Everything Floristry - Flower Duet
Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in floristry but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Kit Wertz, co-founder of Flower Duet, located in Torrance, CA, USA.
What's your business, and who are your customers?
We are The Coleman sisters, Kit Wertz & Casey Schwartz, who own and run Flower Duet, a full-service floral design event company in Los Angeles, California. Our business is unusual in that we spend about 50% of our time teaching clients how to design flowers themselves and the other 50% of our time designing and creating beautiful flowers for special events like weddings, birthdays, and all sorts of big-time life celebrations.
Tell us about yourself
We started our business after taking our friends on tours of the Los Angeles Flower District, which is the largest wholesale flower market in the country. We would teach them how to design with the flowers they purchased at the mart. They had so much fun and learned so much from us that our friends suggested we should do that as a business. So, in 1999 we started Flower Duet as a part-time business out of our apartments while we still worked in corporate positions full-time. Our first paid work was making flowers for the weddings of our girlfriends, who had encouraged us to start Flower Duet! It was a labor of love, and it was a way for us as sisters to spend time together. Over the last 22 years in the business, we expanded our offerings. Ten years ago, we rented a space in a 4500-square-foot studio to hold classes and make floral designs for our ever-expanding clientele. What motivates us the most is making people happy (everyone loves flowers). But, we also love to have the flexibility to pick up kids from school, attend their sporting events, educating floral design students on the fabulous nature of flowers, and helping people learn how flowers can help them actually feel better.
What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?
We've been in business for over 22 years and keep gaining new recognition and new clients every day. It's fun to be "discovered" as a hidden gem. We are on the preferred vendor list for our local high-end hotels and venues. We have traveled for business, been guest speakers for our floral industry and guest designers to help educate people on why it's important to buy local flowers grown near your house through the American Grown Flowers program and the Slow Flowers movement. But, we think our biggest accomplishment is the difference we make in people's lives when we teach them a new skill. The pride and wonder that appears on a person's face after they've taken one of our hands-on classes are precious and a gift, and...it never gets old!
What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?
Sometimes you have to work 60 days in a row. It's the nature of cycles of our business that the fall season is very busy with weddings and then into holiday parties and flower arranging classes. Last fall, we were the busiest we have ever been, and both of us worked many, many days in a row without a day off. So, it's good to try to schedule some downtime, whether it's a night out to eat or a massage in the middle of a hectic work schedule.
What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?
- Before you start a business, have an exit strategy. Ask yourself, what is the goal with this business? How long do you want to do it? Do you want to sell it at some point?
- Make sure you are aware of your supply chains. If you are working with products that are made overseas, make sure you know where to get alternative suppliers that are closer to home in case of supply chain interruptions that would really cripple your business.
- Have fun! Don't be afraid to ask for help from peers in your same industry. It's important to network with people in your category of work. We do a lot of this, and we've made wonderful friends in the process, which is really, really fun!
Is there anything else you'd like to share?
It's okay to start small and work on your new business venture on the side. We did our flower business as a part-time business for about ten years while each of us worked in the corporate world with big Fortune 50 companies. We grew organically and never took on debt. When there was unprecedented downtime in our events industry in 2020, we were able to weather the storm.
Where can people find you and your business?
Website: https://flowerduet.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FlowerDuet
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/flowerduetla/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/flowerduet/
If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solopreneur that you'd like to share, then email community@subkit.com; we'd love to feature your journey on these pages.
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