A few months ago I wrote a blog post about online florists and the poor quality of the players in the South African market. There was no naming and shaming, buy cialis and in truth I wasn’t alluding to any one service provider, but rather to the mass-market industry as a whole. Netflorist saw my article and reached out; asking if it would be possible to meet and brainstorm to better understand my gripes. I jumped at the opportunity and met with MD Ryan Bacher a few days later. In the meanwhile I binged on Pinterest and put together a presentation of the style and ideas I felt were lacking in South Africa.
I learnt a lot about the industry during our meeting; about the complexities of e-tailing living, breathing, wilting things, trying to keep costs low and affordable to the masses, stock shortages, the affects of seasonality and the average South African’s taste when it comes to flowers. I had a laugh at Ryan recounting stories of trying to pull naff arrangements from the line, only to be met with complete horror by the South African public and threatening demands to #BringBackOurCarnations.
I proposed designing something a little different, or at least an attempt to, and Ryan obliged. Netflorist had recently created a bespoke Celebrity Range so the website functionality was ready and the timing perfect. I was thrilled at the idea because spending my day in a warehouse full of flowers is basically my idea of heaven. I looped Angie (Lucky Pony) and Anna-belle (She Said) into the fold and we set out to create a blogger series.
Flower arranging is not for the faint-hearted and I take my hat off to the men and women who work tirelessly in cold warehouses and fridges, negotiating thorns and water and Protea stems all day. It sure is a lot easier than it looks and requires strong hands and a good attitude. We each created 6 items which would then be sold on the Netflorist website, seasonality pending of course. I’m chuffed with what we managed to create, and look forward to improving upon it in future. One of the hardest things is availability of interesting flora in this country. What’s abundant abroad is often simply not available in South Africa and it does call for curbing one’s enthusiasm. Pinterest can be a bit of a heart-breaker. For example, my centrepiece was due to be a simple potted Delicious Monster, but due to lack of supply in our market it’s just not an option.
Here are a couple of snaps (thanks Ange & Anna-Belle) from the morning, as well as my range which is available to purchase here. And if you use the voucher code brandslut10 you can get 10% off any Netflorist order. Happy spoiling.
brandslut xoxo
azeem
nice