FSN recently had the pleasure of talking to Jim Endicott, owner of Flowerama in Ft. Collins CO, about how they keep their customers happy and coming back for more.

What does your flower shop do best?

“Customer service and attention to each customer. We are a smaller shop so that’s kind of where our niche is. We try to provide product that’s a little different than the average shop, especially in our dish gardens and gift lines. Customers have come to expect a wide variety of items to shop for in our store: from plush to candles, dish gardens to other little gift items. We try to select things that you wouldn’t find in a big box or grocery store.”

Do your customers respond to this?

“We think so, mainly because they can’t find them anyplace else. For instance, our garden flags and spinners from Premiere Kites. We’re the only one in the area that carries those products. And when we carry it, we like to have a good selection.”

Does this carry over into your floral design work as well?

“We try to be a little more creative in our designs. So that what they see here, the freshness and design, they’re not going to see in a grocery store or anywhere else. We try to be a little different than what they’re used to, and be a little more competitive in the pricing.”

What is the best thing about the Ft. Collins community?

“Ft. Collins has a very diverse population. Of course we have a major university, we have a lot of high-tech type industries here, and we have the everyday, blue collar worker. So, we have a very diverse clientele that comes in; a pretty good cross section of everybody. Plus Ft. Collins is a very very nice, beautiful city; low crime, very clean. The weather is usually pretty nice, so that’s a big plus.”

How does your shop help out in the community?

“We try to work closely with the local churches and nursing homes. We do things for people, and we don’t expect a lot of publicity or fanfare about it. It’s very personal.”

What are you looking forward to the most in 2013?

“Enjoyable, yet stressful, we look forward to Valentine’s Day every year. That is really a fun time for us. So many things that occur during Valentine’s Day, and everyone gets pretty excited about it. That’s our big time that we really like to take off on. We like to get our people excited about it, and have the most fun with us. The fun part for our staff  is all the extras, the balloons, cards, and upgrades into nicer arrangements.

What other plans do you have for 2013?

“We’re getting ready to go to a couple of shows. We’re going to Atlanta and to Florida; just to see what the rest of the country is doing, what the new trends are. We try to stay in tune to what our customers are looking for: colors, flowers and other things. We have a very loyal client base, we try to have what our customers expect. We try to really take care of what we got.

One of our biggest pluses the past few years is our wire service, Flower Shop Network (Aww thanks!!). Anytime we talk to another florist, it’s a great service, a beautiful service. That’s really been one of our pluses. Especially last year, we had a good response from our website, and we’re going to promote it more to our customers. We want to try to reach out to new customers in 2013.

If you’re in the Ft. Collins, Colorado area, make sure to stop by Flowerama on 1517 South Lemay for a great selection of unique gifts and, of course, excellent customer service!