As part of an effort by a small group of florist to help educate consumers about the quality, value, service and design that professional florists bring to the gift of flowers, Avante Gardens participated in a an unusual guarantee program whereby we offered to replace flowers delivered by drop-ship companies during the Valentine's Day holiday.

The above news snippet was from blog post on Avante Garden's Flower Shop company blog. It describes an interesting approach to combat the growing challenges that real, local florists are facing when trying to compete with direct ship flower companies and floral order gatherers.

Read the full blog post from Avante Gardens about Replacing Someone Else's Flowers.

Read the Press Release on PRWeb.com.

Flower Shop Network is proud to announce the formal launch of our Holiday Email Campaigns program. The holiday email program has actually been in beta since October of 2005. The program experienced tremendous success during beta testing and thoroughly increased traffic to FSN member sites. As a result of that early success, Flower Shop Network is has campaigns scheduled throughout the remainder of 2006.

This is how it works: Before each major floral holiday, Flower Shop Network sends holiday-themed email messages to subscribers, showcasing current featured holiday arrangements.

This helps the local florist by reminding consumers:

that flowers are great last-minute gift ideas for any occasion.

how easy it is to send flowers to someone almost anywhere.

to order their flowers direct from a real, local florist or flower shop.

Flower Shop Network never competes against you by taking orders from your customers. All consumer orders phoned directly to your shop, as well as consumer web orders placed on your FSN Website and sent to you via FSN Relay, represent more flower orders coming into your shop at 100%.

Direct consumer orders are more profitable for your business, and you also receive valuable consumer information that allows you to market to your customers for profitable, repeat business.

FSN Member Florists can also utilize FSN Holiday Email Announcements as a marketing piece that is easy to forward to their own customer address book or database right before the holiday. Please review our terms of use before modifying the email announcements and contact us if you have any questions about forwarding these messages on to your customers.

Click here to view samples of the FSN Holiday Email Announcements, another way that FSN is bringing more and more profitable consumer orders directly to your shop.

The holiday email campaigns are just another valuable service provided to the member florists of Flower Shop Network.

Keep an eye on this news section and the Florists Only section of our site for the latest information about new features and programs provided by Flower Shop Network.

At the Northeast Floral Expo in Cromwell, Connecticut March 4-5, 2006, visitors to the Flower Shop Network booth registered for a drawing for a complimentary florist listing and a complimentary eCommerce website package. Visitors to the Flower Shop Network booth at the convention registered to win the Grand Prize or First Prize package by filling out a small registration card or leaving a business card at the booth. The drawing was open to both existing Flower Shop Network members as well as nonmembers that registered at the Flower Shop Network booth on either Saturday or Sunday of the convention. The drawing was held Tuesday morning after our staff returned to the office and the results are in! Here are the lucky winners:

Grand Prize - Florist Listing + eCommerce Website

Congratulations to Apotheca Flower Shoppe of Goffstown, New Hampshire as the Grand Prize winner! The grand prize consists of a premium florist listing in the Flower Shop Network online florist directory as well as one of our fully eCommerce enabled flower shop websites. The complimentary listing and website will run for a full year on Flower Shop Network.

Apotheca Flower Shoppe
28 Main Street - Suite 102
Goffstown, NH 03045
(603) 497-4940

Apotheca Flower Shoppe of Goffstown, New Hampshire is the winner of the Grand Prize drawing. The Grand Prize consists of a complimentary listing in Flower Shop Network's online florist directory as well as a fully eCommerce enabled website for one full year!

Congratulations, and welcome to Flower Shop Network!

Located in Goffstown, New Hampshire, Apotheca Flower Shoppe also provides floral delivery service to the following areas: Bedford, New Hampshire (NH), Bow, New Hampshire (NH), Dunbarton, New Hampshire (NH), Manchester, New Hampshire (NH), New Boston, New Hampshire (NH), Weare, New Hampshire (NH) and West Manchester, New Hampshire (NH).

Flower Shop Network welcomes you as a new member. Congratulations to Alyssa, Kim and the rest of the staff at Apotheca Flower Shoppe, we hope to see you again at next year's event.

First Prize - Florist Listing

Congratulations to Ellsworth Florist of Ellsworth, Maine as the winner of our First Prize package. The first prize package includes a premium florist listing in the Flower Shop Network online florist directory for one full year.

Ellsworth Florist
89 Main Street
Ellsworth, ME 04605
(207) 667-2244
Ellsworth Florist of Ellsworth, Maine is the winner of the First Prize drawing. First prize consists of a complimentary florist listing on Flower Shop Network's online florist directory for one full year!

Congratulations, and welcome to Flower Shop Network!

Located in Ellsworth, Maine, Ellsworth Florist also provides floral delivery service to the following areas: Bar Harbor, Maine (ME), Blue Hill, Maine (ME), Bucksport, Maine (ME), Franklin, Maine (ME), Hancock, Maine (ME), Orland, Maine (ME), Southwest Harbor, Maine (ME), Sullivan, Maine (ME), Trenton, Maine (ME), and Winter Harbor, Maine (ME)

Flower Shop Network welcomes Ellsworth Florist as a new member. Congratulations to Ed and the rest of the staff at Ellsworth Florist, the Flower Shop Network staff looks forward to seeing you at the convention next year.

Flower Shop Network staff attending the Northeast Floral Expo sponsored by the Connecticut Florists Association are pictured below from the left:

Joe Hays, Network Coordinator
Loranne Atwill, CFO/Owner
Brock Atwill, President/Owner
Steve Pellham, VP Technology