“Perfect storm”: Why local Mother’s Day flowers may cost more
Originally published Sunday, April 25, 2021, for Money & Media class, Georgetown University’s School of Continuing Studies
The price of Mother’s Day flowers purchased in the DMV may be higher this year, due to a shortage of flowers in the market and high demand as in-person events begin to return.
“There’s a pent-up demand for flowers from COVID and not as many flowers were planted last year in many of the traditional growing areas,” Bob Wollam, owner of Wollam Gardens in Jeffersonton, Virginia said. “So the international market is again getting disrupted and this can only help us, local growers.”
Global flower industry
For the global flower industry, December through May is one of the busiest times of the year including, Christmas, Valentine’s Day, International Women’s Day, Administrative Day, UK Mother’s Day, Easter, and US Mother’s Day, according to Suzy Caiger, director of Sales and Marketing at Floral Express, located in Woodstock, Canada. On top of this, the demand for flowers historically increases during recessions because people send flowers for comfort, Caiger said.
As the demand for flowers began to rise beginning in December, Caiger said a “perfect storm” of market disruptions in 2020 and 2021 led to fewer flowers in the North American market. Some of these factors were a shortage in farm employees, weather stunting flower growth in South America, and farms downsizing after COVID-19. At the same time, freight prices increased due to a scarcity of international passenger planes and cargo holds being prioritized for PPE.
“A combination of a shortage of employees, shortage of plant material, just not having fields that they can cultivate because they decided to plow them in and then extreme weather all created the fact that then we had a high demand,” Caiger said.
In March of this year, the US imported $120.8 million fresh-cut flowers, a 73.27% increase from the same month in 2020, according to US Trade Numbers. The top three countries in March for fresh-cut flower imports were Columbia, Ecuador, and Canada, the website said.
Local flower industry
Owner of Danisa’s Wholesale Fresh Flowers, located in Silver Spring, Maryland, Cesar Medina said some of the growers he works with have increased their prices. Other growers who did not foresee the recent uptick in demand decided they would do farm maintenance or grow fewer crops, according to Medina.
On average, Medina said flower prices have increased about 10–20%, and noted that depends on the flower — Danisa’s distributes over 1,000 different types. The ordering process for flowers, Medina said has also become more time-sensitive and caused last-minute order prices to go up.
“The demand has picked up drastically and because of a little bit more weddings and a little bit more celebrations and stuff like that,” Medina said. “So the growers weren’t ready for that.”
For Wollam Gardens, a local Virginia flower grower, Mother’s Day is one of the biggest selling days of the year and last year sold out of flowers. This year, the farm is selling out regularly at the FRESHFARM Dupont Circle Market and has started booking weddings again, out to 2024.
The international flower market disruptions have been mostly good for local flower farmers, Wollam said. In 2020, during COVID-19’s peak, florists were still doing home deliveries and turned to local flower farmers for their flowers. According to Wollam though, the local flower trend was beginning to happen before the pandemic.
“You know, spring is the best time for us and things that we grow, like the redonkulous, anemones and Icelandic poppies are always in big demand, so we usually sell out in the spring,” Wollam said. “But we were able to not only sell out, but we were able to raise our prices slightly last year, and we’re not raising them again this year, but the demand is there.”
The high demand for flowers is on trend with industry forecasts, according to First Research’s December 2020 floral industry update. The report said US personal consumption of flowers and plants is forecasted to grow at an annual rate of 4% between 2020 and 2024. The average price of US floral arrangements is typically between $30 to $75, according to the report.
Future flower prices
The “perfect storm” of disruption will pass, but higher flower prices and more people buying flowers may be a part of the new normal, Caiger said. The industry is not going to want to drop its prices down, particularly since the flower industry experienced little growth in the last decade, Caiger said.
Despite price increases, Caiger said she foresees the high demand for flowers in the North American market continuing in the future. As for Mother’s Day, the flower prices may be higher, but customers aren’t likely to notice, Caiger said.
“I think florists, in general, will do very well, trying to ensure that the customers feel they have got good value for their money,” Caiger said. “Because I think it does come down to that visual presentation, and one of the things that Florists do extremely well is they have that skill to present a beautiful product.”
