Thread: Online florist shop

My first question is

WHY?

Why do you want to do this?

What makes this a good idea?

When I can go to proflowers.com, who spends literally millions annually doing this, how do you differentiate or add value to what they are doing already? What's your hook? So far, there's nothing unique in your brief sketch above. What is driving you to want to do this?

How much do you have available to spend to make this happen? How do you compete with someone like ProFlowers who spends millions in consumer perception advertising to get customers delivered to their florists nationally?

Start with more research, and demonstrating some industry proficiency. Do you have a floral background? What makes a flower shop successful? What can you tell us about what you have learned about the market?

1. Who are the top players, and what are they good at
2. What are they not good at (i.e. where is the market opportunity)
3. Have you talked with any florists? What have they told you?
4. What do the flower shops want you to do?

The outline of your business could be best discovered by talking with your potential clients to see what they want/need. Have you spent time researching them? What do they tell you?

Originally Posted by Xmxl

Hello All,

Am thinking of starting an online florist shop, so basically I will be talking to local florists and offer their products on my website for customers to choose and order/pay online, my competitive edge would be, having up to date designs and ensure product quality and deliver the same arrangement as what is shown online. Currently am in the brain storming and business model building. some of the questions that are coming across my mind are:
1. How can I attract florists to my idea and get their support and loyalty with future competition. what could be a good agreement regarding my sales percentage, liabilities ..etc
2. off the shelf products for my website with friendly management interface, flexibility of design and professional back end processes support like.
3. Any other ideas that would be helpful for me.

Best Regards

Amal

What country are you in? If USA I would say this idea has already been done. BUT maybe you can come up with a completely new twist on it?

Of course it has already been done. Find out what the others are doing poorly so that you can do it better. That way you can garner a competitive edge.

Originally Posted by The-J

Of course it has already been done. Find out what the others are doing poorly so that you can do it better. That way you can garner a competitive edge.

Sound like a bad idea to me. You are basically starting a dropshipping store in which you need hundreds of individual dropshippers.

You are selling a product that spoils. You are also asking local florists to take pictures of each of their arrangements that have limited shelf life.

Originally Posted by biophase

Sound like a bad idea to me. You are basically starting a dropshipping store in which you need hundreds of individual dropshippers.

You are selling a product that spoils. You are also asking local florists to take pictures of each of their arrangements that have limited shelf life.

Oh, that's not what I was thinking it would become. I was thinking it would become a service where the person enters the request on the site, the site notifies a florist that it's partnered with and hands them the order, and the florist makes the order and delivers it to the person as they would usually. Like selling sales leads or sales orders to florists. I don't know if that's a good idea, either lol that is just what I interpreted the post as

But the OP was really vague about the idea. Starting another 1-800-FLOWERS kind of thing would just be silly since they have a huge market share already.

Originally Posted by Vigilante

My first question is

WHY?

Why do you want to do this?

What makes this a good idea?

When I can go to proflowers.com, who spends literally millions annually doing this, how do you differentiate or add value to what they are doing already? What's your hook? So far, there's nothing unique in your brief sketch above. What is driving you to want to do this?

How much do you have available to spend to make this happen? How do you compete with someone like ProFlowers who spends millions in consumer perception advertising to get customers delivered to their florists nationally?

Start with more research, and demonstrating some industry proficiency. Do you have a floral background? What makes a flower shop successful? What can you tell us about what you have learned about the market?

1. Who are the top players, and what are they good at
2. What are they not good at (i.e. where is the market opportunity)
3. Have you talked with any florists? What have they told you?
4. What do the flower shops want you to do?

The outline of your business could be best discovered by talking with your potential clients to see what they want/need. Have you spent time researching them? What do they tell you?

Actually I come from Middle east Dubai, and this kind of service is kinda required in my area as we have many social occasions we would send flowers for each an every event (Marriage, engagement, new baby, promotion ..etc) and this service would be convenient for many people specially people who does not have the time to go to the shop and order, ladies in general. Websites like the one you mentioned are available, however they operate internationally and I tried them many times the arrangement that we get is not close to the one selected online and you don't get value for money I got the same feedback from many of my friends and collegues. In my country people like creative designs and care about the quality of product and are ready to pay more for the good product and the service.

Thats why I thought of creating this website which is serving the local market by providing up to date products and latest designs/deals from local florists. Online shopping was not a popular thing however its picking up in the region.

Originally Posted by PatrickP

What country are you in? If USA I would say this idea has already been done. BUT maybe you can come up with a completely new twist on it?

Good question I come from UAE please check my reply to Vigilante

Originally Posted by biophase

Sound like a bad idea to me. You are basically starting a dropshipping store in which you need hundreds of individual dropshippers.

You are selling a product that spoils. You are also asking local florists to take pictures of each of their arrangements that have limited shelf life.

Please check my reply to Vigilante , All the local florists have their own shipping services, the arrangements are done after placing an order The florists will not take pictures for all of there designs cause that would be too much. the customer will be given the choice to select a florist and buy from their products there would be around 10 unique designs per florist to start with the designs should be suitable for a variety of occasions and will increase gradually based on demand, so basically I will be providing the local florists the opportunity to expand their sales by having an online outlet and convenience for people to place the order and pay without having to visit the store. Cause this is the most common way people are currently ordering flowers and not through online websites.

Originally Posted by Xmxl

Good question I come from UAE please check my reply to Vigilante

Yea baby! I didn't assume you were from the USA so I thought HEY you may have a GREAT idea!

Do you know of 1-800-Flowers? Do that have something like that in UAE?