Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Are you ready to grow your floral business not only in profits but in creativity and fulfillment? Listen as Jeni Becht a wedding and event designer of over 25 years shares all the juicy details of growing and evolving her floral business into one of passion, purpose, and financial freedom. She shares all the secrets with actionable tips and strategies so you can wake up inspired and on a path to profitability while feeling lighter and more aligned in work and life. Join Jeni in building your business while ditching the overwhelm, avoiding burnout, and feeling fulfilled in work and life.
📍
Hello flower friends, this is Jen and you are listening to the Floral Hustle Podcast on this week's Minnesota. We're going to be talking about like, should you add an additional revenue stream? I often hear, because there are of course are lots of ways that you can make money as a florist and when you see on Instagram or when you see on Pinterest or you see, you know, wherever.
that is influencing you, whether that be educators, whether that be, uh, you know, another florist that, that you're looking at what they're doing. And you're like, maybe I should add that too. And a lot of times I think the traditional ways that revenue sources show up for a florist is of course, you know, doing everyday deliveries and then doing weddings and then doing funerals.
And then doing, uh, corporate and then doing, so it just kind of keeps this subset of a million things that you could be doing. And I know often it looks easy to be like, I want to increase my revenue, so I'm going to just start doing more. And. That is a strategy. It's not a great strategy, but it is a strategy to just keep throwing whatever against the wall to see if something sticks.
But if you want to make seriously impactful revenue, it is my suggestion that you master something before you move on. And the reason why is because You don't know if you really have reached your potential on something. You don't know if, if this is providing a great service. You don't know if what you're doing is truly top notch unless you've gotten to a point where you can actually step back and look at something and be like, this is successful.
And when you can do that, you know that you are a master of your craft. You know that you If you get referred for it, you can really feel good about this and, and I have done that with weddings. Like I have done that for quite some time with weddings and now I have perfected because I perfected doing weddings.
Then I added, uh, doing cultural weddings and perfected that and keep perfecting that because obviously. The size of weddings grows, the complexity, the new designs, all those things. But I have then added a la carte weddings. And so that is an additional revenue stream. Each time I added one of those things, they were still in my subset niche of doing weddings, but I kind of mastered the ability to do a traditional wedding.
So then, um, I, I actually for about, I think, uh, 15 years ago, I did my first cultural wedding. And then from there, you know, I kind of dabbled into it until about seven years ago when I went really all in on, on doing cultural weddings and working with somebody. And now I do. You know, 30 ish a year, which is not a little number, but about five years ago, I added a la carte flowers.
And, uh, this year without me really heavily marketing and with me having the volume of full service that I do. I think I had about, I think it was 27, 800 or something like that in a la carte revenue. And that's only, you know, a small part. But it also was a conduit for me to be able to help, um, referrals.
It was something for me to obviously talk about on social media. It was something that really is just additional because normally those people would, that didn't qualify for my minimum. I wouldn't have probably had access to them anyway. So. It's basically just an extra whatever in your business. And to me, that is one of the like, most seamless things to add when you were trying to explain, expand your revenue sources, because you're already making bouquets, doing all those things, but making sure that you have a system set up and.
That's one thing that I work with a lot of coaching clients about. Like they want to set up an a la carte flowers. I have seen an a la carte flowers, you know, florist kind of crushing it. I've talked them, um, before and then heard them on podcasts and they like do 20, 20 a la carte weddings in a weekend.
Can you imagine that? And that is something that I mean, I don't really strive to do 20 a la carte weddings in a weekend, but if I was a shop that I had a full team, uh, that really was like, let's dive in and do that. Like that would probably be a great revenue source. But let's just say that you're setting your goals and you're like, okay, I want.
And to maybe do, you know, I want to add a la carte flowers and I want to maybe do five of these this year. And I'd like them to be an average of X. Well that's a great start. You know, like get your program in place, then go and market it. And then. At the end of the year, which is what I'm doing now, you reflect.
Like, how much did I actually do? Did I like how that felt? Would it be worth putting more of an effort behind this? Do I feel like anything was left behind with this new investment of time? So, like, as long as you implement something and then reflect on it, like, that to me is a good experiment. For one year, You can try anything, but if it's something that's not in alignment, if you feel like, well, I feel like I got less full service clients because they didn't want to get to my minimum because I had this conduit in place.
If you feel that's true, like then get rid of it. But experimenting with revenue sources is a way for you to be able to grow. And experiment with what feels good. Like, I think a la carte weddings feel good to me. Like, I think that they are easy. I get sometimes the best pictures from them because they maybe invested more in a photographer or, like, their photographer just, like, their experience was so much more intimate so they just had a good experience.
More, um, you know, of these intimate close photos. Like it is a way to also get your name out there to more people. So if you are. Frankly, being the florist for more weddings, your name is potentially out there more on social media, your brand, you're getting tagged, like, especially if you have a process set up to really help that person, you know, crush, like, Hey, you know, I, I'm so excited to be part of your day and I would love to set, you know, share your images.
On social media. So if you would mind sharing, sharing them, I would love to, cause I just thought your bouquet was so beautiful or whatever. So like, it's so much more opportunity. Hopefully the photographer is tagging you and it's really like, if you have a, a three or 4, 000 minimum and you wouldn't mind doing a thousand dollar wedding, like it's pretty easy to me and it's additional revenue that I wouldn't have had.
And that often is super fun for me. Because it's not a wedding that I traditionally would have done. Um, and, you know, To me, it's pretty easy because if for some reason is smaller, my wholesalers are not that far away. I can usually add it onto a current wedding order anyways. And they're usually fun because I'm choosing the blooms.
I'm choosing everything. So consider adding a la carte in 2025, because I know that it has serious potential and I personally, especially now that I've expanded, so that's The next revenue source I want to talk about is the luxury silk rentals. That is a new revenue stream for me in, uh, 2024. And I kind of launched it, soft launched it.
I have not fully launched it and had 8, 500 of revenue. And actually if I add this week's Um, somebody did an engagement and they picked up four of my, uh, low aisle pieces. And so actually, so we ended up at 89. And that to me, like is only going to get bigger once I start marketing, once I officially launch it with my rental site.
So what can you do with those clients? If you, if they're renting. Things they normally traditionally are going to get real flowers for their bouquets Or their personal flowers. I mean obviously some people rent them, but I'm not going to be in the business of renting bridal bouquets That's doesn't sound like fun to me, but this is an opportunity for you to get in Front of people who not only would be renting all of these things, but then you could add on a la carte flowers very easily So if you're not familiar with what I'm talking about with the luxury silk arch rentals, um, I took a course from Blue Blossom Academy, from Jacqueline at Blue Blossom Academy, and I, I went all in.
Like, I have these beautiful arches, I've, Fully implemented, um, you know, making them, I've made centerpieces. I've made all these fun things to rent out on this rinse and repeat. Uh, I've used them for marketing. I've put them at a bridal shop on a big trunk show weekend. I've used them, used them in a styled shoot.
I have used them for a open house. I have used them for a. Like wedding vendor, um, luncheon kind of thing. So there are so many opportunities, not only from a marketing standpoint to use these, but to get your name out there and not have to go spend a bunch of money. It's just your time to drop something off for an open house.
That's a great opportunity. So with adding this revenue stream, I am going into 2025. Bye. Fully committed to like, this is going to be impactful revenue in 2025. And I think it's always great to forecast like what you'd like to make in every bucket, because if you don't track it, you don't know. So going into 2025, I want to have, I would say 45, 000 was what I was shooting for in revenue from the Silk Road.
And I don't think that that's going to be very hard to do. Uh, I'm not like going, hey, I want this to be all of my revenue, but I do want it to be impactful and I'm excited to see what it does. Then another one that's circulating a lot is doing hotels. And I actually had, um, Francesca, the hotel florist on the podcast.
And, um, And it is sexy to say that you're going to be home every weekend and I totally get that. But if this is something that you are toying with, I would love for you have to have mastered whatever being a wedding florist, being whatever you're, you're mainly diving into. I often will see coaching clients and that's the same thing with the.
With the blue blossom academy, which if you guys look in the show notes, I actually, if you want to look at it, I do have a code using my code hustle. We'll get you a free, like it's a 2, 500 course. You guys, a free 2, 500 course. Um, using my coupon code when you buy the full masterclass and then you get a free hour of coaching of how to integrate this in your business with me.
Um, it is. Something that I knew I had perfected my wedding flowers, my a la carte, my cultural, so all my things had really been optimized. So that's why I felt comfortable adding. If doing hotels or doing corporate, whatever sounds sexy to you, just look at like, have I really optimized what I'm doing right now?
And maybe I could experiment with doing corporate. An experiment to me is like, you're going to go find one or two hotels. And try and just see how that feels. How does it feel doing flowers every week? Are you stressed out? Does it feel good? What inevitably is happening from week to week from a revenue standpoint?
Like is it worth your time that you're in putting all of those things? Like I always feel like testing something is your greatest service to yourself because I have seen people all of a sudden go like, I'm going to totally do this. And then it didn't feel good. Or This was a lot of work for that amount of money.
So just take a step back and really look at like, how do you want your 2025 to feel? If you perfected weddings, if you perfected a la carte, if you did this, if you did that, like all of those things should feel good at the same time. And, uh, If you are really struggling with like going, I don't know what I should be doing.
Like I'm doing power hour, one hour coaching sessions, um, for anybody who wants to really make sure that their business plan going into this year is, is going to hopefully get the momentum that they want. And then if you're looking for ongoing support, we have a spot in the floral CEO mastermind. And this group is.
So good you guys and I Invite you in because I absolutely love it that like coaching This group is so fun to me and you can learn more at going to thefloralhustle. com forward slash mastermind Thank you so much for listening flower friend It's almost the end of the year and I want big things for you in 2025 So take this time reflect build a strategy and go into 2025 kicking ass and taking names Thanks so much for listening, Flower Friend, and you have an amazing 📍 flower filled week.