And so another wedding season begins!

May has traditionally been one of the busiest wedding months, and marks the real start of the season here in western Pennsylvania.  Tomorrow we have two weddings—complete setup at Betsy’s Barn, and one with the ceremony at Geneva College and reception at the Marriott Pittsburgh North in Cranberry Township—and a shower at the Butler Country Club.

We’ll have some follow-up tomorrow here as well as our Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/bloomery/.

Come see The Bloomery on Jan 10, 2010 at the Sheraton Four Points North (Cranberry Township).  We have hundreds of mini calla lilies, roses and hydrangea on order for some gorgeous floral arrangements.  We hope to see you there!  For more information, visit http://www.bridalevents.com/.

[update]

Sorry we missed you at the show!  We spent the weekend at Children's Hospital with our daughter.  We're home, she's better, and we apologize the cool stuff wasn't able to make it to the show this year.

Our first bridal show of 2009 is the Bridal Events show at the Four Points Sheraton Pittsburgh North.  We’ll be there with samples and ideas for your perfect wedding.  This is the only wedding show we’re planning to attend in the Cranberry Township area, so we hope to see you there!

Full details at http://www.bridalevents.com/NewBridalEvents/Details/details.htm.

We’re thrilled to announce that the Butler Country Club has selected The Bloomery as their florist for their wedding and event packages.  Some of our favorite weddings have been at the BCC, and most of the images in their gallery are work we’ve done.  They were a Featured Location in July 2006, and where we did the Hydrangea, Stock and Peach Rose Centerpieces we features in 2007.

You can see the Butler Country Club at the Wedding Clickers show tomorrow at the Pittsburgh Marriott North.  We’re delivering a couple of the package arrangements for them in the morning, so you get an idea of some of the choices.  Let’s just say this—the BCC wanted their flower options to be very generous to provide a great value to brides.

2008 brides, mark your calendars--the Butler Days Inn 2007 Fall Bridal Extravaganza will be Sep. 16, 2007.  As always, we'll be there with some incredible fresh bouquets, the latest accessories, and trendy invitations.

More information will be posted at http://www.daysinnbutler.com/Weddings/BridalShow/tabid/66/Default.aspx soon.

We're exceited to report that one of our weddings from last year is featured in the current Pittsburgh Weddings.  You'll find our bride on pages 48-49, and thankfully their photo shows her bouquet beautifully.  The issue is on newstands (Giant Eagle, Borders, Barnes & Noble, etc) until it sells out, and can also be ordered online at http://www.wqed.org/mag/bride/index.shtml.

The Butler Days Inn will hold its Winter Bridal Extravaganza on Feb 18, 2007 from noon to 3pm, and a fashion show starting at 3pm.  This is a huge event each year, attracting over 70 vendors and hundreds of brides (with door prizes for the first brides to check in).  This may be the only bridal show we attend, so it's a great chance to come see and talk to use outside of a regular appointment.  Check out http://daysinnbutler.com/ for more details.

For many years, we recommended Linda Clifford of Clifford Keepsakes for wedding bouquet preservation.  We came to know her through a number of bridal shows, and the good service and quality work she provided.  This year, we've had complaints from three of our brides that they have been unable to reach Linda for quite some time, and are concerned about their bouquets.  We've attempted to call Linda, but her business phone is not being answered.  We are shocked and disappointed that her service has taken such a dramatic turn, and we'll continue to try and contact Linda to resolve any outstanding issues.  We hope this is a simple oversight on her part, but right now we have no idea what's up.  We deeply apologize to anyone who's been inconvenienced through our recommendation.

More information at www.DaysInnButler.com.

We're thrilled to announce that Polly Berginc of The Bloomery has been accepted into AIFD.  Even more exciting--her acceptance letter arrived the day of her daughter's wedding.

AIFD is a highly selective organization of the world's best florists.  To gain membership, an applicant must undergo a stressful design test, judged by the membership panel.  Just getting to the test is almost a year-long process, and only about 30-40% of those who test are accepted.  Polly was accepted after her first try, which is uncommon.  This year's test was even more grueling because the air conditioner broke in the testing room, raising the temperature to uncomfortable levels.  That's all right--the a/c breaks in flower shops sometimes, and we're still expected to perform at our best.  Once inducted into AIFD, a member must earn continuing education credits to maintain his or her membership.

Polly will be one of only five AIFD members in western Pennsylvania, and one of 26 in the state.  Polly will be inducted next year at the National Symposium in Palm Desert, CA.  Until then, we can only refer to Polly as an AIFD Registered Candidate.  After induction, Polly will be able to use the letters "AIFD" after her name.  That means we have about 10 months before we have to order her new business cards.

For more information on AIFD, check out their website at http://www.aifd.org.  We'll have a real press release soon.  But we couldn't wait to spread the word.

<update 2006-08-25>

AIFD posted its press release today at http://www.aifd.org/2006aesresults.htm.  64 of 115 who tested were accepted.  There is a full listing of all invitees, and some more background on AIFD.

Want a few insider secrets for choosing your wedding flowers?  We shared a few with By-area writer Mike Adamcik, in his recent post "Interviews: Floral and funna …".  He's right, that's a terrible pun.

The interview's been up for a couple of days, but since we're on the beach at Hilton Head Island right now, we're a little behind in our blogging.

We received some nice press in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review recently.  We were interviewd for an article titled "Blogs offer new avenue for businesses":

Brides-to-be love to read anything pertaining to weddings. That's why the owners of a Butler floral shop reach out to them through a blog, or Web log, that invites their comments.

Richard and Kathy Dudley of The Bloomery post messages and pictures with wedding ideas: Mini bouquets can be made with a deep purple calla lily that looks almost black, for example.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/s_445885.html

Well, one thing has changed.  In response to the article, we have had new customers check out our blog and website.  They found our prom gallery, and came in to order their prom flowers.  Progress!

You can find our blog at www.floristblogs.com and our regular site at www.bloomery.com.

Ever wonder what makes the difference between beautiful wedding flowers, and a wedding-day embarassment?  Much of what determines the beauty of your wedding flowers happens before they arrive at our shop.  Proper handling, especially temperature and hydration, are essential to flower quality.  We took a field trip to one of our local wholesalers on the Sunday after Thanksgiving to show you some of what steps our wholesalers take to ensure we can deliver high quality flowers to you.  You can visit the photo gallery on our everyday flower blog at http://floristblogs.com/photos/bloomery/category1009.aspx.

BW Wholesale is located in Pittsburgh's famed Strip District, but is open only to retail florists.

In one corner of our shop, we have shelves of wedding accessories, topped with photos of brides holding bouquets.  From time to time, we’re asked if those are real brides.  All eight photos are pictures of actual brides whose weddings we created.  Some of the photos we took, and some were taken by our friend Diane Maxwell at DLM Photography.

For the single guys who don’t catch on real quick—they’re brides; no they’re not single anymore.

Today, we suffered a website and e-mail outage for several hours for both www.bloomery.com and www.bloomeryweddings.com.  Our servers are housed in Boca Raton, FL, which got pounded pretty heavily by Wilma.  Currently, our websites are back online and e-mail is fully functional, but as that area recovers, we may face intermittant outages.  We appreciate the work our hosting company, Applied Innovations, has done to keep all their clients online, and feel very lucky that the major data pipes from that area did not suffer considerable damage.  If you can't reach us via e-mail, you can call us at 800-729-1711 (724-285-1711 locally).  We appreciate your patience and understanding, and please include in your thoughts all the people in the areas affected by this year's tragic hurricane season.

So Proflowers is getting into the wedding business.  Color us...interested.  We're sure there's a market for no-hassle ordering of basic wedding packages (stay tuned for more on that).  What makes us interested is how the flowers will actually look on your wedding day.

See, when we make your bouquet, the flowers arrive in our shop usually on a Tuesday, where they're sorted (only the best get used in wedding bouquets), placed in waster and nutrient solution, and held at proper temperatures.  For lilies and roses, we'll often leave them out for a day to get them to open perftectly, but it's in the cooler as soon as they do.  Your bouquet is actually put together Friday evening or Saturday morning.  Corsages and boutonnieres are also made at this time, and everything is stored cooled (36 degrees F) until delivery.  One of the challenges we have with corsages and bouts is they don't have a water source.  It's essential that we keep them moist and cool so they are absolutely perfect for your wedding day.

With Proflowers, your flowers will arrive assembled early in the week, and it's up to you to keep them fresh.  We know there are a lot of you out there who have a brown thumb, so to speak, and you know who you are.  We don't know of many people who have something capable of holding wedding flowers at the proper temperature.  There are a lot of rumors out there as to how to keep vased flowers fresh (pennies, bleach and 7-Up are all bad ideas--ask for a packet of nutrient solution instead).  We know there are a lot of people who will try to take the cheap way out, but just won't be able to hold their flowers at the peak of freshness like a professional florist can.  Like we said, we're curious.

If you've had experience with Proflowers' wedding flowers, good or bad, leave a comment and let us know.

Next week, we're off to the Society of American Florists Convention in Lake Las Vegas, NV.  One part of the convention is the Outstanding Varieties competition, where growers from all over the world present new and developed varieties of flowers.  This is a premier opportunity for us to take a look at new varieties of roses, gerbera daisies, alstromeria and other popular wedding flowers.  We'll have the first reports on the best flowers we see that will be part of weddings for years to come.  Stay tuned!

The Bloomery will be at the Butler Days Inn's Tropical Honeymoon Bridal Show on Sept. 18.  Admission is free for pre-registered brides, and all pre-registered brides are entered to win a Caribbean Honeymoon!  Find out more at http://www.daysinnbutler.com/Default.aspx?tabid=66.

The Butler Days Inn is an easy trip from anywhere in the North Hills, Wexford, Cranberry Township, etc. areas, and the Steelers play a late game that day (they checked).

This isn't wedding related, but it's important enough to the floral industry to mention here.

FTD's press release reads, in part:

The lawsuit states that ProFlowers claims that "flowers are picked the day before - or sometimes the day of - the order, and are then shipped direct to the customer with no middlemen involved," are false and misleading. The lawsuit also asserts that ProFlowers misleads consumers by stating that its flowers are "shipped direct [or fresh, or straight] from the fields, bypassing middlemen, extended stays in refrigerators or warehouses before they reach your doorstep."

...

Rather, in documents filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, ProFlowers discloses that:

• it owns a refrigerated warehouse in Miami, where it often stores many of its flowers before they are sent to consumers;
  
• that it uses at least five other refrigerated warehouses around the country, owned by third-parties, where flowers are often stored before they are sent to consumers; and
  
• that it actually keeps flowers in inventory, especially at busy holiday times, meaning they are not cut to order as said in many of ProFlowers' advertisements.

ProFlowers has made the claim over the years that their flowers are cut at the time of your order, and shipped directly from the growers.  We've known this to be total B.S. all this time, so it's good to see this brought to the forefront.

In actuality, ProFlowers' flowers are flown from South American growers, into Miami.  Here, the flowers are stored in large cooler and orders are packed in a long assembly line process.  The orders are then trucked to other warehouses around the country, spending 1-5 days in a refrigerated vehicle.  FedEx or UPS picks up the shipments from ProFlower's warehouses, and transports them to their final destinations, with orders spending 1-2 days in unrefrigerated vehicles.  When FedEx or UPS makes final delivery, they can (and do) leave the order at the recipient's door.  Not such a good thing if you're in Arizona in the summer, or Pennsylvania in the winter.  By the time the flowers reach the recipient, they are 3-7 days off the plant, spending all of that time out of water, and some of that time in unrefrigerated vehicles.

In contrast, our South American flowers are flown into Miami, where they are cross-docked and flown to airports around the country on commercial flights.  From the airports, local trucking companies or the wholesalers themselves bring the flowers to the wholesale houses.  The more tender flowers are cut and placed in water, and all are placed in large coolers.  The wholesalers then pick and pack our orders, and make delivery that day or the next.  We receive the flowers, inspect them, cut and hydrate them in a nutrient solution and place them in our coolers.  Afternoon deliveries often conatin flowers that are 3 days off the plant, transported in cooled vehicles, properly hydrated, and placed directly in the hands of a human.  In the case of our Holland and Canadian flowers, we receive them direct overnight, where the have been off the plant about 24 hours.

Now, not every arrangement is made with flowers at their peak.  The flowers for your bridal bouquet, for instance, are usually received in our shop on Tuesday.  This allows us to let them open to perfection (who wants a bouquet of tight rose buds?), and make sure we choose only the most perfect flowers for your wedding.  Even daily arrangements are made with flowers that can be 5 days old.  These are usually flowers such as carnations and daisies, which are pretty hardy.  Scientific studies have shown that several days time makes little difference in the vase life of of flowers when held at the temperature of our coolers (a chilly 36 degrees) and with proper hydration.  The worst thing to happen to flowers on their way to the recipient is to let them get warm without proper hydration, which ProFlowers does not do (remember those warehouses and FedEx trucks above?).  Professional florists are well trained and keep current on proper care and handling techniques, and we strive to maintain the highest quality.

You can read FTD's press release at http://www.ftdi.com/pressroom/082405.htm, which contains a link to the full filing.  Business 2.0 covered ProFlowers' delivery chain (albeit with a very positive spin) recently, at http://www.business2.com/b2/web/articles/0,17863,1047683,00.html.

We hope you don't mind the interruption of our usual wedding coverage.  We'll return to that in our next post.

The Fall/Winter 2005 issue of The Knot Weddings: Pittsburgh features a wedding we were pleased to be a part of.  You'll find the happy couple, Angelina and Michael, on page 46.  Photographer Mike Bordo did an excellent job shooting in the Morning Glory Inn, and we're happy to see the photographs featured the flowers so nicely, too!  There's a gorgeous close-up of Angelina's bouquet on page 48, and the rose petal path was made from several hundred roses.  It was a really windy day, and the Morning Glory Inn staff had to wait until the very last minute to make the path--you can see them doing so at http://www.bordo.com/angelina.html (near the middle of the page).  Usually we'd handle the path, but on such a windy day, we had to ask them to handle this.  Also, check out the floral swag on the garden arch behind the couple on page 46.  It's mounted about 10-11 feet off the ground, and consisted of calla lilies, dendrobium orchids, roses and other flowers with bountiful ferns and greenery.  It was a very large piece, and quite heavy due to the amount of wet floral foam we had to use.  We were rather nervous when getting that up on the garden arch.  There are two smaller ones on either side of the arch, which you can kind of see on page 49.  We have a couple color photos as well in our portfolios at the shop--stop by during regular business hours and you can look through them.

Congratulations to Angelina and Michael on your wedding, and for being one of "16 Amazing Pittsburgh Real Weddings".  Thanks for making us a part of your special day.

P.S. You'll find our ad on page 80.

Q: How much packing material do you buy each year?

A: None.

That's right!  Since we began the online part of our wedding business over two years ago, we have never purchased packing materials (aside from tape and recyclable corrugated boxes).  Every peanut, air pack and crumbled kraft paper that protected the thousands of items we've shipped was a re-use from our suppliers.  We work with the beauty of nature every day, and we enjoy the open farmland, parks and forests so abundant in our area (one of us even holds a BS in Environmental Science from Allgheny College).  The stems and leaves cut from our flowers have become mulch in our gardens, and we return the vast majority of shipping boxes back to our flower wholesalers.  As we grow, we'll continue to find ways reduce, reuse and recycle so our arrangements aren't the only place you'll find nature's beauty.