How 1-800-Flowers.com became one of the biggest, clunkiest names in Valentine’s Day gifts
... 1-800-Flowers.com has become a gifting-industry giant, selling around 20 million gifts every year. You can send someone a massive teddy bear, personalized keepsakes, and even jewelry. In fact, flowers aren’t even the real cash cow of 1-800-Flowers.com: While 40% of the company’s 2019 revenue came from consumer floral, 52% came from gourmet food and gift baskets, and 8% came from BloomNet, an in-house network of 5,000 to 6,000 florists who help with design and local sourcing. Seventy-five percent of their flowers come through florists, but the rest originate from farms in places like Colombia, Ecuador, and California.
“What we realized was that customers were coming to us to buy flowers because they really need to send an expression and connect with someone and build a relationship with someone,” Chris McCann said in a phone interview. “We realized flowers satisfied some of those needs, but what else do people use? That’s what moved us down the road of becoming a gourmet food company.”
read more (vox)
... 1-800-Flowers.com has become a gifting-industry giant, selling around 20 million gifts every year. You can send someone a massive teddy bear, personalized keepsakes, and even jewelry. In fact, flowers aren’t even the real cash cow of 1-800-Flowers.com: While 40% of the company’s 2019 revenue came from consumer floral, 52% came from gourmet food and gift baskets, and 8% came from BloomNet, an in-house network of 5,000 to 6,000 florists who help with design and local sourcing. Seventy-five percent of their flowers come through florists, but the rest originate from farms in places like Colombia, Ecuador, and California.
“What we realized was that customers were coming to us to buy flowers because they really need to send an expression and connect with someone and build a relationship with someone,” Chris McCann said in a phone interview. “We realized flowers satisfied some of those needs, but what else do people use? That’s what moved us down the road of becoming a gourmet food company.”
read more (vox)
