5 Time Saving Tips for Event Florists

Written by Ryan ONeil | Sep 14, 2017 4:32:36 PM

We often hear from florists who say they simply don't have enough time in their day to get everything done. They're up all night creating proposals and wholesaler orders and doing other administrative tasks that they don't have time to actually grow their business or spend significant quality time with their families.

It was these frustrations that actually led us to create Curate in the first place!

The question remains: "What else can I do to save time and help my business run more smoothly?" So here are 5 time saving tips for event florists that will help you save even more time:

Create a Game Plan

We recommended this to entrepreneurs in our "How to Start a Flower Shop from Scratch" series but it's something that many florists overlook in the chaos of an event week. Creating a game plan allows everyone on your team to know exactly what's going to happen when and who is responsible for each moving part.

Include everything from receiving the flowers to creating the arrangements to pick-up after the event is over. If you will have to build out some arrangements on site, be sure you know exactly how long it will take. Also, put together a checklist of everything that will need to be loaded for transportation to the venue.

If you're using Curate, you can use the "shopping list" as your pull list for your rental items and your packing list for the items you need to bring. Nothing is worse than forgetting an important item and trying to finagle an alternative design or rush back to the shop to pick it up.

Use Recipe Sheets

If you have floral designers to help you before the big day, you should assign them to specific arrangements and give them a recipe sheet so they know how to create those arrangements. By creating recipe sheets, you no longer have to stand by and verbally give instructions. They can look at their recipe sheet and know exactly what to do.

BONUS: Curate is a florist app that automatically has these created when users click just a single button.

Create an Assembly Line

There's a reason that the assembly line model has sustained the automotive industry for over 100 years. In many business situations, it's the most efficient way to put things together--including arrangements. We've had a few of our users who have described this to us as a way to handle a limited amount of space.

Once you've created your gameplan for the week, creating an assembly line is easy. Make sure each person has their specific workstation as well as everything they need for their assigned arrangements. By having each person stay at a specific work station with the tools they need, movement is minimized, and the process becomes more efficient and no one gets hurt trying to run across the room to grab the last pair of scissors to cut some stems.

Replace Yourself

There's a rule we use called the "Gold Bus Rule." It goes like this: if you got hit by a golden bus, what would happen to your business? Do you have someone who could easily replace you and keep things running?

As a floral shop owner or manager, your goal is to make your business successful and that means it has to be able to be successful even if you cannot be there to attend to it. So develop a focus on teaching and mentorship.

If something can be done by another person at least 75% as well as you do it then train that other person to do the job. This frees you up to focus on more important things. Not only will this help save your business if you get hit by a golden bus, but it will enable others on your team to gain more experience.

Train Someone to Create Your Wholesaler List

Speaking of replacing yourself, one task that is always a headache to do is creating your wholesaler order. The wholesaler list is where the rubber meets the road in a business and is an enormous time suck. You NEED to have someone else who you can train to do this. This gives them the experience with some of the business end of things and allows you to focus on more important issues. Of course, you'll want to check their work before sending it off, but that's a much simpler process than pulling everything together on your own.

And if you use Curate, the process becomes completely pain free as you can combine multiple events for a weekend and create your wholesaler list with just a click of a button, without having to worry about inaccuracies in the order.

The biggest thing time saving tip for florists is obvious though...

Use a floral software like Curate! You can create beautiful, accurate proposals in the consultation and book more florists on-the-spot.

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