Page 40 - BusinessWest June 13, 2022

used to go to flower shows with my mom and my aunts when I was a kid, so I’ve always been around flowers.
“My father died when I was very young, and after he died, my mom went to work part time in a flower shop, so I had that exposure,” she went on. “It’s always been an interest of mine, and I’ve always arranged my own flowers.”
But making flowers a business is challenging in the current marketplace, she told BusinessWest, adding that there are still plenty of traditional flower shops in the region and supermarkets in nearly every area community with huge floral departments.
Upon surveying this scene, she decided she needed something decidedly different, and by that she meant the experience of choosing and buying flowers. And she decided that a mobile model would set Blooms apart and provide that unique experience.
“It’s kind of like a food truck, but with flow- ers,” she said, adding that she does pop-ups at the Longmeadow Shops and other locations such as wineries and breweries, and will also appear at events like charity golf tournaments. She has also made appearances at businesses — the Big E was one of them — that are showing appreciation to employees by giving them flowers.
Her first real challenge, and maybe the big- gest in her estimation, was simply finding a van in which to operate — a difficult task when inven- tory is short and prices have skyrocketed.
“When I was looking last year, there were zero; there was nothing out there for a few months,” she recalled, adding that at one point she was in line to get a used model but eventually scored a new one and in less time than she anticipated.
Last November, she went next level and opened the studio at the Mill at Crane Pond in space by the loading dock that was formerly occu- pied by a machine shop. There, she sees some foot traffic for flowers and also conducts some workshops.
Moving forward, she is shaping and reshaping the business model and working to create enough revenue streams to see the business through the
“
still evolving. I’m rewriting the business plan regularly.”
months that don’t have those busy flower days, like Mother’s Day, Valentine’s Day, Easter, and even Thanksgiving, which was more lucrative than she imagined it would be.
Such streams include everything from event planning, something she has done for years, and providing flowers for such gatherings, to an array of gifts she sells at the studio — most of which are intended for marrying couples — to work helping area residents with their home gardens.
“Blooms has evolved, and it’s still evolving,” she explained. “I’m rewriting the business plan regularly; some things have worked, and some things haven’t. The latest incarnation is to focus on as much events business as possible, and try to book as many large events, such as weddings and corporate gatherings, as possible.”
Elaborating, she said she wants to create more added value at such events by providing take-
away gifts such as bouquets, or staging work- shops for attendees on making arrangements, an interactive experience she calls a “Blooms bar.”
Plant Manager
All this is part of an entrepreneurial experience that is, in many ways, what she expected. But in other ways, it’s been much more than she could have imagined.
“Iknewitwasgoingtobealotofwork,butit is a lot more work than thought it was going to be because I’m just one person,” she explained. “I have friends and family that help when I need it for larger events, but for the day to day, I’m han- dling all of it — managing the books, the buying, the marketing, the social media, and the delivery; it’s much more than I thought.
“I do have to remember that it’s good to put things down and put things away,” she went on. “I really have to focus on staying organized, plan- ning my time, and budgeting my time so that it’s not completely taking over. But that’s also the blessing of being an entrepreneur, because you can make your own schedule.”
Overall, the highs and lows, up and downs, have certainly been palatable, because D’Agostino is in a place she wants to be, figura- tively, but also quite literally.
“There aren’t really any bad days, but at the end of the worst day, I look next to me, and I’m delivering, or surrounded by, or working with, all this beauty, and that’s really important to me.” u
George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]
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WOMEN IN BUSINESS
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