Four Benefits of Choosing a Local Florist
Local Pittsburgh and Bethel Park flowers are important because they sustain small farmers with income, encourage a healthy environment, are very unique, and last much longer than blooms shipped from miles away.
When choosing a local Pittsburgh florist that specializes in locally produced products, you’re making a choice that supports our ecosystem and you are receiving a superior bouquet.
How Local Flowers and Florists Help Farmers
Pittsburgh and its surrounding regions, like Bethel Park, are filled with small, family-run farms that produce stunning flowers. Here is a list of some specific farms Redolent Floral works with.
These hardworking people are providing a critical service to the land and to customers. By planting a variety of flower crops, they are encouraging a diverse array of pollinators. Pollinators are crucial to a healthy food landscape and are often in danger. At Redolent, we specifically love working with farms like Sol Patch Garden, that employ organic practices.
Farming is very physically intensive work, and so much is left up to Mother Nature. Climate change continues to make farm work unpredictable, with a great deal of variation in income streams. This can mean that citizens playing this crucial role sometimes barely make enough to sustain a healthy income.
By purchasing goods directly from and sourced by local farms, you are directly making a difference in the lives of farmers. Farmers depend on this income to keep their operations afloat.
Local Flowers Help The Environment
Most people are familiar with hothouse roses and other types of flowers traditionally found in florist windows and websites.
What you may not know is that these flowers undergo quite a journey to reach your vase. This trip is laden with carbon emissions and other forms of waste.
Did you know that over half the flowers that are picked don’t even make it to your arrangement, due to their delicate nature?
By shopping locally, you’re helping preserve the beauty of so many flowers. This reduces unnecessary waste and mitigates the extreme carbon emissions that go into shipping.
Steps Involved in Traditional Flower Delivery
To summarize, flower delivery typically looks like this:
- First, farmers grow flowers for distribution. South America ships 90-95% of all flowers in the United States.
- Importers or brokers meet the flowers, typically at ports in Miami. Importers sell and spread the shipment across the United States to regional hubs.
- Flowers need to travel hundreds, sometimes thousands of miles to reach their destinations. On average, this whole process takes 17 days.
- Wholesale distributors take inventory and get the flowers across the country.
- Finally, many online retailers (like Teleflora) simply contract with local flower stores to finish off the supply chain. As a reminder, at least 50% of all grown flowers do not survive this journey.
At the end of this lengthy process, the customer is receiving an arrangement that is already weeks old.
With local Bethel Park flowers, you are receiving or gifting blooms that are less than a week away from when they were soaking up the sun. This translates to a longer vase life, and more bang for your buck.
Locally Sourced Flowers are More Unique
Local farms in our area are able to grow a huge variety of blossoms. This is largely because they do not need to be hardy enough to withstand weeks of transportation.
This leads to farmers being able to grow whatever kinds of flowers they truly want. They can also expand their offerings to florists and customers.
More unique flowers are naturally appealing and eye-catching, especially when given as a gift to a loved one. Locally grown flowers never look like they came directly from a grocery store. Their one-of-a-kind beauty means that you can really show someone how much you care.
Subsequently, local flowers are inherently seasonal, meaning that farmers can produce different varieties at different times of the year.
So, if you have a Pittsburgh floral subscription, you’re able to fully observe these changes in your home. This could look like peonies in May, hydrangeas in June, and zinnias in July.
Then, dahlias in August, cosmos in September, and marigolds in October!
Local Pittsburgh and Bethel Park Flowers Last Longer and are Less Expensive
Redolent Floral flowers are hand-picked within days of delivery. We assemble bouquets with love in our Bethel Park studio.
When you take proper care of flowers at home, they can last much longer than blooms that were cut weeks ago.
It’s also important to remember that every person involved in the traditional flower delivery supply chain needs to be compensated. These middlemen take their cut, which translates to higher prices for the end customer.
At Redolent Floral, our goal is to offer something unique for customers. We want to truly capture the organic beauty found in nature while keeping the planet in mind. This is why we focus on a “garden style.”
Redolent Floral offers something we had not seen in Pittsburgh – floral delivery that truly celebrates and respects the environment. We hope these arrangements bring you joy each and every day. Shop our floral subscriptions and bouquets here!
