Consumer Beware: Many choices for Valentine’s flowers

It’s not only the Super Bowl for football this weekend; it’s the Super Bowl for florists as Valentine’s Day approaches. Consumer Man Herb Weisbaum, appearing on Seattle’s Morning News, had things to watch out for as those flower orders are being sent.

There are many ways to purchase flowers

“I think everybody knows that there are a whole bunch of options,” Wiesbaum, contributing editor for Checkbook.org said on KIRO Newsradio. “These days you can get some great flowers at supermarkets, especially the big stores like Costco. Costco has great flowers at really good prices.”

Weisbaum said the real question is how do you combine the best price with the highest quality.

“Checkbook Undercover found that prices for flowers at supermarkets averaged about 60% less than the traditional floors. That’s a significant difference,” Weisbaum explained. “They also found the big price differences between supermarket chains, so they’re not all the same.”

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A dozen roses range from $10 to more than $35 at supermarkets,

“Chances are that if you go with the retail stores, the quality is going to be the best you can get,” Weisbaum said. “They keep those flowers at about 33 degrees in the in the cooler, so they keep them at the peak of freshness, and they’re going to probably last longer and look better when they arrive,.”

There is a big price gap from florist-to-florist. Prices ranged from a low of $23 for long-stemmed roses to more than $100.

“When thinking about the ‘mom and pop’ florists, the also have delivery as a service that can probably drive up the price, as well.”

The price can range from $10 to $50-$100 around the holiday for the delivery charge.

Beware of online ads for florists

Weisbuam strongly advises to be careful of online ads for florists because it may be a floral broker in disguise.

“These brokers, these shoddy businesses, do this for flowers, and they do it for plumbers, and they do it for electricians,” Weisbaum explained. “But what they are is these just shops that set up, and then they take your order and then they farm it out to some local florist. You have no idea who you’re talking to, and if something goes wrong, you really don’t know who to talk to, and that’s why, if you hook up with one of these things, go to Google Street Map and make sure there’s really a local address for somebody you’re talking to.”

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Weisbaum suggests working with a local florist so there’s no third party involved.

“Then, if something goes wrong, you’ve got somebody to go back to.”

Weisbaum suggested a free link for KIRO Newsradio listeners and MyNorthwest readers: click here.

Bill Kaczaraba is a content editor at MyNorthwest. You can read his stories here. Follow Bill on X, formerly known as Twitter, here and email him here.