of those rare individuals who shares the spotlight and platform with her peers, her students, and her contemporaries. In 2018, she invited me to present the Slow Flowers Floral Insights and Industry Forecast for 2019 during the Trend Summit Symposium a one-day session open to the larger floral community in B.C. and beyond. It was such a great experience and truly an honor to be given a place at the podium in what some might consider the mainstream floral community. I was so touched that Hitomi shined a light on my work with Slow Flowers, adding sustainability, floral sourcing and eco practices to the conversation!
For 2020, there are so many events and activities planned. To kick it off on March 12th and 13th, the Trend Roundtables focus on a variety of themes important to the future of floristry. This is an opportunity to be introduced to some of the newest product from participating vendors and growers, who will also be in the discussion. In addition to Hitomi, I will join Gregor Lersch, Holly Chapple, Susan McLeary, Françoise Weeks, Rebecca Raymondand Colin Gilliam for this riveting event.
We took in the inspiring natural beauty on a Bowen Island hike one afternoon, too!!
With Hitomi, Colin, Rebecca and
Francois in early December, we spent two full days brainstorming the roundtable
format. We sat in the cozy living room of Hitomi’s delightful home on Bowen
Island, which is located a short ferry ride across Horseshoe Bay north of
Vancouver. With a view of water, mountains, trees and nature, it was a working
session that doubled as an unforgettable retreat.
We cooked up
some of the key topics that will seed the conversations at the Conference:
botanicals, hardgoods and accessories, lifestyle shifts, wedding styles, as
well as emerging floral design styles.
I think you’ll love hearing our dialogue and perhaps you will be
tempted to join us in March.
You might want to attend Thursday Night, March 12th, when Leatrice Eiseman of the Pantone Color Institute will present her insights on color, or on Sunday when all these fabulous design innovators will present during the Symposium.
Quickly, here’s a bit more about the guests you’ll hear in my
conversation today:
Teacher, mentor, floral industry leader Hitomi Gilliam (c) Colin Gilliam
Hitomi Gilliam AIFD is a Japanese-Canadian floral artist, keynote lecturer, demonstrator, educator and a consultant in all aspects of the Art and Business of Floral Design. She is the Creative Director for DESIGN358. She has guest-designed extensively throughout North America, England, Japan, Mexico, Taiwan, Bermuda, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, Colombia, Belgium, Korea and India.
She
owned and operated Satsuki’s Florist in Mission, British Columbia for 28 years.
She currently works with her son, Colin Gilliam in an Event & Education
business, DESIGN358 which was established 10 years ago.
Hitomi
has lectured at major art museums and floral shows around North America and
beyond, and she is the founding organizer of the Annual ‘Survival of the
Creative Minds’ Conference in Taos, New Mexico.
Françoise Weeks, born in Belgium, has infused her work with a quintessential European reverence for flowers and nature. Combined with creativity and mechanical ingenuity, she has crystalized her singular style of Textural Woodlands and Botanical Haute Couture pieces, garnering a global following.
Francoise Weeks discusses ‘Plants are Trending’ in the run-up to Trend Summit 2020
Françoise’s
studio is located in Portland, Oregon. Her innovation and love of teaching have
brought her to the Flower School Cohim in China, the Academy of Floral Art in
Exeter, England, studios in Australia and Mexico, workshops at Mayesh and
Florabundance and to the La Jolla and Memphis garden clubs. Her dynamic work
has been published in Nacre, Fusion Flowers, Modern Wedding Flowers, Huffington
Post, Flutter and Millieu.
Her
generosity of knowledge and perspective in use of floral materials, structure
and mechanics, in addition to the business of being a florist, unite to create
rigorous and exciting learning opportunities for her students to explore all
that nature has to offer.
Rebecca Raymond, EMC, floral artist and educator
Rebecca Raymond, EMC, is owner of Rebecca Raymond Floral. She is one of the most respected and sought-after floral designers in the Pacific Northwest.
Rebecca
collaborates closely with each of her clients, gets to know their hopes and
dreams, and then works with color, texture, and architecture to bring their
vision to life. Whether it’s a bridal bouquet or a floral installation, she
sources both seasonal and curated fresh flowers to design beautiful, eclectic
arrangements that reflect the moment and create memories to last a lifetime. As
a member of organizations at the cutting edge of floral design, including
Chapel Designers, she has access to a network of leading designers and ongoing
professional development – and Rebecca is always looking for the latest and
best techniques and design ideas for my clients.
Colin Gilliam
Colin Gilliam, partner with Hitomi Gilliam in Design358 and owner of Colin Gilliam Photo + Design, has been photographing flowers for more than a decade. His work has been published in numerous books, as well as in Florists’ Review and Fleur Creatif Magazine.
I had a chance to discuss my thoughts about Trends during a recent conversation with Hitomi
Clarity in 2020 is knowing where we are at and where we want to go.
Hitomi Gilliam, AIFD, founder of Trend Summit 2020
Hitomi, Francoise and Rebecca have all been guests on the Slow Flowers Podcast. Here are links to those episodes:
Registration continues for Slow Flowers Summit and we’re nearly 50% sold out, which is amazing to me! Please join me on June 28-30th and connect with our fabulous speakers, enjoy the incredibly beautiful venue at Filoli Historic House & Garden, and experience the many features that will immerse you in the people, principles and practices of Slow Flowers.
The Slow Flowers Podcast
has been downloaded more than 568,000 times by listeners
like you. Thank you for listening, commenting and sharing – it means so much.
As our movement gains more supporters and more passionate
participants who believe in the importance of the American cut flower industry,
the momentum is contagious. I know you feel it, too. I value your support and
invite you to show your thanks and with a donation to support my ongoing
advocacy, education and outreach activities. You can find the donate button in the column to the right.
Thank you to our Sponsors
Florists’ Review magazine. I’m delighted to serve as Contributing Editor for Slow Flowers Journal, found in the pages of Florists’ Review. Our partnership with Florists’ Review is such a valuable one, providing a forum for beautiful and inspiring editorial content in the #slowflowersjournal section – month after month. Take advantage of the special subscription offer for members of the Slow Flowers Community.
Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers. Formed in 1988, ASCFG was created to educate, unite, and support commercial cut flower growers. It mission is to help growers produce high-quality floral material, and to foster and promote the local availability of that product. Learn more at ascfg.org.
Johnny’s Selected Seeds, an employee-owned company that provides our industry the best flower, herb and vegetable seeds — supplied to farms large and small and even backyard cutting gardens like mine. Find the full catalog of flower seeds and bulbs at johnnysseeds.com.
Longfield Gardens, which provides home gardeners with high quality flower bulbs and perennials. Their online store offers plants for every region and every season, from tulips and daffodils to dahlias, caladiums and amaryllis. Check out the full catalog at Longfield Gardens at longfield-gardens.com.
The content and opinions expressed here are either mine alone or those of my guests alone, independent of any podcast sponsor or other person, company or organization.
The Slow Flowers Podcast is engineered and edited by Andrew Brenlan. Learn more about his work at soundbodymovement.com
I’m so touched that my friends at Florists’ Review magazine included an article in the upcoming June 2018 issue about the American Horticultural Society recognizing me with its Frances Jones Poetker Award in honor of achievement in the field of floral design.
The award highlights my work advocating for and promoting domestic flowers and recognizes significant contributions to floral design in publications, on the platform, and to the public.
You can read the entire article, “Slow Flowers Pioneer,” written by Jane M. Markley, here.
