Aren’t all online florists the same?

Of course not! There are several ways for flowers to be purchased online. Our goal is to educate you about your online purchase options and why we think purchasing flowers directly is the best way to shop. 

Types of Online Florists

• Floral wire services. Having been around for over 100 years, floral wire services connect a florist in one city with a florist in another.  As an example, let’s say you want to send Aunt Mary some red roses for her birthday. She lives in Philadelphia and you live in Chicago. You decide to place an online order with a large floral Internet company. The floral Internet company would serve as a middle man and locate a florist in Aunt Mary’s area, who would then send you flowers. The large Internet floral companies (the wire service) do not actually touch any flowers and they have no control over the quality and freshness the flowers sent. The wire service only brokers Aunt Mary’s rose order to a local florist in your area.
• Direct-to-consumer Florist.   Companies that sell flowers direct to consumer purchase flowers directly from flower farms, transport and briefly store the flowers in a refrigerated space, and lastly ship the flowers directly to the recipient. The direct-to-consumer florist takes responsibility for the flowers until they are delivered to recipient. Or in the example above, the direct-to-consumer florist handles the entire order from start to finish for Aunt Mary’s birthday red rose bouquet. We, at Overnight Flowers, are a direct-to-consumer florist as we pride ourselves on being able to provide you with best in class service as well as flowers.

What are the potential pitfalls of purchasing through a wire service?

We aren’t going to lie. Some florists and wire services provide excellent quality and value, while others will leave you disappointed. We hear the same criticisms time and time again. “When I’ve purchased flowers online, they arrive dead.” “The flowers didn’t match what I saw in the photo.” “I barely received any flowers for such an expensive purchase.”

When purchasing flowers online, you have options of how your flower order will be fulfilled. Often, these options may be hidden, so we would advise you to read the fine print to know what you are purchasing. 

• Flower Substitutions. One of the most important things to realize when with purchasing flowers online with a large Internet wire service is the potential issue of substitutions. If there is fine print related to the ability for a florist to make substitutions or if the photos represent examples only, there is a good chance that the flowers you’ve purchased online will not be the exact flowers that will be delivered. There are two simple reasons why substitutions occur. First, not all flowers are seasonally available and fresh in all areas of the country. Second, very few local florists have in their stores the full range of flowers seen on large Internet wire services.
• Floral quality and freshness. When you purchase a flower bouquet online through a national Internet floral wire service, it can be fulfilled by one of the thousands of flower shops in their network. Although many flower shops have great reputations, it is difficult to manage the quality of every flower shop within the wire service’s network. Therefore, there is a chance the flower shop may not be selling their flowers fast enough for you to receive the freshest and long-lasting flowers.
• Value for the money. Just like in any business, the more middlemen that are involved, the higher the prices. Flowers purchased through large Internet wire services are no exception. Not only do the flower wire services take a commission on the order, they also charge fees to florists to be part of their wire service network to receive orders. You, as a consumer, lose because money that should be put into the flowers is instead sent to the large Internet wire service companies. 

Why purchasing flowers direct from Overnight Flowers is superior?

• We fulfill all of our flower orders. We do not outsource.
• Our flowers are always fresh. Because of the high volume of flowers we sell, our entire floral inventory is replenished every one to two days. This means our flowers are more beautiful and last longer.
• What you see is what you get. We do not substitute our flowers. Period. We believe it is unfair to the customer and the recipient when this happens.   Instead, we want to ensure that you are happy with the quality of our bouquets, and we want you to get what you paid for. Due to our high sales volume, there is no need to substitute our flowers. How else are we going to earn your repeat business?
• We offer you more variety. We believe in our customers’ right to choose from a large variety of flowers. However, we also only select flowers that are in season and of the highest quality. This is our promise to you. If the flowers you want are not available on our site, it’s because you deserve the best flowers out there and we won’t let you settle for less.
• We are able control the quality of our flowers. Since we monitor every detail of our supply chain, we make sure that no detail is left to chance. We geek out of the technical specs, so you don’t have to.
• We provide you with delivery tracking. When you purchase flowers from a wire service, delivery tracking is generally limited. With Overnight Flowers, we put the tracking information into your hands so you know exactly when your flowers will be delivered. Who has time to guess or wait?   We know your time is precious.
• More value for your money. One of the most important attributes of all is value for money. We cut out the middle man. As a result, there are no fees paid to the large Internet floral wire companies that reduce the value of your bouquet. By cutting out the middle man, we are able to give you lower prices and more value for your money.
• Always Free Overnight Shipping. We do not have any hidden shipping or care and handling charges or fees. We built our business with trust, not by hitting our customer with fees at the end of their purchase.