Here is the podcast replay, video, and show notes:

FLOWER QUESTIONS

• • Shelley/Dave - can you guys select a few pretty flowers to show off?

     

     

     

    • New Flower 411 update from Mayesh’s purchasing department: https://www.mayesh.com/flower-411-march-2019/ 

• Jen & Jesse: Trends for the new year

   

   

   

  • • Pampas grass ceremony circles, bleached & preserved fillers & foliages, earth tone dyed flowers.    

   

  • • Dried trends, boho weddings, Joshua tree look, seeing a lot more color, tropical

   

  • Tropical theme

• • Yazmine Cortez, 1/15, FB: What’s a good dusty blush rose??

     

     

     

    • • https://info.mayesh.com/rose-guide
        There are quite a few varieties in varying gradients of blush to light pink. Some of my faves In standard roses are: Esther, Nena, Jessika, Faith, Pink Mondial & Sweet Akito,  In garden roses it’s Keira, Pink O'hara, Charity, Tsumugi & Wedding Spirit, and In spray roses Star blush, Sweet Sensation & Royal Porcellina.

     

    • Shelley: I really love Madre la Perla and Sweet Escimo 

• • Sharlet Driggs, 1/15, FB: Which months will be best for anemones?

     

     

     

    • Anemones are grown all over the world and are readily available most of the year with the exception of July & August when production dips very low. A great sub is micro gerberas. 

• • Penny Stone, 1/15, FB: White king protea. Fabulous blooms!! Terribly expensive wholesale! Alternative??

     

     

     

    • • There is nothing on earth as cool as a white king protea and subbing for these is difficult. When in season, white kale makes a great sub... but it isn’t available year round either. We are starting to import many bleached flowers and foliages from Holland and one of these might make a great impression as an alternative. Some of the bleached white products offered now are ferns, palm leaves, poppy pods, amaranthus & fillers like eryngium, gyp, misty & riceflower.

     

    • From Shelley: you could always use a queen protea and tint it white with design master spray or any of the white proteas like owl or white mink or white knight. The other option is to use a silk or artificial stem. Sometimes these can be just as expensive but if you have to have it..especially when they are out of season..this is a good choice.  

• • Jill Mohn, 1/15, FB: I have a bride this summer looking at a showy piece using Monstera leaves but they are expensive. Can you suggest an alternative?

     

     

     

    • Large aralia leaf is inexpensive but much smaller in size. Birds of Paradise leaves have a taller linear look. Hala leaf is another tall linear foliage. We import these greens from places like Costa Rica & Hawaii. So, unless you have a secret local source for Monstera leaves, there are lots of freight costs involved in shipping. Another option would be to invest in artificial Monstera leaves that can be reused. 

• • Kirsten Gordon, 1/16, Email: A question I would like to talk about is what flowers that can be obtained in America are good choices for spring summer and fall weddings and if we chose two or three focus flowers how we would mix these with more commonly known flowers like hydrangeas or roses. In other words, how do we best play up the stars of each season?

     

     

     

    • Talk to us, we're always excited to tell you what’s hot in our cooler! There are so many options its mind boggling and impossible to list everything here… the best advice is to check out our 12-month flower availability list http://info.mayesh.com/flower-guide-offer and try to plan around what we have listed. My disclaimer is always to double check with your sales rep closer to your event in case there are any problems with the production of a particular item.  

• Kirsten Gordon, 1/16, Email: Another question I would like to hear about is for you to talk about the different types of garlands that you make and different options. I have a lot of brides asking about using greenery because they either want that look or they perceive that it is cheaper than using flowers. Need to go past the basic eucalyptus.

   

   

   

  • Garlands are a fantastic way to make a statement for any event BUT they are extremely labor intensive and even with the most frugal selection of foliage are still not “cheap”. To cut cost, start with something big & bulky yet affordable like lemon leaf or silver dollar euc. You can add bits of textural interest later with more expensive greens.  I can tell you from experience that hand wiring garlands can be a lesson in humility. If they aren’t fabricated correctly they will fail and gap in sections. They are extremely difficult to repair at a moment's notice during installation. Having Mayesh manufacture you garlands by our experienced garland machine operators will provide a super strong, reliable base.  

• Monica, 1/16, email: How is the floral industry evolving and working to keep up with the standards of improved environmental and health impact through our products? (Supplies and cut flowers). In other words, what changes are being made to reduce the health risks of working with commercially grown/cut flowers and the supplies like foam, etc?

   

   

   

  • • There have been many positive strides in the global floral community over the past 30 years to improve agricultural sustainability. At Mayesh we do our part by purchasing from Veriflora, Florverde & Rainforest Alliance Certified farms. These farms follow strict guidelines for sustainable agriculture production. Some of these practices include biological pest controls, composting, water reclamation, safe storage and handling of agricultural chemicals, proper land management that supports healthy regional habitat. Sustainability also ensures growers adhere to fair labor practices for their employees providing better wages, a safer workplace, and resources like medical and daycare.

   

  • I try to teach my floral design students to use chicken wire instead of floral foam as much as possible. I am a big advocate of going green in this industry and having as small a carbon footprint as possible. Composting, using recyclable containers and supplies are ways that you can help. Always recycle plastic and cardboard.

FLOWER CARE

• • Jeanette: What if any are your thoughts on Oasis solution 360, where no cutting the stems when processing is directed?

     

     

     

    • From Shelley: We use this here at our location and it works very well. We have been using it for over a year and have not had any issues with product in general. There are a few flowers that we still cut just to be on the safe side because they are delicate ( astilbe for example) But over all we love it. It’s also great because we can re-use the water several times and it can also be reactivated.   

• • Is Chocolate cosmos edible?

     

     

     

    • As good as chocolate cosmos smell, it is still not advisable to eat them. According to Gardeners World magazine, they have no measurable toxicity. However, most commercial flower farms use some form of pesticide during production, SO, If it is not USDA certified for human consumption… please don't eat them! We do carry USDA certified organic edible flowers, please contact a Mayesh rep for their availability. 

• • Kelley: I would love to know the typical lifespan on Dusty Miller and how to keep it looking great in bouquets and arrangements. I feel like mine gets droopy so quickly and its very finicky.

     

     

     

    • In Phoenix, we import our Dusty miller from an Ecuadorian grower almost all year round. It has a remarkably long vase life, up to a week or more. Of course, these commercially grown varieties are selected for their strong traits and last longer than if they are foraged from your garden. In my experience, the lacier leaf varieties tend to be a little more fragile than rounded leaf varieties. When hydrating dusty miller, make sure to avoid submerging their short stems too deep or dripping water on the tops of the leaves. Their fuzzy surface tends to hold moisture that can activate botrytis spores on the leaves and cause bacteria to form in the water quickly. Using the recommended dose of flower food, recutting stems & changing the water frequently ensures they stay hydrated and firmed up. 

• Winnie, 1/16, email: I would like to know how do you keep Dusty Miller fresh and how do you revive it and make sure it looks good the day of the wedding. Appreciate the help.

   

   

   

  • Dusty miller has tiny little hairy filaments all over the stems and leaves called trichomes. These hairs act as a deterrent for frost damage, insects attack and lessen dehydration from transpiration. But their fur coats can become breeding grounds for stem clogging bacteria while submerged during the hydration process. Try gently scraping these off of the part of the stems that will be submerged. Hydrate them in a shallow level of fresh solution instead of a deep plunge. Recut stems and replace the solution every day or two.

FLOWER BUSINESS

• Linda Sims, 1/15, FB: How do you handle Brides who say they have their own materials for their flowers but wants you to design them?

   

   

   

  • • From Shelley: Well it depends on what they are talking about. A few blooms from their garden? That may be sentimental to them but address the fact that they may wilt. They have their own containers? Make sure they are waterproof and you are contractually, clearly not responsible for them.

   

  • If they have all of their own flowers ( why aren’t they getting the flowers from you btw?) their best friends dad’s in the wholesale business, yada yada...charge a substantial design fee and charge for everything you do including delivery and installation, mileage, van, rentals, extra designers or gas etc..You are not doing them a favor...it’s your business and you don’t want to pay for their wedding.

TRANSCRIPT

- Hi everyone, welcome to our March 19 Mornings with Mayesh show. I am Yvonne Ashton, the director of marketing here at Mayesh and I am here today with Shelley Anders and Dave Tagge to answer your flower questions. Love doing this show, I get to meet people as I travel and just meet everyone that does watch the show. So I just wanted to thank you. Gonna give everyone a couple of minutes to come on in. And just say hello and where you're from. That would be great, hi guys and hi Penny. Penny is one of our viewers that joins us pretty much every single time so we appreciate people like Penny, thank you. Good morning, Tanya, while people are coming in and saying good morning I just wanted to mention that we have Desi in our control room. Good morning Desi, she's gonna be posting our links for us and just kind of helping us stay all organized. And hopefully this show goes smoothly. Speaking of, I do wanna bring up that it is raining today here in sunny South Florida and my electricity has been flickering. It's done it three times, it hasn't officially gone out so if the show does happen to go down, I promise I will be on as soon as the electricity goes back. But because the account is through me, there is a possibility that the whole show will stop. So if that happens I promise we will be back on as quickly as my electricity goes back on, which'll hopefully be immediately. Okay so that's out of the way. So keep on saying good morning, hi Herman. Good morning Jamie from Portland, Leah from Memphis, good morning guys. I have another Jamie from, hold on it just moved, Adrian, Michigan and we have Jennifer Bleakley, she's saying good morning Yvonne and crew. Again she's one of our lovely people that is with us every single Mornings with Mayesh. Thank you so much, so keep on, Lucy from the UK, hey Lucy! I love it when people are coming in and watching from all different parts of the world. That's just amazing to me, love social media because of that. So as we are going through the show if you have any questions while we're talking, we will try our best to answer them. You go ahead and post them in the comments below and also while we're at it if you can, while we're watching, just on our Facebook page say that you wanna be notified anytime we go live, that would be awesome as well. I think there's a little bell, or something you can say I wanna be notified. And that way you'll never miss a show when we go live if you're on Facebook. Alright guys, I also wanted to let you know that today's show is brought to you by our Mayesh Design Star Flower Workshop Tour, yay! We have three dates left for 2019. We have a date coming up in May, May 20 and 21, after Mother's Day. It's an all levels class in Nashville. We'll be hitting up Austin in August with the masterclass. And in November we will be finishing up in Columbus, Ohio with an all levels class. I do wanna make mention that my website is on word press and it recently had a big change on the back end of things and it kinda broke a few things. One of those things is being our ticket sales. So you might go on and try and buy a ticket and it is broken right now, I am working on getting that fixed hopefully in the next couple of days. But I have to rely on outside resources to get that done. I am very very sorry that this is happening. It's very frustrating and as soon as it is fixed and ready to go I will definitely let you guys know. I'll let the world know, I promise. But we will share the link so that way you can check that out. We have Jennifer from Chicago, good morning. Penny said she shared it, thank you Penny for sharing our video, love it. I also wanted to talk quickly about Quito. We had a workshop there, not last week but the week before my team was there, Shelley came with us, we had Holly, Sue, and Veronica too, amazing designers who did a workshop. We did a farm tour and we also went to old town Quito and we played tourists for a little bit. But anyhow it was truly magical. I knew it would be, right, how could it not be. But honestly so many things could have gone wrong because we were importing a lot of things into Ecuador for the show, a lot of our supplies and some flowers from Holland. We obviously had beautiful roses and summer flowers from the Ecuadorian area. But it just turned out to be magical. The people were amazing, the Hacienda Cusin, if you just wanna vacation, Hacienda Cusin is freaking amazing, the food was awesome, the rooms are so cute, we had fireplaces. They're not fancy rooms by any means. But they're comfortable and cozy and just the people and the atmosphere is just to die for so check them out. Even if you don't wanna come with me at a workshop. That's okay, but definitely check out Hacienda Cusin. And wait until you see the images that I get from Nicole. We posted some for Instagram, but I'm a big believer in the pros. So we brought Nicole Cleary to take photos. We brought Logan from Tailwind Visuals to do the story telling video piece of it. So when those things come out, you guys are gonna die, gonna absolutely die. So anyhow, I'm bringing this up because it did sell out and I think we're gonna continue to do this. We have two more years we're already starting to plan right now, so hopefully in the next little bit I will have more details for 2020. Can you believe we're talking about 2020? It's going to be, I think, a very popular destination and I'm pretty sure that it'll sell out very very quickly. Not to mention many of the people that went to Quito want to do this next trip with us. And they definitely have the inside scoop 'cause they got to hang out with me and my team for a whole entire week. We definitely had a lot of bonding and talking about the next trip that we're going to be planning. So if you wanna go, you will need to be on a wait list 'cause we are gonna send out the official details to our students, our past students and then we'll send it out to the wait list. And then I will send it out to the world. Again we'll probably only have like 20 to 24 spots. And you don't wanna miss it 'cause it will be amazing if you're able to go. Penny says I'm doing another show at a Hacienda here. Oh very cool, yep so fun, I love it. Okay also I wanna make sure that you mark your guys' calendars for our next shows. So April 2nd, I have my special guest Alison Ellis. She's gonna be on with me talking about pricing. She has a bunch of questions from her last live price talk that she did which was really cool. So she's gonna talk about those questions that she didn't get to and then answer your guys' questions as well. So I'll send something out specifically for her to get your guys' questions. But if you guys do have questions in the comments, maybe just write Alison so that way I know you want her to answer those questions, cool? Alright and then also mark your calendars for April 16th, that will be our regular scheduled show with Dave and Shelley. Alright guys, so let me bring on Dave and Shelley. And we will get started, hi Dave, hi Shelley.

- Good morning Yvonne, how are you?

- I am good, thank you, I'm good because my electricity's still on so that makes me happy. Yes and Shelley I couldn't hear you just that second. Nope I can't hear you, I know! Wait, for some reason, I don't know. We have issues with Shelley's things. Nope, I can't hear you, so maybe, sorry guys, maybe do a refresh, I don't know. I'm not sure what to do about this. We always have technical difficulties. Alright so she's gonna figure that out. While Shelley is figuring that out, guys, we are going to have Dave show you some pretty flowers. So Dave what did you bring today to show us?

- Yeah I brought a few things. Pieris is just starting in Oregon and consequently it's also happening in Holland. So this is the Dutch, if I can get it out of the bucket here. And it's looking pretty amazing right now.

- Can you hear me, okay.

- Oh hey Shelley.

- Hi, sorry.

- We couldn't hear you yet. No it's all good, so this is the Dutch Pieris. It's in gorgeous, full blooms. Oregon is, like I just said, just starting so we got a little bit of pink in this week. And that is gonna be hot right now. So grab it while it's here.

- Yeah people go crazy over the pieris when it starts.

- So pretty.

- Yeah, it's too bad it's not available year round. Here's an oddity that we're getting from South America. This is Chilean grown snow berry and it is gorgeous right now.

- Wow that's beautiful.

- So thank you South America for growing some of this novelty stuff for us. We're gonna talk about anemones during the show today, but these caught my eye this morning. These are some doubles that are California grown and they're just amazing, all those petals in there.

- Those are so cool, I don't think I've ever seen double anemones.

- Those are from our local guy here near Carlsbad.

- Very cool.

- Well thank you Shelley.

- We decided to share.

- I like to know the origin of my stuff, too which is cool, here's some Japanese astilbe and this is died and I am told that they actually inject the die into the soil and that the plant takes the die through the roots. For whatever reason it does not die the foliage, just the bloom heads but isn't that a cool navy blue color?

- Yeah.

- Very cool.

- So many died flowers now and you know, a few years ago I was so not into them and it's kinda hard to not fall in love with this little trend that's going on.

- They're fun.

- Last but not least, tulips, it's spring. The Dutch grow a whole bunch of really cool stuff. This one has been in our cooler the last few weeks and although it is extremely pricey, it's moving very well, this is called Leo.

- So cool.

- It's a fringe, but it's a fringe on steroids. I don't know if you can actually see how crazy cool that is.

- They look like flames.

- Yeah, they do exactly look like flames. They're just so vibrant and pretty. So many tulips right now guys. They're popping in Holland so get 'em while they're hot. That's all I got today.

- Thanks Dave.

- So pretty, well it is spring and it's daffodil season, so one of my favorite times of the year so I've got some daffodils to show you guys. This is a very beautiful variety, if you can see that, it has a white with the pink center. Really pretty novelty daffodil, great for wedding work. I'm sorry, I think this is, I forgot the name of it. It's not Johann Strauss 'cause that one's the orange. But I'll find out the name of it.

- I wanna say pink perfection.

- Oh pink charm maybe.

- Pink charm, okay.

- Thank you Lisa, here's standard, beautiful garden variety daffodils. Ours are so luscious right now. And the doubles, the double bloom ones, they're so pretty.

- Oh I love it.

- And then there's the narcissist style varieties of the little mini ones, see those.

- So cute!

- They're cuteand then the white which normally we see around the Christmas time. The paper whites, they're forced, but really pretty for spring, I love them. Because it's spring, I thought I'd showcase some classic spring flowers, these are forget-me-nots. Beautiful, pretty blue, everyone's favorite lily of the valley, so beautiful. That's my birth flower by the way.

- I love it.

- We've been showing a lot of the died sweet peas, but just the classic, beautiful, regular sweet peas. These are also Japanese, we haven't got a lot of local ones yet but they're just so precious. And so pretty for this time of year. And then this locally grown pennycress. So when you get this from Holland it's quite expensive. But here we're getting it in right now and it's very pretty and it kinda will bloom out little white flowers. This is a nice filler to use. It's not really a greenery, it's a flower or sort of a cross between I guess. Very pretty and then one dramatic thing to show you. We have some really beautiful giant nerine clooney ranunculus, they're so dark I don't know if you can see them on the screen.

- Yeah I can see them.

- Gorgeous.

- Yep looks good.

- So it's that time of year for gorgeous ranunculus, anenomes, spring flowers, daffodils, tulips and all those fun things. We're really excited for all the stuff coming in right now.

- Thanks Shelley.

- You're welcome.

- And we just recently published a New Flower 411 so if you want updates directly from our Mayesh purchasing department, they know what's going on in the world of flowers 'cause that's their job and they're good at it so check that out. We'll post a link for that so you guys can go and see our March Flower 411. Now it's time for our first question. Comes from Jen and Jesse and I feel like we can talk about this next couple of shows, but I wanted to see what you guys are seeing in terms of trends for the new year. And even Shelley before you talk about what you're seeing, I'd also love for everyone else as well to let us know what you guys are seeing in your neck of the woods as well because while there's, I feel like, some national things going on, there's always different things happening in everyone's different regions. So Dave, Shelley, what are you guys seeing right now?

- Yeah, pampas grass ceremony circles seem to be all over IG right now. As well as the bleached and preserved foliages and fillers. So those things are everywhere. I know we've been featuring these at all of our locations but the earth tone dyed brownies. These are the anemones but we've got tulips and a bunch of other stuff that they're dying right now have just really blown up as far as the trend. And like I said, dyed flowers, who knew, but here they are.

- Yeah the dried trend is really big here in California. The boho wedding look here, the Joshua tree look, all the textures and fillers and things that you see with drieds have been still going strong. And this year it's been, I think, the epic of that with the drieds. California tends to set the trends for the rest of the United States so you may not see that progressing over the country until maybe next year but they're going strong here. I also am seeing a lot more color. I know when we were in Quito at the workshop, Sue and Holly did vibrant colors, you know this year coral's the Pantone color of the year, but I really felt like they did a really great job showcasing that and I think people are gonna start moving away from so much nude and natural. I mean that's still gonna always be popular and probably the most requested for brides. But once you start seeing that color hit this year, you'll see it next year in trends even bigger. I think people are getting tired of seeing the same palette all the time. So citrusy bride, tropical, fruity tones. And tropical foliage is used more, a mixture of exotic and tropical flowers with standard garden style flowers too, that sort of tropical Hawaiian sort of feel will kind of come on as well. So those are the things we're seeing here.

- Yeah and I definitely wanna second the tropical theme. I'm seeing it showing up even in design of interiors and things like that. Monstera wallpapers and pillows and things like that. And then I just saw on a Facebook group a groom walking down the aisle in a tropical printed suit. So that's a lot for me, but you know, there are brides and grooms out there that love it, take it to that level.

- I think people are looking for just out of the box ideas now, I mean, we've been so aesthetically tasteful and beautiful for so long, I think people want to see kinda shocking things or brighter colors or things that they just don't fit the wedding mold anymore. You know we see that with Birch Floral doing some crazy colors and things and I think that's gonna hit in the next two years. We're gonna kinda move away from this pretty aesthetic.

- Yeah, and we have a big designer that comes down to the Miami area. He's from New York and he's been here for a couple weeks now and he did a huge event and my husband went foraging for him and just got a bunch of dead palm fronds and just--

- Weird, yep.

- Yep and he used that and it looked freaking amazing so yeah the tropical, kinda big patterns, the bright colors and strong lines is definitely a thing now so definitely look out for that.

- Yeah we have a lot of people asking us to dry palm and palmetto fronds right now. It's pretty interesting.

- And luckily around here they're pretty easy to find 'cause they're just dropped dead all over your yard. So you just gotta cut them down. Very cool, so Jen and Jesse, I love that question. It's definitely one of my favorite questions for the show and with that, if you want a mug, make sure you send me your, yep thanks Dave. If you want that mug, that super cute Mornings with Mayesh mug, shoot me over your address and we'll send you one, so thanks Jen and Jesse! Okay our next question comes from Yazmine. She says what's a good dusty blush rose, guys?

- There are quite a few varieties in varying gradients of blush to light pink. I'll list a few of my favorites and then Shelley you can kick in. There's Esther, Nena, Jessika, Faith, Pink Mondial and Sweet Akito, those are all standard roses. In garden roses Keira, Pink O'hara, White O'hara, Charity, Tsumugi, and Wedding Spirit are some of the really nice blushy, kinda dusty pink tones. In spray roses, you're a little bit more limited. There's Star Blush, Sweet Sensation, and a new one we've been carrying here. It's not really a new variety, but new for our market is Royal Porcelina which is really pretty light blushy pink.

- Yeah for dusty rose is a hard one too 'cause it's not always a lighter pink. It's kind of a mid tone pink so you can think of like a geraldine or a romantic antique. There's also modular perla, I like those, sweet eskimo, so it's, and there's one that we saw when we were down at Greenrose, I don't know if it was hot carpe diem or, I can't remember the name of it. I'll look it up and put it on our list, but I thought wow that's a good dusty blush or dusty rose 'cause dusty rose can be kind of hard. It needs, I think that's what the designer's asking. Sometimes it's a little hard to find that good mid tone pink that's not Barbie pink, not pastel pink, not baby pink. But those are some of my favorites.

- You can look on your handy Greenrose

- Oh yeah I have that.

- Card thing which I really think this is cool, guys. Do you see this, so this is from, we did go visit Greenrose which was amazing by the way. You guys really missed out, but they gave everyone these, they're like paint chips but with roses on them so it was pretty cool. So we can check that out for you while we're talking. I wouldn't know what to look for so I'll let Shelley do that. It would take me probably forever to figure it out. Let's see Penny, I just wanted to put this up here. Penny Stone there's a lisianthus that's spot on for a dusty rose color.

- Yeah there is.

- Do you know the name of that by any chance?

- I know the name of that variety, but it is like a true, dusty rose kinda can be, some people will call dusty rose mauve too. Mauve, dusty rose kinda have the, mauve has a little more purple undertone. Dusty rose is a little more red undertone. But yeah, there is mhmm. It's an elusive color.

- And then of course, hi Brad! Brad just was celebrating his birthday, so happy birthday Bradley!

- Hi Bradley.

- And if you guys don't know he's from Design Master and he Just for Flowers can help shift and blend when you're in a pinch, shameless plug. I like shameless plugs though, it's all good. I mean that's why you're up here, thank you Brad. Thank for tuning in, too. Tanya says, how do I get one? You want one of these bad boys I'm assuming. I don't know, I'll talk to Greenrose and see if I can get some of these. And maybe I then can give them away as well. So I think that would be kinda cool 'cause I feel like people would love these. But I'm imagining that these are pretty pricey to produce. So I probably can't get a ton of them, but I will see what I can do, sound good? Let me see, okay how do I get away. Alright there we go, alright time to, oh and before I move on to the next question, we do have a really cool rose guide for you guys. And Desi put the link in the comments below. So you guys can check that out and I will put that on the screen too just so you guys can see. If you go to info.mayesh.com, and then /rose-guide you guys can check that out. Cool beans, alright, moving on.

- Hi Nancy, Nancy's in our comments.

- Hi Nancy, Nancy came to Quito with us. We love Nancy, she's so sweet and her hubby. Okay Sharlet wants to know, which months are best for anemones.

- So anemones are grown all over the world and are readily available almost all year round with the exception of July and August when the production dips really low. So I had a great thought, we're carrying these micro gerberas and they're coming out of Canada right now. You can't get a true blue or purple like an anemone but they do come in an array of other colors and they're about the same size with a little black center.

- They're cute!

- Yeah they're adorable, I mean look at how small those are. They're tiny, you could do a boutonniere out of that. They're just adorbs, so anyway I wanted to bring that up as a possible sub for an anemone.

- Yeah anemones are a spring flower so they're available naturally from December on through this time of year. We have local growers right now growing the most beautiful anemones, they're huge. So I shoulda actually showed you guys some anemones. But we have really pretty anemones right now. So it's this time of year, you can get them year round but just remember they're gonna be itty bitty and not always the nicest.

- Good to know, guys, our next question is from Penny. She wants to know about white king protea. They're very very expensive wholesale and she wants to know if there's any alternatives for this fabulous bloom.

- Yeah there's nothing as cool on earth as a white king protea, that's true. But subbing for those are really difficult. When in season, this white kale is a really good sub. It takes up a lot of space like a king protea, but this isn't available year round either. So we're starting to import all these bleached flowers and foliages from Holland and one of the ways that you can make a great impression would be with some of that as an alternative. There's palm leaves, poppy pods, amaranthus they're doing all the bleaching with so you could get a similar effect.

- Good to know, Shelley you have any thoughts on this?

- Yeah you can also use queen protea when they're not, when the king are not in season. You can tint them with our favorite design master and kind of recreate that look. There's also white owl, white mink proteas if your bride just wants something that's kind of big and showy and textural and is interesting looking like a protea. You can also find artificial ones if you really have to have it and they're out of season. An artificial flower, a well-made artificial flower tucked in with fresh products is sometimes virtually impossible to tell it's not the real thing. And you can also take dried protea that you've dried and take the petals off and actually add it to an artificial to recreate the texture of it. So you gotta get creative sometimes. The true season for king proteas I believe is January, believe it or not. But they're very hard to get and they're very limited. So it's not, even when we do get them, we only get a handful per branch. It's not like you can order 100 white king proteas and have them, it's difficult. So they're hard to get sometimes.

- Yeah and I think this would be the reason why they are expensive and hard to get because they take two years to produce one bloom.

- One plant takes two years to produce, yep right Sylvia.

- Yeah thanks Sylvia, that's crazy to me. It really, you know, in going back, I'm still stuck in Quito, my head is still there. But just learning and hearing, you know as wholesalers we do get to learn about the growing process probably a little bit more than other people, but it's just still amazing to see the people and the time and the effort it takes to create one bloom of anything. And just a rose and what they go through and going to Valen Fleur and they're talking about their breeding process and how many varieties they go through to find the next new best thing that want to produce for you guys. So it's just always mind-boggling to me and people kinda forget that when we're on our day to day.

- Yeah I have a total new appreciation for, I mean I already did appreciate, but just seeing how these growers are producing and growing product for us and the lengths they go to and how many hands pass just to produce one flower. It's really an amazing process that we should respect.

- Yeah and it's not like this automated thing. I feel like with, I don't know, with Siri and Alexa everything's so automated and it's done immediately, that's not our industry. The people are planting these things by hand and picking them by hand and there's experts for each individual variety so that they know how to cut it and get it done quickly. Everything's done by hand so it's again just really amazing artisan community that we are very lucky to be a part of. Alright let's see our next question is from Jill, she says I have a bride this summer looking for a showy piece using Monstera leaves but again they're expensive, can you suggest an alternative?

- I brought some aralia leaf, it doesn't come in sizes quite as large as the bigger monstera, but I mean you can fill up some space with that. There's a lot of other tropical options, but they're gonna have a different shape and a different look like birds of paradise leaves for instance, they're taller and linear as is hola leaf. We import these from places like Costa Rica and Hawaii so unless you have a secret local source for monstera leaf, there's a lot of freight cost involved in shipping them to us. Another option would be, circling back to what Shelley just said would be to invest in some artificial monstera leaves that you can reuse over and over again.

- Yeah you can even custom paint artificial product to get a more realistic look. If they look a little flat, you can touch them with acrylic paint. And a lot of people are just straight painting them anyway, solid white or gold or whatever. And once you paint something it's very hard to tell whether it's real or not. But yeah Dave's suggestions are great. Aralia's wonderful to use as well. It doesn't quite have the same pow as monstera, so you just have to start, I think when brides want that kinda stuff, you just have to explain to them that's why it looks so amazing, and that's why it costs as much as it does 'cause it is an unusual plant. Unusual to get as well and slow growing.

- Yeah or you can move down to somewhere like here where they'll grow in your backyard.

- Exactly.

- In California it grows pretty well, I've had luck growing them in pots so if you can do that, but it takes a while to get those big leaves, those big daddies.

- Yeah very good, very good. Okay Kirsten Gordon says, a question I would to talk about is what flowers can be obtained in America that are good choices for spring, summer, and fall weddings and if we choose two or three focus flowers how we would mix these in more commonly known flowers like hydrangea and roses. In other words, how do we best play up the stars of each season?

- Pick up the phone, call us, talk to us. We're always excited to tell you what's hot in our coolers. There's so many options it's mind-boggling. And impossible to list all the combinations here. Best advice check out our 12 month flower availability list. Try to plan around what we have listed. My disclaimer would be always double check with your sales rep closer to your event in case there's problems with production of a particular item. Things do unexpectedly come and go out of season sometimes.

- Yeah, if you stick with your season, like California grows a lot of local product, tulips, anemones, ranunculus, so all those spring and summer flowers, we have dahlias in the summertime and through the late fall. So focus on those items to showcase your spring and then you can mix with other more common flowers. It's kind of a melting pot right now of all different kinds of design styles anyways. So if you want it to look springy, then you wanna choose classic spring flowers like we just showed you. So summer flowers are more like dahlias, roses, gladiolas are even a summer flower. So look at what kind of overall style you're trying to do then mix those other flower in to give you some balance and keep your cost down.

- Good advice, and our flower guide is awesome. It is our availability list put together in one handy dandy guide, but as Dave said, and just like with our flower library that's available or any other resource that anyone else provides, all that has to be taken with a grain of salt because we're dealing with mother nature, we're dealing with logistics and all that crazy stuff. So it really affects what the actual data's going to be for your real event date. Alright guys, good stuff though Kirsten, thank you for the question and you have another question. She said I would like to hear about the different types of garland that we make and different options, she has a lot of brides asking about using greenery because they either want that look or perceive that it is cheaper than using flowers. Need to go past the basic eucalyptus garlands. Guys, what do you got to say?

- Yeah garland's are a fantastic way to make a statement for any event, but they're extremely labor intensive and even with the most frugal selection of foliage they're still not really cheap to fabricate. To cut your cost you can start with something big and bulky yet affordable, lemon leaf or silver dollar euc or anything that's cheap and in season and then add bits of textural interest later with some more expensive greens. I can tell you from personal experience, from hand wiring with paddle wire and string, making garlands can be a lesson in humility. If they're not fabricated correctly, they will fail and they gap in sections which makes them extremely difficult to repair at a moment's notice when you're doing an installation. So having Mayesh manufacture your garlands by one of our experienced garland machine operators will provide you a super strong, reliable base. Shameless plug.

- Love shameless plugs, yes and so Ryan says does Mayesh do pre-built garlands? I should know this, hi Ryan by the way from Curry. We love Curry and we love Ryan. Yes, we do produce garlands, custom garlands based off of request and that will be another guide that I'm working on with my team. It's in our funnel of things that we need to get done for you guys so we'll definitely get more information out. But is there anything that you guys wanted to, like how does that work, do you guys wanna talk a little bit about that?

- Go ahead, Shelley.

- Well we have someone make them in house for us and then also our Riverside location custom makes them for all of our branches. And I don't know why brides think that greenery garlands are cheap to do. They always think that's a cheaper option and it's not. They're labor intensive to make, they take a lot of product so it's up to you as a florist to let people know that that's actually not an inexpensive option. It can give you a different look than doing a floral, but then by the time you add flowers to a garland which most brides also ask for, it can be quite expensive to do. And it's labor intensive, like Dave said, to make the garlands then they have to add flowers to them and do all that and there's not a cheap option. You can make garlands out of any greenery pretty much. There's some that are gonna be more tender and go down faster. Another option is if you need to do it inexpensively, is just to lay greenery down the center of a table to give a garland effect and that takes less product, but that's still labor intensive to do that as well. But yeah you can order them from our branches.

- Yep and then, I love, again, Huntress Florals saying we only made our own garland once and then after that they ordered it.

- It's a lot of work, it takes time to do.

- Yep, time and money, gotta love it. Okay so Monica, we're moving on to the next question. She says how is the floral industry evolving and working to keep up with the standards of improved environmental and health impact through our products, supplies and cut flowers, in other words, what changes are being made to reduce health risks of working with commercially grown cut flowers and supplies like foam, etc?

- There have been many positive strides in the global floral community over the past 30 years to improve agricultural sustainability. At Mayesh we do our own little part by purchasing from Veriflora, Florverde and Rainforest Alliance Certified farms. These farms follow strict guidelines for sustainable agricultural production. Some of these practices include biological pest control, composting, water reclamation, safe storage, and education of handling the chemicals, proper land management that supports healthy regional habitat. Sustainability also ensures growers adhere to fair labor practices for their employees which provide better wages, a safer workplace, and resources like medical and daycare.

- Yep, things have changed quite a bit over the last 20 to 30 years. You guys know I'm a big proponent of having as much of a low carbon footprint for our industry as possible. We were very excited when we visited Greenrose and how their practices fall in line with that. Their farm was impeccable, their employees were well treated, it was a really great experience and it was a good experience for all of our florists that went to see how the changes have been made. And this provides income and livelihood for these people in Ecuador that before didn't really make very much money or the farms didn't really take care of them like they should have, that has changed a lot. And I was really pleased, I think we all kinda had a really good experience there with that. And I think as a florist there's a lot of things you can do. Composting your product is one thing instead of just throwing it out in the trash. Recycling all your cardboard, plastic brads, rubber bands, anything that comes in in your packaging make sure that you're separating and recycling that properly. I'm a big fan of using chicken wire or poultry wire or florist Oasis net instead of using Oasis or I should say floral foam. If you can use less floral foam, that's always better as well. It's not always necessary to use that. It's got its uses but there's ways that you can use less of that, I teach that in my classes. Recycling or using up cycled containers, repurposing containers, using things that you can get back and reuse again. Those are all very important things that you can do and using plants and materials that can be repurposed for the bride or your customer in arrangements, that's always nice. So it's a lot of things that you can do to be more environmentally friendly. But I think the floral industry is finally taking notice that you as consumers are talking about this and this is important to you now.

- Yeah, and going back to Greenrose, too. They also provide a lot of jobs for women where other companies don't traditionally hire women in South America so that was cool. And then they had just installed a really cool water system to help recycle all of their water.

- Yeah that was cool.

- Did you get to hear about that? I was kind of on the outside, did you wanna talk like two seconds about that?

- They had a huge pond that, they have a facility where they're taking their water and they're recycling and reusing it to water their farm which is amazing. So they're cleaning up their own waste that they're using and reusing it there at the farm level. And they are taking those steps. It's not something that they were required to do, I believe. I think that was something that they decided to do to be more environmentally friendly. It was very nice to see that. We've all heard these horror stories about the South American farms and how their employees are treated, the pesticides and all that, and yes there are still pesticides being used. Unfortunately American consumers want blemish free product and an organic product is an ugly product. If you look at organic apples or flowers that are grown, I mean we have American grown flowers too, they're not perfectly grown because we have this level that we want our product to look. You want a perfectly shiny apple, that is not organic so we have to sort of lessen our expectation of what we want out of the product I think, if you don't want it blemish free. You're going to have to use these pesticides and chemicals to keep that from happening. But they're doing a lot to help that. And I was very pleased to see that as well.

- Yeah if you don't mind bug bites and ugly shaped things and stuff like that, then--

- That's nature, folks.

- And there are designers that love that, like Christi's one of those designers where if something came in and there was, you know, it was organic and there was bug bites on it she was all about it, she was like it makes it look like it's from my garden. I like that look.

- It's natural, yeah. Natural, but we are, sometimes, a hermetically sealed people and we want everything perfect and pristine so flowers are not. If you grow your own flowers you know how there's something charming about a rose petal that has a little hole in it where a little whatever chewed through its leaf. I mean it's just charming.

- Yep, Penny has a question on here it says does anyone use frogs anymore? And yes people do use frogs, Veronica who is our other designer for Quito, does a lot of our Spanish videos, she has a whole collection of frogs and we gave frogs to all of our attendees too and we have done, Kayley last year did a design video using a flower frog. So she loves frogs as well, so everyone else that's watching, do you guys use frogs? And then Shelley did you wanna talk a little bit about that, I see you shaking your head.

- Yeah frogs are wonderful to use and we've talked about them on the show before. They are an expense for a lot of florists so some people shy away from using them, but if you, say you have a client that you always do her weekly arrangement for, you could use a flower frog in conjunction with chicken wire and both those things are great for an armature in your design and you get that back and recycle it every week instead of throwing out a block of Oasis every week. So it's a wonderful product to use. They're very easy to use and they're not hard. I think one thing most florists don't know, they need to use stick-em, the floral clay to attach it to the bottom of a container. So if you're using the same container over and over again. But for weddings and things like that, they can be a little cost-prohibitive and sometimes not necessary, but they're wonderful to use. I use them all the time, I collect them actually. I have a whole collection of them.

- Yeah, so do Veronica, you can walk in her studio and she's got a big giant drawer of them, it's really cool. And then Linda wants to know can floral foam be reused, I don't think so.

- No it cannot, once it's been saturated, you can keep adding water to it to rehydrate it, but if it dries out it cannot be resaturated. It just doesn't work very well.

- Yep exactly, okay good stuff. We're gonna move on to the next question from Jeanette. She says what are your thoughts on Oasis solution 360 where no cutting of the stems is necessary for processing?

- We actually use that in our branch here. It's saved us a ton on labor so what that product is is a super hydrator and it keeps bacteria levels very low. You can actually have dry packed flowers out of the box and just stick them right in the water. And I, as a florist, thought what! That is not gonna work, I was like how can that even work? I was scared I have to say, but it works great and we use it here. There's a couple of flowers it doesn't work well with. I think it's gerberas and sunflowers. And if you're in doubt, it doesn't hurt to recut the stems anyway, put it in, that water is fantastic, it helps the flowers live longer. You can even reactivate it, the company sells tablets so it's also eco-friendly. You can reuse that water, put the tablets in it and it cleans the water and it's reusable. The guy from the company told me that it was also safe to drink, but I don't think I'd wanna do that. 'Cause we here at Carlsbad were not able to, at our old location, were not able to pour water down the drains 'cause it goes out into the ocean here through the system here. And he said it was perfectly safe to do that. So I'd have to research that a little bit more to be sure but it's supposed to be very safe for the environment as well. And it does work well and I love it. And I always tell my girls when they pick, or my florists when they pick up here, if they use buckets from us to keep the water in it and reuse it in their arrangements for processing, not to toss it out.

- Yeah, Laura Kellogg says what was that product? And we're talking about the Oasis 360 solution. Hopefully Desi can find a link and we can share the link for that solution.

- I think it's also called DE Express as well. We get it in huge drums and there's machines that, by the way, one of our customers has a outdoor stand, you can attach it to your water unit. So it comes in small drums and big drums and there's a system that goes with it. And what it does is it mixes with your actual water and then you pour it out through the hose. So you have to mix it with water. If you do use that, but everyone in my shops uses it. It saves a ton of labor.

- Good stuff, and labor is time and time is money.

- That's right.

- Alright, next question and I'm not sure who this is from so I'm sorry guys. Chocolate cosmos, is it edible?

- Well as good as they smell, it's still not advisable to eat them. According to Gardeners World magazine, they have no measurable toxicity. However most commercial flower farms use some form of pesticide during production so if it's not a USDA certified for human consumption, please don't eat them. Here I have actual chocolate cosmos and the normal red cosmos and these are coming out in Japan right now, yeah they're gorg. We do carry USDA certified organic edible flowers. For more information you're gonna have to contact your rep on that, I believe we have a minimum we have to bring in so it's a little bit prohibitive. And they can be a little bit pricey. But they are available if you have a need for them.

- Very cool, yeah so don't eat the flowers even if they smell really good. And again it ties into what we already talked about with the pesticides and stuff like that. Alright, good stuff, our next question is from Kelley. She wants to know about the typical lifespan of Dusty Miller and how to keep good looking in her bouquets and arrangements, she feels like hers get droopy quickly and it's very finicky. What do you guys have to offer for Kelley?

- In Phoenix, we import our Dusty Miller from an Ecuadorian grower almost all year round production on this stuff. Here's a bunch just so you can see how big it is. So this has a really remarkably long vase life. It lasts up to a week or more. These are a variety that have been selected and hybridized so that they have the strong traits and I think they last a lot longer than stuff that you might forage from your garden. In my experience, the lacier leaves tend to be a little bit more fragile than these roundier leaf varieties. I don't know if that's your experience too, Shelley. There's some things that we do when we're hydrating Dusty Miller that can help and that's avoid, let's see here. Sorry I lost my place, avoid submerging their stems too deep or dripping water onto their leaves. The fuzzy surface tends to hold moisture and can activate botrytis spores and cause bacteria to form in the water quickly. Using the recommended flower food and dosage on that, recut the stems, and change the water frequently. That'll ensure that they stay hydrated and firmed up.

- Yeah I also like the bel fiore, the Ecuadorian product as well. It holds up really well, it seems to be bred to be a little stronger. It is more expensive, it can be almost double the cost of local Dusty Miller, but it's worth it if you end up throwing out a lot of Dusty Miller. I sometimes think it's cut too early. That seems to be a lot of the problem with it. It doesn't have very strong leaves. Sometimes it comes in fresh and it's just wilty looking. But Dave's right, the fuzziness of it, the way that that leaf is, it can get all kinds of problems with spores and don't drip water on it, like Dave said. That's probably one of the things that causes it to get, you notice the change of the color of the leaf. But recutting always, putting in warm water will always help perk things up. It could be an issue of it not being hydrated enough or being out of water for too long, so you can try that, but ask your Mayesh rep about the premium Dusty Miller if you still have a lot of issues with it, especially if you're in a hot climate. That one seems to hold up very well.

- Good stuff, and Winnie has a similar question about Dusty Miller, she wanted to know how do you revive it and make sure it looks good the day of the wedding, do you guys have any tips for Winnie and Kelley probably as well?

- Yeah so Dusty Miller has tiny little hairy filaments all over the stems and leaves and these are called trichomes. They act as a deterrent for frost damage, insect attack, and they lessen the dehydration from the transpiration process. But those furry little coats can become the breeding ground for stem clogging bacteria, especially when they're submerged during the hydration process. So try gently scraping some of the fur off of the part of the stem that's gonna be submerged is one tip. Hydrate them in a shallow level of fresh solution instead of a deep plunge, recut your stems and replace the solution every day or two.

- Yeah and clean buckets, we can't say that enough. Make sure your buckets are clean, no bacteria. They seem to be more susceptible to that so that's always a good tip. Wash your buckets out with chlorine once or twice a week if you can, at least once a week.

- Good stuff, good thank guys. Not that I wanna mention another wholesale florist, but they just had a show and they had a designer there that said to spray the back of the leaf with matte white paint and it helps them keep from going limp. Never tried it but we're going to. And if Bradley's here, I'd be curious to know if he's heard of something like that. So there you go, thanks Leroy French Flowers. I'm hoping I pronounced that correctly. Oh and then David, hey David, he is watching. David Dahlson from our Miami location and he says bees love those hairs to make their hives.

- Oh cool.

- He always has little known facts about our flowers and things so that's very cool, thanks David. Alright guys, on to our next question from Linda. She says how do you handle brides who say they have their own materials for their flowers but they want you to design them? What do you guys do and while Shelley is talking about this I would love to know what you guys do who are watching 'cause I know this comes up every now and then.

- I think as a florist I got this question at least once a year from a bride. If I get my flowers wholesale will you design them for me? If I bring my containers will you arrange in them for me? You have to be very careful here and tread lightly because you have to control your product yourself and there's no telling what happened with the product before it gets to you. So if you decide to do this, you gotta have a lot of rules and parameters in place and also I would be very careful about maybe posting that work that you do with whatever they bring in 'cause who knows what it will look like. It depends on what they're talking about, there may be a bride who has some sentimental attachment to the roses in her garden and she just wants you to incorporate it into something. That's fine, if you wanna use, if they want you to use their containers for example, make sure you preview and see those way ahead of time and you approve them that they're waterproof, that they're usable. You can have a bride who you think is talking about a container that's this big and then she brings it in and it's this big, can you see me? So you know, make sure that you approve everything, that you go over it, you're not responsible, blah blah blah blah blah, write it in your contract. I wouldn't do it personally because there's just no way to control that. If you do that though and you use all of their product and you're a smaller florist and you're trying to just get some experience, make sure you charge a substantial design fee. They can't think because they're getting the flowers wholesale that it's gonna be cheaper for them. What I mean by that is you have to value your time and your experience. If she wants to do it expensively, then she should do it herself, or get her friends to help her. If she's coming to you as a designer, then you should be charging your rate, your fees for everything, delivery, set up, the van, you have to itemize it all and then present her with a cost. And it may be that it's better for her just to have you do it yourself. And why isn't she having you do it? So you have to explain to them and not shoot them down, but explain to them why it's important to have a professional handle the wedding from beginning to end. You know the product better, you know the amounts to order, you know the color palette. She may bring you all this stuff and it's not the right amount. You're gonna actually do double work trying to figure out what she has to what you can work with and do and the numbers are not gonna work for you. So I would avoid this, this is a DIY bride who's just trying to get out on the cheap, usually. Or friends, as we were just talking about this last night in a class. As a florist you always have all these friends who want to have you do their wedding for them and you still have to charge for your time so that's my advice on that, I hope that you think about it and make sure that's something that you wanna do for your business.

- Good stuff, yeah we have, let's see, lots of people have some thoughts on here. Tracy says containers maybe, flowers no way. Now we have incorporated something from Grandma's yard which is cute. Trista says we an exclusivity policy. We provide all stems, we do all flowers at our weddings. Also, pre approve all containers they provide.

- Great Trista, that's great.

- Let's see, I have told brides that want me to design with their own flowers based on the same reasons you said. I also have them bring in containers a month before the event, so yeah that's good, good stuff Susan.

- It's really important about the containers too, because you may quote them one price and that container is not gonna work for what you quoted in your original budget. I would, if they actually are thinking that in the beginning and you're having that conversation with them, I would say bring me in what you're thinking about and let's see if it's gonna work with your budget. Because even at that point you are gonna have to renegotiate with them on the price of the centerpiece if it's not the right container. So that's all stuff that it's just, be preemptive from the beginning. Control your business from the beginning.

- I have like one more minute, so let me see if I can find a question. Texanna, what rose still has the strongest scent? And I heard that the trend is smaller wedding bouquets because of the recent royal weddings. What do you guys have to say? Strongest scent rose and small wedding bouquets.

- Vitality, it's a garden rose, and patience. Both of those have super high fragrance. A lot of standard roses don't have a lot of fragrance. Fragrance is bred out of roses, they have to lose something to get a longer shelf life on the flower. And a flower uses a lot of its carbs in fragrance. So the vitality garden rose which, it's probably one of the strongest smelling. I don't know, Dave, if you have a favorite, but on standard roses there's not any that have a super strong scent. There are some that are scented, but not super strong.

- Yeah, I think my favorite, fragrance wise, would be patience, it's pretty strong.

- Patience, yeah. Yeah vitality and patience are about similar. Vitality doesn't always look really pretty in the package but it opens up really gorgeous. And then on the question about the trend on smaller bridal bouquets, you will see that, it's gonna take about a year. Because what happens is people have to get requests for that and then photo shoots are done and then all that stuff has to get published and then it shows up a year later and then brides start seeing it and then that's when they go oh that's cool and beautiful, I think I wanna do that. So it'll take a year or two to go through the whole system of how things get done. You may start having some brides come in who say they want that look. But that look was so small and tight, it's still not for everyone, but it will start. You'll start seeing that trend where things will start shrinking back to not that compact ball we used to have, but a lot more controlled arrangements. But you'll see that trend, everything kinda goes out and back in on floral design.

- Yep good stuff, thank guys. I'm not gonna kick you off 'cause you know, we're at the end of the show. I don't have anything extra to add.

- Your electricity didn't go off and I didn't have any technical glitches, yay!

- I know, yay! So that's a wrap on today's Mornings with Mayesh. Thank you everyone for joining us. Make sure you mark your calendars for April 2nd. We're gonna be back with Alison Ellis and then April 16th I will be back with Shelley and Dave. And I hope you guys can join us. Keep on sending in your floral questions. Thank you for joining us, I will see you guys soon. Have a rocking day, bye everyone. Thanks Dave and Shelley.

- Bye everybody. Thank you.

- Bye!

- Bye!