The Floral CEO

 

Hello flower friends. This is Jen and we're gonna talk about something different. I always actually try to make things interesting and different and dynamic on the podcast, but I am nearing 300 episodes, so I am excited about this episode because this weekend I really reflected on. What I had learned with now doing over, I mean, I've done over 1700 weddings.

I, I, if you guys haven't listened to my story, I mean, I've been a florist for 30 years. It was my first job when I was 16 and I've always been, had my hands in flowers somehow. And I, a couple years did 125. I think the biggest year I did 135 weddings. Like one wedding weekend I had nine weddings. Like it was crazy.

But I've learned a lot along the way. I mean, it is, this weekend in particular, I. Had some like hard lessons that are just growing pains with now moving and, you know, I have different truck schedules and I have I had my bride all of a sudden like grow her wedding by $8,000 two and a half weeks.

Before her wedding at the final planning meeting that I'd been reaching out to try to do. And so then I was having a really hard time finding freelance help. Of course, it's also on a very busy weekend. And then before this grew by $8,000, I had one of my favorite venues reach out and want me to participate in this, you know, style shoot slash open house that Minnesota provide was doing.

Then I had another venue reach out and I was like, I could do something, but it's gonna be like silk or dried so I can have them done it ahead of time. But I was like juggling all of these components and then the week of shit went sideways. There was a bunch of things that were outside of my control.

I stepped back and I know that I did all the right things. The first thing was my order from California on all this product coming from one one of my vendors. Didn't, it was late. And I really want to order from this vendor because they support all of my floral rockstar, uh, workshops, um, which I am planning three this year.

And I'm so excited, uh, because I will be unveiling those workshops at the beginning of November. And they're gonna be so amazing. But like I appreciate their support because it helps make these workshops more affordable. And I wanna order from them. But their truck schedule, now that I'm on a outside rural route, they only come on Sunday night delivery.

So they deliver overnight between 11:00 PM and 9:00 AM. So I was already, I actually had a sign on the door. I made sure that my garage studio was unlocked. I cleared a path and I wrote a note for them. Thank you for delivering. Please place it where I put a note for placement. And don't get freaked out if you hear something.

I have donkey. So like I made this whole like, clear kind of, path. Then I wake up and I go out and then I wait and then it's like nine o'clock and I'm like, where's my order? Well, the California truck didn't make it so they didn't ship any of my shit. So here are a bunch of things that I thought we were gonna have time.

I actually had someone here to help process and they were here by the time these things were arriving. So I'm like. So I have labor here and no product. We, of course, have a long line of to do around here, so we definitely can keep things going, but then that happened two other times where stuff was supposed to come in and wasn't in on time, or the stuff that I got was completely wrong.

And we had to make a bunch of changes. So like one of my first lessons, we're gonna talk about 10 of my biggest lessons, but one of my first lessons is always have a cushion for time. I see some florists that are like, because they don't have coolers or whatever, they're getting their shit last minute and they're getting it on Thursday or Friday for a Saturday wedding.

I get my product way early. Because stuff happens and luckily I have a cooler, but so much stuff can happen that I wanna make sure that we're ready. Also, always having a cushion of time or set up. We of course, went to deliver this $26,000 wedding and. Trekking out because I rented a 26 foot U-Haul trekking out to the ceremony site.

They had these really tiny carts and when I had been there before, there had been a UTV that we could throw boxes on way faster. So we had to hand track all of these boxes out and that of course, added time to set up then. The linen company who I had actually helped design and pick out the linens was not arriving till noon, and from my understanding, everything was supposed to be set by noon, so that was late.

So making sure because of traffic, because of weather, because of logistics, because of setup changes, you want to protect your call and your quality by just planning for margin. Don't be afraid to ask for more. That's not enough time. I have had people tell me that they can get into their venue super late and they don't wanna buy additional time, and I frankly have just told them, I am sorry, but like there's two approaches.

I can either try. To find more team members. But with the size of this, even with more team members, it would be really hard to execute that in this timeframe. Especially Teardowns when there is a very big wedding and they're telling me they have an hour for Teardown, that is just frankly, not enough time to pack glassware.

And if I go and pay like. Four people for tear down for one, finding four people who are gonna wanna tramp their butt over to a venue at midnight can be tricky. Uh, I don't even wanna get into it, so I wanna make sure that I just have cushion and I have actually had people up. Their time that their last dance happens, so that the wedding starts to shut down early.

I am not afraid to ask for more time because when you have more time, like I feel more calm, I feel like I'm doing a better job. The next one, number two, you likely need more help than you think. This week I had of course tried to find more help. But then I had a person that I thought was gonna be there two days that told me their kid was sick.

On day two, I had another person who I thought was coming two days and could only come one because of some childcare thing. I had another person, I mean, these were like the last minute people that I had added. That of course, like I shouldn't fault that, you know, they just had a lot going on and life got in the way, but I can't run my business on.

I hope that this works out and I really, me and my core studio help. We literally were working till 11 o'clock on Friday night, and then I was up at seven. Going to go get a U-Haul and I had to load a 26 foot U-Haul and get up here. I mean, like, so much has changed and so much of the ease that I had when I was in the metro area has gone away, and so things are just trickier, so I need to make sure that I can get help.

I basically, because I didn't have enough help, I didn't sleep very much. That sucks because now even going into this week, I just, I, I don't feel recharged, I don't feel energized to like my normal, like kick ass and takes names off because I'm just frankly tired. And that is, I, I, I would've known earlier, I budgeted and really reached out before a lot of people were booked.

I. I know that if I would've had more help, I wouldn't have been working till 11 o'clock at night. And luckily, I have a person who's kind of ride or die who is always super helpful. But it, it makes everything run smoother, safer, and more enjoyable, and especially if product is getting messed up and arriving.

Different dates, different times. All right, my third lesson is don't undercharge. It hurts everyone. When you under charge, you are hurting not just your own business, you're hurting your energy, your creativity, and your local floral community. It, you start to resent so much. You resent clients, planners, yourself.

The wedding, you start to burn out and then that cycle is really hard to break. Charge what your work is worth. So you can give your best to not only your clients, but you can sustain this passion you have. We don't wanna get in flo into flowers and something that, I, I actually, it was so interesting.

I returned these pair of shoes that were very pretty sparkly flower shoes that I was going to use for my brand shoot and then didn't. And so I returned them today and the lady was like, oh my God, these shoes are so beautiful. And like, I was like, yeah, I'm a florist and I was gonna use them for a photo shoot.

And they were like thinking it was the coolest fucking job. And they were like, how long have you been doing that? I was like, I've actually been doing that for 30 years. And they were like, oh my God, that is so cool that you've just found this thing. I was like, well, I have two purposes in life and I really have three.

Being a florist, being a mom, and being a coach. And I didn't get into being a coach 'cause they could give two shits. But like I know that that's my purpose and for me to sustain my per purpose and my passion for my purpose, I can't be resentful. I can't not make money like that feels like shit for everybody.

All right. The next is kind of goes hand in hand is you need to create space for growth and creativity. Here in Minnesota it's very easy because basically weddings when. The Arctic Tundra sets in weddings like slow down, like to almost nothing. So you can't run your business on an empty cup. Your creativity needs rest.

I feel when I go, I'm going to pottery classes where I'm taking a wheel pottery class on Mondays, sitting there with my hands in clay and just. Like being creative, trying different, I got to actually, there's this way you can make faces. It's fascinating. You guys is called Off the Hump. They literally take like pounds and pounds of clay and make this huge pile.

And this is how a lot of our stuff from like accent decor, a lot of like production pottery is made because then they just have this huge thing of clay and they're centering and making like it perfect on the top and then cutting it off and then making, pulling some clay up and make centering it and cutting that thing off.

I mean, it is, it was fascinating, but I got to try it for the first time and I have been in pottery for so long. I was just sitting in pottery class after this shit show of a weekend and then like all these things going on with my family and the farm and our baby donkeys are still sick if you guys pay attention.

The Pickles and Mabel saga. And like just all these things, me trying to get our pasture finished so I can wean all of the babies that were born on our farm, which just seems crazy that we're there right now, but. That was so that space made me feel so creative that rest like just me. Like I am not trying to accomplish anything right now.

That was so giving, and when you're on the edge of burnout, your art and your business, both supper, so make space for play, for curiosity, and for stepping away. It's not lazy. I am one of the hardest people in myself that if I'm not doing something, I'm being fucking lazy. It is like this mindset that I have really worked hard to say to myself that rest is okay.

I mean, even at CrossFit I, my brain, because I'm not thinking about really anything other than being in class. Will all of a sudden be like, I have this grandiose idea for a podcast episode, or I just remembered I needed to do this and this, and what if I did this this way, or, God, I really have this great idea for the next workshop and like I, it's because like I'm literally thinking about nothing and my brain had space to develop.

So create space then. This was very apparent this weekend. Order your product from multiple sources when something matters. I, I had these, this inspiration photo that I screenshotted off of Instagram and it had these beautiful leaves. And these leaves are, they were a bigger, um, they almost look like an arrowhead.

Um. Like pretty large and I sent it to one wholesaler and said, can you get something like this for me? Can you order this? Then I sent it to another and they went on LICs and found it. So like I had sent that order to two places and got it from one. That was thing number one that happened. Number two, I needed burgundy in theory.

I don't know if you guys have noticed, but Ethereum, at least in the US right now, it's like tricky. And when it gets cold here in Minnesota and things freeze, like it gets even trickier. And then some people are really dumb and they put the Ethereum the cooler instead of the tropical cooler. And it's just like this big thing that you get all this stuff but.

I ordered Burgundy Ethereum from two places because it was a critical part of this design. And yeah, it literally, one of 'em was like chocolatey, which still matched, thank God. And then the other one was like a red brown. So I made them work. I was gonna get some spray paint out, but I was just like, uh, I don't have it in me.

I'll make it work. And it was so beautiful. But they also were two completely different styles of Ethereum. One was more the peace, slowly shape, which I hate. And then the other one was the flat face. Beautiful. That's all over Instagram. But I just thought it was so interesting because here's all these examples on how product was drastically different.

The quality, it was so interesting. The Peace Lilly Kind were the shortest Ethereum I've seen in my life. The stems were nine inches long and I've never seen an Ethereum stem at least less than 12 or 14. So also very fascinating, but I know often we're scared to order 'cause we're scared to overspend. But if you even take your order.

And order half here and half there. That helps up your chances of actually being able to get that product. I have had florists cracked and I've seen in all the Facebook groups, even in our own, the floral CEO Facebook group, literally here's somebody like, oh my God, this happened. And it actually, um, I'm the founder of the Minnesota Floral Collective and a florist anonymously posted because I think they didn't.

You know, they were embarrassed that this happened, but it was a picture of all of their light blue duff inm crushed, like every single flower petal fell off. They were very old. It was very apparent. They were very old. But if I knew I needed light blue duff inm, I would order it from two places. I know that sounds crazy to do, but I then know at least some of it I will be able to garner something good.

Uh, if I order out of two places. If something's messed up over here, I feel like at least one of them shouldn't mess up. I know that's not giving very much credit, it was very apparent where these leaves came from for my styled ch on Sunday. The other wholesaler had the exact same access. They both have icks and these, these leaves came in a icks box.

So I then called my rep, took picture and sent it to 'em because I absolutely adore this rep. And I said, your buyer obviously gave no shits to even try because they bought this on Holics. The same tool you guys have, and he was like, oh my God, I'm so sorry. I was like, you missed out on a good chunk of money because I spent some money on those leaves because they were big.

But don't be afraid to order from multiple sources. All right, next, speaking of going overboard on style shoots or what I like to call marketing opportunities. Style, choose can be wonderful. And honestly, uh, it was so amazing 'cause I, I do almost like a monthly, monthly, either mini or. Um, you know, I used my silks or do something with this venue that I partner with for some of the workshops and there're where I have the installation Rockstar workshop and I really want to get into full event design.

So they've been letting me take the charge and kind of design the recent events and I've done the last two and I sent one of them to our local Minnesota bride and just said, Hey, I don't know, but if you guys are interested, but. I just thought this was stunning and so different and fresh and very on point because it was a tomato kind of inspired.

And I got an email today that they're publishing it. So some style juices definitely I feel like are worth it, but I, I see other salad shoots that I'm like, oh my God, you wasted so much money on producing basic shit. So I will only do a soil shoot if it's inspiring, if I get to make something really cool that I, I hope and dream will attract my dream client if I'm using for an educational purpose because some of them I've, I've made videos at some of these venues while I'm making something.

Uh, I feel like getting in with that venue is really important and I feel good about it. And. Marketing opportunities. I'm always evaluating fading. Okay, if I go to this marketing opportunity, which is me setting up a booth at whatever, like it never seems to go well. It, it an open house unless they are putting money behind it.

And I did Monday's episode talking about, um, this exact thing. But don't spend your time, energy, and money on things that are not going to have an ROI. It's just not worth it. All right, number seven, analyze your time from an ROI perspective. And now that year end is approaching, this is something we do in the floral CEO Mastermind.

We actually go and reflect on the year where we took our energy. What. Amount of time we invested what was the ROI on that investment by revenue buckets. So if you are a florist that does daily deliveries, funerals, weddings, and events, and you are spending a ton of money or a ton of time and not making a lot of money on dailies.

But you spent a little time and made a ton of money on weddings or a ton of money on events, or you integrated like a la carte and your wedding revenue has gone up and it's felt really low touch. What's super amazing, I actually had, I have a coaching client in Iowa that is just, she's the sassiest little thing ever.

I just love her. And she added a la carte flowers this year. I was like, how do you think it's going? She's like, it's crushing it. She's like, this is so easy. We used to d around with all these low budget rides because they are a retail florist. And we used to just spend all this time and energy and blah, blah, blah.

And you know, we were just, were like, eh, like this is so easy. And they have booked a ton of weddings. That, you know, are kind of, anybody in the studio can kind of make them or in the shop that can make them. And it has been a huge win. But sometimes you go, okay, I'm adding X and then I look at it. Um, I've had people like, make this determination like that workshops are not profitable and they spend a ton of money and time and energy and it, their ROI.

It's just not there. But then they look at their I call, I, I always look at it like, what is your hourly wage that you, you made with this experience? So let's just say that you have a workshop that you charged $50 for. Very low, but I'm just using that as a number. And you had eight people in it, so you made $400, but you spent on product.

You spent $250, so then you net $150. Uh, then you bought the venue manager or whatever, a gift or did whatever, and so this $150 you spent. An hour going to pick up your product. Then you spent two hours going and processing and prepping it, and then you spent another hour sorting it and getting everybody's bucket and getting all the tools ready, getting your containers ready.

Then you spent an hour teaching. Then you spent, let's just say 30 minutes cleaning up. I mean, we're in deep already and this doesn't even count. The Canva graphic that you probably made to propo promote, said workshop, and the million other times that you spent time and energy posting about it, worrying about it, worrying that this isn't like something isn't working.

So analyze your time. From an ROI perspective, what are you paying yourself? Because in this situation with $150, you could have spent like 10 hours, then you're making $15 now. And honestly, I feel like most people when they do a workshop, that's what they spend is 10 hours. All right, the next one, and if you listen to the podcast ongoing.

Obviously I am a coach, but my whole business and my whole life changed. When I got a coach, I thought I fucking knew everything. I really did. I thought I have been a florist at that point for 25 years, 23 years, whatever. What could somebody teach me that I don't know? I, I know so much my lovely florist in Iowa that I just adore.

She has been a florist for a very long time, but never had really thought of a la carte flowers and how to execute it. I have the most amazing florist I've talked about her that's been a florist for 30 years, working for others. She had no idea really how to like market and, and really drive her business forward and how she should talk to people and how her emails, like all of those things.

You want to have a coach. That is a person who knows all about what you want to do. They are doing what you want to do. I love being coached by somebody who is actually in business for themself. And even more interestingly, I've never had a florist business coach. I have always hired people outside of the floral world because there's never been somebody that I like.

It was like, oh my God, I really wanna be coached by them. I have taken workshops. I've gone to flower stock, um, with Holly Chapel. I have, I've taken tons of courses. You guys, I've, I've taken Passion Flower sos I've taken I Siren Floral Co. I've taken some flower science classes. I've taken a wildflower academy.

I mean, I've, I've taken all the things to take in other people's goodness, but like when I have really invested, it's somebody who has a different mindset, who has a different way of looking at it and has a different frame of reference. From a revenue perspective, I think bigger and I often will run into a florist.

That you know, or even like somebody else in the wedding world and I'm talking to them and they're like, you know, their business is like at $50,000 or $80,000, and I'm like, my business is in the threes. I like would be sideways if my business was in those numbers. So it's perspective. I want to talk with somebody who has a $500,000 business.

Somebody who is like nailing and spending hardly any time on their 300,000 business. And it is interesting because when I've, I've coached people who have a, you know, $500,000 business and they're paying themself less than I pay myself because there's so much expenses, so much overhead, so much whatever, I still can teach them so much about.

Optimizing what's working about creating systems to make their interaction less so that they can live their life more. I don't want, I don't coach people in a way that it's just like, you just need to work fucking harder. I want you to live your life in alignment. I want you to live a life. That you can get your kids off the bus if that's what you wanna do.

You can go to CrossFit, you can go to pottery class on, on Monday. You can sleep in, like you can create space, go hard, do your wedding, great space, or go hard and have help. The right coach or mentor can shift your mindset faster than any course or free resource ever will. And I know we are in the kind of economy of free resources and I have so many free resources.

If you go to my website, four oh ceo.com, there's like a dropdown. It's full. So like if you guys want free resources. They are there and I would love to share them with you because they are very impactful, but there's nothing more impactful than putting skin in the game and spending your own money. I know when I've gotten really low cost or free things like free three day challenge or whatever, like I am, like it's free.

I'm not spending any money, so if I can't show up today, it's not a big deal. If you want. I actually, I was messaging a couple of girls in my mastermind, how is this going? Because without me riding their ass a little bit, things would move forward. You need accountability sometimes, and a course isn't gonna give you accountability.

So I, I, I coach people one-on-one. I coach people in the Mastermind. The mastermind is definitely a more economical, because we're doing it a group, but in that group, you're not only learning. From the questions you have, you're learning from the group. And to me like that is so impactful. I've been in five Masterminds myself.

I've been in a creative business owner's mastermind, and that was the closest because there was another florist in it. But it is a huge shift. Surround yourself with action takers, dreamers, and people who are stretching their thinking. It will change your life. It changed mine. The, when I started and I, I joined that Creative Business Mastermind, and then I hired her for some one-on-one, and then like I went into a different mastermind and then now I have a coach.

Like every time my revenue has grown, grown substantially, way commensurate to what I expect. It has elevated strategy, it's elevated my thinking, it's elevated what I feel I'm worth. I see what other people think that they're worth and go, why not me? All right. The next trap that I have fallen in over the years, and I actually was just moving that shit is going and getting inspired by containers and then buying them.

I'll use them someday. I'm gonna find a bride for these, and then it sits collecting dust. Then I have to move it. Then I have to figure out, God, I have so much crap, so then I have to sell it. And then my storage unit is huge. And I mean like literally we filled our barn with all this stuff that I had in storage units.

It is crazy. So make sure, I always try, which is really hard and tricky with how accent decor is with their back stock now. But I really try to. If I'm gonna buy something, I've had either several people ask for it or have pitched it several times. And I feel like it is an in inevitable, this is inevitable that I'm going to, to rent this out, or I have a client that wants this exact thing and then I'll go buy it.

So make sure you're not getting caught in the trap of, this is gorgeous and I think I'll use it someday. All right, next. Share your vision and goals with friends, family, your partner, your team, a flower bestie, the Mastermind being around people who get it, who celebrate your wins and lift you up through these hard moments.

Make all the difference. I would not be as successful as I am without my husband. He is my biggest cheerleader. Every time I tell him what I made or what I did or whatever, he always thinks it should be, should be more because he, he looks at, especially from a coaching perspective, he's like, Jen, 1700 weddings you have made.

Like whenever I talk about designing bouquets because I actually, like even this last week I was like teaching the girls in the studio how to make a spiral bouquet easier. And he was like, you have so much value because all the things that you've done wrong and learned from, like you can teach that person not to do it.

And he's my biggest cheerleader because. I've shared with him so much about how I wanna help people so much about the kind of weddings that I wanna do, the kind of business, the kind of life he knows how important like the animals are to me, and taking care of them and the children, and being creative and creating space, and all of these things.

So I have his support, but that same thing goes for my business coach. She has literally, you know, she follows me on Instagram and she has seen me going through things like, you know, sharing about like the cookies being sick or, you know, whatever is going on. And she will like, Hey, I'm just checking in on you.

Like, how are things feeling right now? How can I support you? Um, I've told her I need to be held accountable for doing certain things because I have all these big goals and. I always am putting too much spaghetti on my plate. I am a high performer. I literally always feel like I can do more and I don't have enough hours in the day.

But she actually, we had this conversation 'cause I, I can send her voice messages and I was like, I'm feeling really down on myself. I feel like I look back at when I've relaunched and did my branch shoot for the floral CEO and I looked back on when we started coaching and there's all these things that I wanted to have accomplished and I'm beating myself up right now because I haven't, and I've accomplished so much, but not like those big business goals that I really had wanted.

She just reframed it. She's like, Jen, you have maybe not accomplished some of these things at the expense of living your life, an expense of being the mother that you wanna be, being the person that you wanted to be. You've lived life. And I would rather do that all day long than hit some business goal.

So having her give me perspective and then just go, you know what, how can we make this easier? How could we simplify this so that we could accomplish one thing? And I'm the queen of micro goals. I love breaking a big project down into small, and she's like, how could we do this and make this, this more attainable community can help you feel grounded and inspired.

And I would love to invite you into my community and the floral CEO mastermind because it, even today, like I listen to the Voxer messages and it's somebody talking about this Flo meeting with their planner, but it's also talking about somebody like this wedding experience they have, which just blows my mind.

Literally these people brought three, two by four boards. And gave them to one of my florist in the group as an, so that was actually, I think that that's the craziest thing I've ever heard happening and just talking through that and then this person like getting this request for this really super cool fucking wedding at this venue and like just.

Talking through like their excitement and sending pictures and how they really want this, and I'm just like, and I, I'm so here for supporting 'em and like they're wondering how to do it. And I'm, I can tell you exactly how to do it. Like that support is invaluable and will help you get to the finish line faster.

So check it out, floral ceo.com/mastermind. These less 10 lessons they have shaped me the most after 1700 weddings. Some are really hard to learn. Others came with time, but every single one made me a better business owner and designer. I hope that this reminds you that you're not alone in the chaos and that this, this whole journey is about growth, not perfection.

If this resonated with you, please, I'd love to hear your favorite lesson that you learned. Send me a DM or take me on Instagram at the Floral CEO so we can keep this conversation going. I wanna support you. I want you to accomplish everything with as little amount of hiccups along the way. Thank you so much for listening, flower Friend, and you have an amazing flower filled day.