Fall Flowers for Thanksgiving

The night before the fairy party, we had a family birthday dinner for my sister-in-law.  Of course I was up to my eyeballs in pixie dust and other messes, so I was thrilled to have been given the opportunity to get a fresh flower delivery straight to my home that day.  The Sunflower Guy offered to send me a bouquet of their flowers to review, so that I could tell you about their flowers and unusual shipping system.  I decided it would be a great birthday present!  I think my SIL thought it was, too!

Here's what he said about their company:

1. We are grower direct.  We grow most of the flowers (in particular the sunflowers and filler greens) in our bouquets and they are harvested only hours before we assemble them into bouquets and ship them.  So our flowers tend to be a few days fresher than flowers you would buy from a local florist.

2. We have a very unique, patented shipping box that protects the bouquet from being crushed or compressed in any way.  It also allows the flowers to stay hydrated during shipment.  Most online flower shippers will pack their bouquets into a tight box where they can become damaged and dehydrated.  Our bouquets come right out of the box looking like they were freshly arranged by a florist.

3.  Although you can buy a nice bouquet at Costco or someplace for less than one of our bouquets, everyone needs to send somebody flowers in another state or city a few times a year.  Our service is perfect for those occasions.

My take:  I actually have a lot of experience with flowers.  I did wedding flowers for a while as a home-based business, and so I was excited to see this innovative approach.  I was apprehensive when the shipping box looked like it had gotten a little beat up, but the flowers seemed unscathed.  They put some wet foam (floral oasis) in the bottom of the vase, so that the flowers have a source of water while in transit, and a wooden dowel and the box keep the flowers upright.  The paint on the vase had been rubbed of a bit, by the cardboard container, but not too seriously for this rustic feel. The question I had/have is whether to get rid of the foam or not.  I thought that is what the instructions were saying, but after trimming the stems, as suggested, the bouquet no longer sat well in the container.  I ended up shoving the foam back down there (even though I had filled the vase with water) before giving it to my sister-in-law, so that it would look nice.  

I'm not sure if the sunflowers opened any wider.  When I saw the flowers a week later, they were on their way out.  Not dead yet, but not as nice as I had hoped given their 8 day guarantee.

The bouquets aren't cheap, and I like to arrange flowers, so it isn't a service I would use very often, but I do think that it is a really nice idea for those occasions when you would like to send a nice arrangement far away.  They ship right away and do an overnight delivery, so you don't even have to plan very far in advance.  I think this could be great if there is a Thanksgiving dinner you couldn't attend but still want to send your love.

If I were going to do that, I think I would send this "Apple Hill" bouquet.  I love the use of the berries with the sunflowers.

If you are a DIYer, I'm going to show you a few ideas of floral arrangements you might want to try for your Thanksgiving dinner in my next post.

UPDATE (11/22):  The Sunflower Guy just emailed me with a discount code for my readers.  If you want to send a bouquet this holiday, enter the code, "turkey5" at checkout for $5 off your order!