July 2022 Update
Welcome to our new monthly blog where you can get all the gossip on all things happening within our business here at The Flower Man!
I have been meaning to do this since we took on The Flower Man but it’s been one of those things that I have never seemed to get around to starting. So firstly, I would like to say a huge “Thank you” to Sian for getting it moving for us. Some of you may know that Sian has been working with The Flower Man for 5 years now. She started as a Saturday Assistant on our Promenade stall for Mark and then went to Leicester to complete her three year course at Addict Dance Academy. We are so pleased that she is now home and back with us and also want to wish her a huge congratulations on completing her course! You will all be seeing lots more of Sian over the coming weeks and months; she will be on our stall, in our shop, running new events, in our warehouse, running our social media and generally helping me out with lots of ‘behind the scenes’ bits and pieces which I am very excited about!
June was an extremely busy month for us! In April 2021, we took on our beautiful shop in Winchcombe and we have been filtering through jobs to transform it into our forever shop ever since. Our new signage went up at the start of June and it is amazing to finally see “The Flower Man at Winchcombe’” above the doors. We closed for just over two weeks to give it a full electrical overhaul and create a new wall to enclose our flowers in an air conditioned room, now known as “The Flower Fridge’’ in order to keep them in the best possible, fresh condition all year round. The Flower Fridge still acts as a 'pick and mix' flower area and we really want our customers to come in and browse rather than peak through the window so please come on in and have a look! Paul has created two new floristry benches in our new room for our team to work on, put up some gorgeous reclaimed wooden shelving for our flower buckets and has laid some smart new flooring in there to cover up the concrete that was there before. Our shop now has a dedicated ‘Plant’ space with a wide selection of indoor plants which will brighten up spaces in your home or make a lovely gift. With a variety of Air Purifying plants, hanging plants, Cacti and Succulents, please pop in and have a look! We have also had a really good sort through of our lovely range of gifts, homeware, cards and seeds and are excited to be adding to our range of stock in the very near future with more lovely gift ideas for our wonderful customers. It may have taken a little longer that we had hoped to get there, but buying a new business in the middle of a pandemic was never going to be plain sailing and we are so proud that we are getting there now.
Our next goal for the shop is to get Trevor, our Delivery Driver’s van re-signed and start working closely with local suppliers and crafters to stock further gift products to accompany your flower purchases, so be sure to have a look out on our Instagram highlights as new products arrive. We are also now better able to host some exciting workshops as we have more space so we have two on the cards already. These will be with Sian, who will take you through all of the essentials to make up each of these beautiful arrangements.
- Saturday 23rd July, 3.30pm - 4.30pm - Flower Crown making, which will be so much fun if you have a weekend ahead of partying or for those who have just finished the school term and want to start the holidays off with a glamorous splash of colour! You can book on here or call us on 01242 269905 to arrange your place!
- Saturday 20th August. 3.30pm - 4.40pm - Wild Meadow Hand-Tie making, which will give you the chance to learn the basic skills of making a beautiful, natural style posy for your home. You can book on here or call as above!
We really want to make our events a regular and fun part of the business, and to inspire people to get involved and creative with Floristry, so if you have any suggestions of things you would like to learn more about, please drop us a line or a call with your ideas! It has been great to finally get stuck into putting our own stamp on the shop. As many people will know, Mark previously owned a shop in Cheltenham in addition to the stalls in town, so it is great to finally have his business name above some bricks and mortar and carry on his legacy, albeit in a crazy, post pandemic world where things don’t seem to go exactly to plan or as quickly as we would like!
Talking about our stalls, there has been a slight change in this area as well. If you have been searching for our much loved High Street stall on Pittville Street you will have noticed that we sadly had to make the decision to close it in April. There is no doubt that the pandemic has had a major impact on High Streets up and down the country, and with the rising cost in flowers, and being next to a very competitive supermarket, it was no longer viable. However, it has given us opportunity to really focus on our Promenade stall, which is still going strong and continues to see many of our previous High Street stall customers, so a big thank you to those of you who stay loyal and supportive to small businesses, we genuinely do appreciate it.
Our amazing “Prom Team” have all been working hard to make tweaks and changes to what we have on offer to provide more flexibility and variety on our stand. We are lucky to work with Jodie, Rose and Bethany who you will see week in, week out, in all weathers, creating the most amazing bouquets and posies!
You may have noticed that Larysa has recently left the Prom stall, and we wish her all the luck in the world in her new role; supporting refugees from Ukraine nearer to where she lives in Bristol (she actually commuted 4 days a week to work in Cheltenham, that is dedication!) She will be making the odd appearance to help out with holidays and busy periods so we can’t wait to see her back again soon.
In other news, we have been really busy with weddings in recent weeks. This is such a great part of the job for us as we love to hear all about our Bride’s ideas and wishes for their special days and getting to see it through has been so much fun! We have lots more coming up and we couldn’t have done it without the fantastic dedication, passion and experience of Fleur, our incredibly experienced Florist, who has been working with The Flower Man and Mark for a number of years before we took it on in 2019. We have been up ladders, dangling from pillars, decorating staircases and attended so many beautiful venues across the Cotswolds and I have personally learnt so much from Fleur and her amazing knowledge and attention to detail over the last 3 years. I will be updating our website with some amazing photos of her wedding designs over the next few weeks so please keep an eye out. If you are getting married, why not pop in and have a chat with us about your floral ‘wishlist’ and see what we can do? Bookings for next year are already coming in thick and fast so don’t leave it too late!
Overall it's been a busy and hectic month with quite a few challenges with shop refurbishment and trying to run deliveries around that, but as we enter our fourth year of owning The Flower Man, we are extremely proud of what our team has achieved and how we have battled through the pandemic and come out stronger.
We are excited to keep you updated with our progress from now on but do keep us posted if there is anything you would like to know more about.
You can always call our shop where you will speak to the lovely, Fleur, Jules, Sarah or Sian, or you can email us and we will get back to you as soon as possible.
We hope you are all enjoying the heatwave! We are lucky to be able to spend a lot of time in “The Fridge Room” or the actual industrial fridge at our warehouse so hope you can all stay as cool as our lovely flowers!
Next month, we will be sharing a bit more information about or warehouse, where a lot of the stall activity takes place!
Best wishes
Lucy, Paul and The Flower Man Team.
Tel: 01242 269905
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.theflowerman.co.uk
