Flowers insolita Blog

The past week the weather has been just beautiful. The village of Huntington has come alive with people strolling and shopping. Kenji, the owner of the shop has started the “Name Game” once again. Much to the delight of the people who work and reside in the Village. What is the “Name Game” you might ask. Well at the beginning of the week he picks 4 names and posts them on a blackboard which is placed outside of the shop. If your name is one of names posted, you get a free bouquet of flowers.

The smiles and joy this brings to people is amazing! They can’t believe it. It’s really nice to see how a small bunch of flowers can make a person feel special and happy. Flowers really do touch people emotionally in many ways. But, I think for no special occassion and when it’s totally unexpected is the best.

Have a great day!

Her husband was just arrested. From local CBS News:

“(CBS/AP) HUNTINGTON, N.Y. The estranged husband of a woman who was found shot to death in a bagel store was arrested Friday on charges of second-degree murder, police said.

… Robert Anderson, 66, was arrested later that afternoon at his sister’s home, said Suffolk County police spokeswoman Audrey Marrone.

… Ann Anderson, 39, had an order of protection against her husband, but it didn’t include their business in Huntington, Marrone said.

… The husband told police he knew that his wife didn’t lock the door of the store after she opened, and he entered to discuss how to divide their assets. He told detectives that he became enraged and shot her, said Suffolk county detective Jack Fitzpatrick.”

more from Newsday

The owner of “Super Bagel” in Huntington Village, near intersection of Wall St & Gerard St, was shot to death early this morning. Read Newsday Article here.

At this moment, it is not clear whether this is an armed robbery or something else. Our village is usuaully a very safe place to operate a business. This kind of news really gets to our nerves.

Our sincere condolence goes to the family and friends of Ms Anderson, the owner.

Channel 4 Video 

Julie Ardery of Human Flower Project wrote an interesting article entitled “How to flower a Queen.” Julie writes:

“…We’re just a shade away from expecting Her Majesty to chunk a $20 into the self-serve rose cooler at baggage claim.”

“Here, an attractive bunch of young girls meets Queen Elizabeth as she arrives at the Virginia State Capitol in Richmond, on May 3. No curtsey, and a melee of stems they picked up at Sam’s Club on the way over. Did anyone offer the Queen a stick of gum?”

(click on the pic above to enlarge)

Yeah, I would have to agree with Julie’s analysis. In the picture, Her Majesty does indeed look like frowning at the flowers. These flowers definitely enforce a common British stereotype of we Americans, i.e., people with no taste nor respect. Who is that guy taking a picture of the Queen? I mean, he should show at least some respect to the Queen. She isn’t a Hollywood star; she is a Queen.

These cheap flowers are totally inappropriate for the Queen, the symbolic head of United Kingdom. It’s like serving a burger and fried chicken to Her Majesty; no one would do that… Wait a minute… wasn’t that what they did serve to Queen in the White House? Possible.

Anyway, I kept wondering… From where did the girls get those burger flowers? Sam’s Club? No, I suspect the truth is worse than that; I think they bought the flowers at local florists. The green wax-paper shown in the picture is the kind of material that we retail florists use everyday. Supermarkets don’t.

Did the girls tell the florists that flowers were a gift for Queen? I hope not…

We will re-open on Tuesday, May 29th.  We wish you a beautiful Memorial Day Weekend.

We hear about it all the time and most of us think it won’t happen to me. Well guess what. It happened to me, or I should say my husband. He would never have known untill a check bounced or he couldn’t get money from an ATM, but his bank called to ask about suspicious activity on his account. Turns out they stole his card number and pin number while he was making a transaction at a local ATM. The bank said they use some sort of electronic devise which can read your card and pin number when entered. Lovely Right? As it turns out he wasn’t the only one this happened to at this ATM machine, I ran into a woman at a bagel shop who had the same thing happen to her, from the same machine. These crooks then went into Manhatten and withdrew money from all the accounts they had collected, not only once but several times. I just want them to know that they are lower than low. We are very hard working people and it is hard for us to make ends meet. This other woman was a senior on a fixed income, she can’t afford her medicine this week. When you are caught I really hope they throw away the key and let you rot in jail.

Tulips: The tulip season is finished.  Tulips from domestic growers (Washington, New jersey, New York) and those from Holland are done.  We still have a limited availability from Canada, which will end in June.  No French Tulips will be available until late July.

Peonies: Peony production is increasing.  We expect there will be a reduction in pricing of some variety of Peonies.  Local (New Jersey) Peonies will become available soon.

Dendrobium Orchid: All Thai growers are experiencing some quality issues, especially with white Dendrobium Orchids.

California wild-flowers: Seasonal Califiornia wild-flowers are now available in the market, including English Lavendar, Saponaria, Tritoma, Foxglove, Atriplex, Cornflower, Nigella Blue, Scabiosa, Lamb’s Ear, Euphorbia Dog’s Eyes.  We will try to get most of these flowers in stock. 

People sometimes ask us why flowers are so “expensive”?

OK, my answer is simple: flowers are not expensive at all. In fact the price of flower arrangements has been flat for the last 10-15 years. During the same period, the price of gas tripled, while the average price of meal in a restaurant doubled. Everything went up, except for flowers.

Considering all the human efforts put into making a flower arrangement (from grower to importer to wholesaler to retail florist), I cannot help wondering how come flowers are so cheap now.

Question: What kind of gift item can you purchase for a mere $50 these days?

With a simple phone call to a high-end florist like us, $50 would purchase a tasteful flower arrangement that can be (1) customized to your taste and (2) hand-delivered to your recipient on the same day.

Or, you can go to a shopping mall by yourself, if you don’t mind spending your time to look for a nice gift that costs less than $50. However, you can’t customize it to your taste, for that kind of money. After finally deciding on what you want (a pair of inexpensive sandals maybe?), you then drive to a drug store and buy gift wrapping materials. Exhausted, you go home and wrap your gift, only to find out you’re too tired to bring it to the recipient today…

Or, you can spend hours on the Internet, looking through all those virtual gift shops. You then suddenly realized that the gift must be delivered right a way. You click on the delivery option, and they say you’ve got to pay $20 for “over-night” delivery. Only $30 left for the gift itself! You also remember that last time you ordered one of those, the actual item you received looked a lot cheaper than the picture shown on their web-site. You never know what you’ll get…

Fore more information about the impact of flowers as a gift, see “Flower Fundamentals” at aboutflowers.com (Society of American Florists, of which we are a member).