‘You only see black tulips and blue roses in the Netherlands’
How are your sales going?
‘We are not complaining, but revenues have been reduced severely since the start of the crisis in 2008 and have not yet returned to the original levels. Expenditure on flowers and plants has been under pressure for seven years now. Flowers have become an item almost exclusively for giving; people do still buy plants for themselves. If we believe in the seven fat and seven lean years, we should be out of misery soon.’
Has your policy changed accordingly?
‘We have not increased the prices for over eight years, while our costs have increased threefold. Furthermore, we have scrapped supermarket products from our assortment, and now focus on the added value in upmarket sales.’
Has the crisis fueled the demand for local products?
‘Not in particular. Although the Polish are known to be chauvinistic, we don’t notice this in their consumption behaviour, and they remain very internationally oriented. We do sell domestic tulips, lilies, peonies, and freesias, but the icing on the cake comes from Holland, which our customers understand and appreciate. You only see black tulips and blue roses in the Netherlands. On the other hand, we also import Convallaria majalis. The Polish love them, but are not allowed to pick them in the woods. Greenpeace activists monitor this aggressively when they are not too busy at the North Pole, so we import them from the Netherlands in bulk.’
Which products do you mainly sell?
‘Throughout the year, we mainly sell roses, carnations, tulips, lilies, and chrysanthemums. About 75% comes from the Netherlands, Turkey, and Africa. The remaining 25% comes from local growers through the wholesale market in Warsaw. I am very pleased with the Dutch assortment, its quality, and diversity. It is the only country where I can find the full range of products every season. My only complaint is that your products remind me more of factories and production lines than of nature. Customers are filled with nostalgia for the days of yore, for man-made products, made from the heart, for flowers that smell and are not clones of each other.’
Do you have a lot of competition?
‘Following the fall of communism, we have had freedom of enterprise and therefore a lot more competition. We face the most competition from supermarket chains, online suppliers without a shop, and wedding planners who have their own flower service.’
Company: Kwiaciarnia Flora
Location: Warsaw, Poland
Assortment: 60% flowers, 30% plants, 10% other
Specialties: None
Number of employees: 7–10
