Website Closers® presents a brand that has been operating for well over 100 years in the Event & Floral Supplies industry. This valuable acquisition allows a buyer to acquire a historical brand that has weathered the ups and downs of markets and still continues to be a consistent performer.
The business operates across multiple sales channels, including Retail, Wholesale, and eCommerce, and has long-standing relationships and trust built with major wholesalers. Their status as one of the oldest Floral Supplier wholesalers in the country has net them well-earned brand recognition that newer competitors would be hard pressed to achieve.
They boast multiple large warehouses that are well-stocked with their branded products, allowing them to offer everything their customers might need to decorate weddings, bar mitzvahs, funerals, and various other business and special events.
This company is an excellent opportunity for any buyer interested in acquiring a brand with strong profit margins, thousands of wholesale accounts, and a growing online presence. Their century of experience has given them a dedicated audience with over 2,000 B2B accounts that include wholesalers, retailers and online shops, an outstanding 80% Repeat Customer Rate, and the knowledge they need to build a capable and qualified team to manage their day-to-day operations.
Business Broker Takeaways
1. Established Reputation. Launched in 1915, the brand has spent the time since their launch building valuable connections with vendors and customers and making a name for themselves as a go-to source for just about anything that a flower shop or event planner might need.Their SKU roster has grown to over 10,000 SKUs and includes a diverse range of common and specialized floral supplies such as vases, artificial flowers, decor for weddings and parties, and more specialized products for funeral parlors.
2. Diverse Revenue Channels. While the brand has thrived as a retailer, and still maintains a warehouse and a presence in the New York metro and Tri-State area that allows them to directly sell their branded products to regional shops, they have seen incredible results with their expansion to eCommerce. Between their D2C website and their Amazon storefront, Amazon has proven to be the most profitable, and has grown to be the largest segment of the business today. They have over 500 products available on the storefront, most of which are their own brand, and consistently generate a respectable number of 5-star revenues.
3. Growth Tactics in Place. The company has not sat on their laurels waiting for a new buyer to scale them. Instead, they have taken matters into their own hands by continuing to adapt and implement significant enhancements. For instance, they have recently added an Inventory Management System to improve their working capital position and to switch their order fulfillment from paper to digital pick routing and product scanning, reducing human error by up to 90%. Their stock and fulfillment operations at their facilities have been divided into specific areas that include receiving, order staging, picking stock, and replenishing stock in order to minimize errors and enable faster retrieval.
Finally, they transitioned their Software to ODOO, which offers benefits such as scanning and matching items in their warehouse to a specific shelf location, and digitally picking every sales order with a scanned matching control.
Marketing and Operations
The brand’s products are packaged by their suppliers and delivered to them in boxes, which are then stored at their warehouses. Their inventory is handled by a business software solution, and Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) is used to handle their online orders. Each box is branded with the company name and logo. Their daily operations are managed by 23 employees, which include 3 in their main office, 3 in the Amazon division, 7 warehouse workers, and 3 drivers. Though the company has traditionally advertised their products through print and digital catalogs, they have adapted to include email marketing and digital ads on Amazon in their modern marketing campaign.
The brand doesn’t rely on any one product for their profits, and while sales are consistent throughout the year, they do see spikes around certain holidays. These include Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day – which stands as their largest sales holiday – and Christmas.
Scale Opportunities
As seasoned as the brand might be, there are still several scale opportunities that a buyer could pursue for short-term and long-term growth alike. They could incorporate additional digital marketing efforts such as a blog on their website, a video marketing campaign on YouTube and TikTok, and a social media marketing campaign that includes the use of affiliates and influencers. This move, especially when paired with PPC, would attract more consumers than ever, boost their profits, and allow them to better target new wholesale accounts across the nation- or, potentially, across the globe.
The brand could further diversify their revenue by launching online sales channels on new platforms, such as Walmart.com, Wayfair, and Overstock. They could also add to their wholesale and online accounts alike by expanding into the live flower business, which would likely significantly add to their profits since they have a proven sales team ready to market new products.
Conclusion
This polished commercial operation will offer their new owner remarkable annual profits of nearly $4 million, a position as a leading national wholesale provider that successfully transitioned to eCommerce, and phenomenal long-term potential. Customers are increasingly shopping for flowers and related supplies online, and with the brand’s expert knowledge of the market, they are in a great position to capitalize on this growing demand.
