As floral designers, you're most likely somewhat aware of what goes into the flower growing process, but you can really, truly appreciate the process after witnessing first-hand all of the time, effort and passion that goes into it. During our trip to Quito, Ecuador last year, we brought our 24 designers to Greenrose, one of the biggest rose farms we buy from, to show them exactly where their roses came from and just what goes into the process before they're in our customers' hands. The entire process of producing just one rose takes years - from breeding & variety selection to growing, packing and shipping to the wholesalers, our attendees were able to see first hand just how much work goes into the production of the flowers they work with every day.
After an incredibly educational & powerful day, a couple of our attendees asked us if we would create a short video that they could show their clients & brides that would enlighten them to how the flower industry works and give them a better understanding of why flowers cost what they do. No, these flowers did not just appear for free in your florists' hands! So much had to happen for them to have those flowers to make your beautiful bouquet for your wedding day.
In this video, CEO Patrick Dahlson takes us through the process of growing a rose from start to finish. Special thanks to Greenrose for hosting us so graciously and allowing us to share this with our customers!
P.S. If you want to see the growing process in real life, then don't miss out on our upcoming International Workshop Experience in the Netherlands.
Videography: Logan Martin of Good Notion
Photography: Nicole Clarey Photography
THE GROWING PROCESS
Here are some detailed notes from Greenrose on their process:
Variety selection:
We select the variety we are going to grow, according to market demands. Color, vase life and transport performance is also evaluated.
Soil:
We take care of our soil with all organic material, preparing it for the coming years in the production of our beautiful roses, the highland Andean soil is filled with minerals, that also help in this process.
Crafting and planting:
We take care of our rose plants from day one. We craft our plants by hand and we have specialized people looking out for them, making sure they come out in production when needed.
Depending on the variety, a plant will produce 1 stem every 90 days.
Harvest:
We harvest our roses every day by hand, each rose is handled with special care.
Each employee is in charge of a certain amount of plants. Providing detailed care to make sure our plants are healthy, clean and in perfect conditions to meet our highest standards.
Post-Harvest:
After the harvesting process, our roses are taken to post harvest.
Here, they go through a selection process, grading and later bunched. Finally, they go into our walk-in cooler. Since this is such a delicate product, roses can only stay there for 4 days, to ensure freshness.
Packing:
Each customer has different requirement for their orders. Our packing team makes sure that our roses are put into boxes, labeled and shipped according to each customer.
Transport:
GREENROSE owns four refrigerated trucks to transport our roses every day. This way we control the cooling chain process, and proper delivery to the airport.
