Dec 12, 2022
SAF Holds One-Day Event to Help Valentine’s Day Sales

Industry professionals will have the opportunity to network and learn next month at The Society of American Florists 1-Day Profit Blast in San Marcos, Texas. The event on Jan. 14, 2023, sponsored by the Bill Doran Company, will feature three educational sessions focused on helping attendees ensure a profitable Valentine’s Day, and a supplier showcase where attendees can learn about fresh products, hard goods, and services from top suppliers.

Amber Micciche, who owns Mainstreet Flower Market in Parker, Colorado, with her husband, Frencesco attended SAF’s Profit Blast in Denver, Colorado in October, where she met florists, designers and growers. She also took away lessons from educational sessions, discussed industry trends and viewed new products.

“We purchased our shop in April of this year and this was our first conference with SAF. All the presenters were entertaining, educational and filled with tips that we could apply immediately. We will definitely be attending more conferences in the future,” Micciche said.

SAF’s 1-Day Profit Blast events are held in cities throughout the country and provide retailers the opportunity to connect and learn strategies to boost profits at a regional location. The 1-Day Profit Blast in San Marcos will include:

Derek Woodruff, AIFD, CFD, CF, PFCI, owner of Floral Underground, will present a design program on producing creative arrangements with limited resources, and strategies to adjust and substitute when suppliers don’t have the required products.
Derrick Myers, CPA, PFCI, of Crockett Myers & Associates, will share ideas to create incentive programs that help motivate and retain employees.
Flower Clique management Vonda LaFever, AIFD, PFCI, and Lori Wilson, PFCI, will teach attendees how to effectively communicate, collaborate, and celebrate with both employees and customers to ensure a profitable Valentine’s Day.

Being able to see new products and learn from floral industry experts is so important to sisters Johanna Bareford and Elizabeth Call, co-owners of King William Florist in King William, Virginia, they brought the whole shop, about 10 people in all, to SAF’s 1-Day Profit Blast in Baltimore last year.

“If you want to learn, you need to do this,” says Bareford. “If you want to improve yourself and your company, you need to do this.”

Husband-wife duo Lance and Judie Hoopai’s 1-Day Profit Blast experience provided more than continuing floral education; it helped the couple get rooted in their new community. After owning a flower shop in Hawaii for several years, the Hoopais relocated to Missouri in 2018. Judie Hoopai says SAF’s 2019 Kansas City, Missouri event helped them meet other area florists.

“There were about two or three we became very good friends with,” says Judie Hoopai, co-owner of Higdon Florist & Flower Delivery in Joplin, Missouri. We’ve sent them orders and they’ve sent us orders. The camaraderie was very good.”

For more information or to register for the 1-Day Profit Blast in San Marcos click here.