- Linz Kinchin, The White Horse Flower Company
“February, much like January, is a bleak and often grey month. The appearance of snowdrops in the hedgerows and garden is a welcome reminder that Spring is on its way. As a florist, the first quarter of the year can be long and protracted save for the farewell, birthday and anniversary flowers.
Florists often find this period tough to get through with overheads still to pay; a frugal period where the opportunity to share some floral love through occasions like Valentine’s generate welcome trade for high street florists and smaller businesses alike. Flowers offer a welcome splash of colour ahead of Spring when, finally, our gardens and parks will once again blossom into life and local flower growers recommence their first flush of locally grown blooms.
Why buy roses in February? Because they lift our spirits, bringing joy; a perennial favourite regardless of the season, roses are the nation’s most beloved and iconic bloom. Marking lives lived, celebrating life’s rites of passage, a luxurious splash of colour amidst the darkest, coldest of months. Imported flowers, like tea and coffee, form part of our culture, enveloping us in the familiar, given in love and received with appreciation.
Like many florists, alongside importing flowers, I try to buy what I can locally and not just flowers but food, wine and crafts. I’ve found engaging customers in conversation and encouraging them to allow me to create their arrangements inspired as seasonally as possible often enlightens them to what’s actually growing here in that moment but the reality is there simply aren’t enough flowers grown locally in February to meet demand and variety to meet expectation.
We import flowers to the tune of almost £50 million a year – amongst them the beloved rose: regardless of the season they are the lifeblood of our industry. I find it almost ludicrous and often inappropriate to suggest swapping out a rose for the exquisite and delicate snowdrop.
One size doesn’t fit all and some flowers are best appreciated in their natural habitat amongst the hedgerows, and others simply present themselves as perfect pairings for gift bouquets in all sizes and arrangements within the home. There is no real vase life in a snowdrop, therefore no relevance or point: as offensive to some as that may sound, the reality of commercial consumerism is how I and the majority of my fellow florists earn our living. It’s difficult to wrap up the facts into a more palatable, pretty format.
The conundrum we face is not straightforward: imported roses, carnations, lilies and others are these days mostly grown in Columbia, Kenya and Ethiopia. They are fundamental to the local economies of those countries, providing employment, boosting welfare and education for a great many communities. Notwithstanding global warming, which one must acknowledge is at a critical point, the benefits both here and in Africa or Latin America simply cannot be ignored.
It is undoubtedly preferable to buy local wherever possible and yet commerce, culture and individual livelihoods play a pivotal role in understanding the bigger picture, including the livelihoods of those south of the equator as much as us florists right here in the United Kingdom. Many European flower growers no longer grow roses due to the impact of climate change and instead have replaced rose crops with anemones and ranunculus, which are gaining traction with the public at large as relatively local and more seasonal alternatives to a rose. That said, it is a slow burn changing public perceptions.
Why do we florists buy roses in February? Because not to would be commercial suicide.”
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