There's more to merchandising holiday floral displays than simply setting up a beautiful bank of red poinsettias, retailers told SN.
Across the country, customers expect poinsettias. In fact, most retailers said the showy red flowers account for up to 40% — and one said up to 80% — of the greenbacks rung up in floral departments between Thanksgiving and Christmas. But to set themselves apart, retailers all have stepped out with something different, too.
At upscale Bristol Farms, the knockout attraction is a tableful of custom centerpieces, freshly assembled at the store.
“We use fresh flowers and insert crab apples and pears and other fresh fruits,” said Alice Grazziani, floral director at the 15-unit chain, based in Carson, Calif. “They get the attention.”
And their retail prices range from $45 to $300. Reindeer topiaries, at $79.99 and $89.99, are hot sellers as well, Grazziani said.
“Then there's a bank of wonderfully fragrant paper whites,” she said. “The store looks and smells like Christmas. We also have Hanukkah centerpieces and other items, using paper whites and blue and white hydrangeas.”
In addition, premium orchids, some retailing at $30 a stem, are big holiday sellers.
At the same time, distinctive props and knickknacks bring customers into floral departments in other markets. Once they're in the store, customers linger and buy other things. Blooming cactuses and more affordable varieties of orchids make displays look a little different at Penn Traffic's stores in upstate New York. The Rochester, N.Y.-based company owns and operates 111 stores under the banners Quality Markets, P&C Markets and BiLo.
Meanwhile, the ordinary poinsettia has been elevated to a new level — and a higher retail — at Kowalski's Markets, St. Paul, Minn. Designer colors, such as burgundy and turquoise, and a dusting of glitter set the scene. Customers can't seem to get enough of them, according to one official at the 10-unit, family-owned independent.
That's at $17.99 for a 6.5-inch pot. Compared to the $9.99 Kowalski's gets for a traditional, red poinsettia in the same size, there's gold in that glitter.
Like Bristol Farms, Schnuck Markets, St. Louis, is using orchids to build holiday sales momentum.
“Their simplicity is wonderful. Some of our customers have found that lining up a row of orchids on a silk or satin tablecloth or runner adds the touch of elegance they want,” said Rhonda Lynn-Moeckel, floral design coordinator at 101-unit Schnucks.
Orchids are becoming popular in many places, said Tom Lavagetto, principal at the Floral Consulting Group, Spokane, Wash. “Growers have found how to grow them in volume,” he said. “Retailers can take a decent margin, but haven't turned them into a commodity yet.”
Roses are popular at Christmas and orchids are gaining but they're no match for the ever-popular poinsettia, Lavagetto said. After the poinsettia, it's a hodgepodge of impulse buys.
While Schnuck is selling a satisfying number of orchids, the company is featuring poinsettias. They're not in designer colors. In fact, red in bountiful displays is the mainstay, but other varieties have been added this year, including milky white, a marbleized white and several shades of pink. A light dusting of glitter there, too, gives them holiday sparkle and catches the customer's eye, Lynn-Moeckel said.
At the Macey's Food & Drug in Pleasant Grove, Utah, topiaries in the shape of small Christmas trees and stars sell like crazy at retails ranging from $9.99 to $16, said Rosie Tippetts, the store's floral manager.
At this time of year, knickknacks are terrific sellers as well, and they help lift the department's overall margin, Tippetts said.
“It's just a fact,” she said. “At Christmastime, people's attention often goes to something cutesy. I used to be a checker so I know the kinds of things people buy during the holiday season.”
Drawing on that experience, she is dedicating about 30% of selling space in her department to hard goods such as measuring cups shaped like Santa Claus, and Christmas tree ornaments. Even ceramic and little metal turkey place card holders left over from Thanksgiving sell out.
Tippetts said she gets a green light from her store director to do pretty much what she wants in floral and she takes the opportunity to inject some creativity. It's apparent in the props she is using this year, including a big, double-sided, multi-paned window that her husband made. The double window has lights encased between the sides and a snow-like mist applied to the panes.
“Then we put in a faux fireplace, even a fuzzy rug, and a short, white picket fence. It all looks very cozy and holiday-like. I know that draws people over to the department, because they see it from pretty far away,” Tippetts said.
“Then when they're in here, they see what we have and they buy” — everything from topiary stars to kitchen towels, she said.
Customers often ask if they can buy the props, but they're not for sale. Tippetts gets many of her ideas for merchandise and merchandising from magazines and catalogs.
“And a lot of it stems from our customers,” she said. “We know them. We know what they want to buy from us.”
They started shopping floral departments for holiday items early this year, Tippetts said. Other retailers agreed shopping for floral products got off to an unusually early start this year.
“I've noticed people transcending past Thanksgiving right into Christmas. Two weeks before Thanksgiving people were buying poinsettias,” said Mark Wach-ter, lead gift and floral organizer at Kowalski's, who was interviewed days before Thanksgiving. “Even a rosemary tree that's shaped like a little Christmas tree is already selling well.”
At Bristol Farms, Grazziani kicked off the holiday season with a large table at the front of the produce aisle laden with Thanksgiving centerpieces which sold down several times the week before Thanksgiving. But that same week, Grazziani had the floral departments decked out for the Christmas holidays.
“Our reindeer topiaries are hot for the holidays. Then, for Hanukkah we'll have fresh ivy, living menorahs with candles,” she said.
Bristol Farms, unlike most retailers, counts Thanksgiving as its biggest floral sales week. Grazziani said the company expected to top $95,000 in floral sales for Thanksgiving week alone. That compares to $78,000 in sales during Thanksgiving week last year, when the retailer had three fewer stores operating.
“But every week, during Christmas month, we're up, too, [from the year before] in sales,” she said. “We have the whole store themed this year for Christmas before Thanksgiving.”
A New Twist
Poinsettias and Christmas go hand in hand. For supermarkets, the challenge is how to sell more flowers when it seems every retail format under the sun is offering them.
In an effort to do something — anything — other than price them lower and lower, retailers are taking extra care to create dramatic displays, cross-merchandising them in other departments, and sourcing variations on the traditional, familiar reds.
“Within Schnucks' European Floral Market displays, our designers love to place the plants in groupings for maximum impact and they believe poinsettias provide drama,” said Rhonda Lynn-Moeckel, floral design coordinator at 101-unit Schnuck Markets. The brightness of the flower also serves to draw the customer's eye to other items, she added.
At a Macey's Food & Drug unit in Pleasant Grove, Utah, floral managers for years have been placing poinsettias in the bakery, the deli, the meat department, up front by checkout, all over the store.
They serve two purposes: decoration and another point-of-sale.
“We leave the tags on them. People can pick them up wherever they are and take them to the register,” said Rosie Tippetts, floral manager at the store.
One consultant told SN he thinks it's time to bring up the retail price of poinsettias in any way possible.
“Supermarkets have consistently driven down the price of both roses and poinsettias, and they don't need to,” said Tom Lavagetto, principal of the Floral Consulting Group, Spokane, Wash.
“It's an easy sale,” he said. “People will buy poinsettias for Christmas. You can sell as many for $14 or $15 as you will for $10.”
The most notable trend is embellishment, with colors, glitter and glaze added to dress up poinsettias. By adding a few extra touches, retailers can charge nearly double the retail price of that of an ordinary red poinsettia, sources told SN.
Mark Wachter, lead gift/floral organizer, at 10-unit Kowalski's Markets, St. Paul, Minn., said the chain is merchandising poinsettias this year in some startling decorator colors.
“Some are dark green, or burgundy, or magenta shading into purple,” Wachter said. “On top of that, there's gold and silver glitter on them.”
In fact, Kowalski's customers were buying the dressed-up holiday flowers for weeks for $17.99, he said just before Thanksgiving.
“If you can believe it, we even had orange and black ones for Halloween and they kept selling through,” he said.
— R.H.
