DRCKMBER 14. 1899. 



The Weekly Florists' Review. 



51 



Preparing for Christmas. 



This will assuredly be a 'ijIluU 

 diristnias," Every retailer of note lias 

 made iirovisions for it. and it is only a 

 possible' severity of weatlier tliat will 

 in any way injure their hopes for this 

 branch of the trade. This vigorously 

 increasing growth of the plant trade 

 for Christmas is a matter to be regret- 

 ted on all sides. It bodes the greatest 

 evil to the cut flower trade and that is 

 the great foundation stone, aye. the 

 principal pillar of our business. It is 

 undesirable to split the Easter trade. 

 It is inconvenient and troublesome for 

 retailers to handle plants at Christmas 

 —but what were we to do? The un- 

 certainty, the poor quality of stock 

 and the exorbitant prices were not 

 alone sufficient to impair the sanity of 

 the retailers, but it stunned the pub- 

 lie and would shortly have destroyed 

 the Christmas trade altogether. 



In our business perhaps more than 

 in any other it is "live and learn." It 

 is bad policy to lie continually disput- 

 ing and trying to fly in the face of 

 facts. High prices were never condu- 

 cive to the expansion of trade. If 

 growers cannot see the error of de- 

 manding extraordinary prices for salt- 

 ed flowers at Christmas, there are 

 many hundreds of houses devoted to 

 cut flowers today which will either be 

 turned into plant houses or wrecks in 

 a few years from now. 



It is a source of much satisfaction 

 to be able to go to your plantsman, see 

 the plants, and know what you are to 

 pay for the goods weeks or months be- 

 fore you need them. Whereas with the 

 cut flower element one is continually 

 on the gridiron until the very last day 

 and then mostly all is disappointment. 

 Plants last longer and give more sat- 

 isfaction, of course they do— liut they 

 cause a decrease in the demand for 

 flowers simply because they last so 

 long. The successful or artistic retail 

 florist has powerful influence with the 

 public, he is a more important factor 

 than the grower in the advancement of 

 floriculture. The American people love 

 flowers and will have them either on 

 the plant or cut. We are in favor of 

 the live and let live policy and would 

 like to see every one succeed, but if 

 any. element is looking towards exact- 



ing ;ill the wealth uud pleasure there 

 is in life, why, we agree with teaching 

 them a lesson. 



Holly is a great disappointment this 

 year. What we have seen so far i? v;ry 

 poor, compared with that of other 

 years. The reason given is that all 

 the available holly trees were butch- 

 ered up last year by all manner of 

 speculators and it will be years before 

 the outrage can be effaced. This same 

 thing is fast depleting the American 

 landscape from much of its great 

 charms in the way of evergreens. The 

 Jersey and Connecticut coasts were 

 once beautiful with stately hemlock, 

 juniper, arborvitae andtir, now scarce- 

 ly a decent looking one remains, and 

 we are informed 'tis so all through the 

 New England states. Even the woods 

 of Maine are being dismantled with- 

 out reason or cause. Over a quarter 

 of a million Christmas trees are 

 shipped to New York every year. They 

 are mostly pileil up along the docks m 

 West street. Grocers and butciiers anu 

 all manner of dealers handle and dis- 

 pose of this stock. 



Now let us see what we are going to 

 have and what we are going to do for 

 Christmas! We are busy on wreaths 

 to hang in windows. They are going 

 to be very popular again this year. 

 Now you know if you want well made 

 wreaths you must have them specially 

 done for you. Holly of course will 

 lead. Make the wreath good and fjill; 

 you can pack the inside with the poor 

 material or with Princess pine, but 

 have them good and round on both 

 sides and have your extra special ones 

 made in laureate shape, that is, both 

 sides facing up, a cluster of berries at 

 the bottom, with a good cluster of nar- 

 row ribbon, or it will do without. A 

 good hollv wreath is worth from $1 

 to ?2. 



There will be a few wreaths of mis- 

 tletoe tied with berry colored gauze, 

 but they will not be as popular as the 

 bunches. Princess pine wreatns made 

 round and full, with or without red 

 immortelle stars, are going to s?ll well. 

 so are laureate shaped wreaths of 

 boxwood and cluster of berries. There 

 is not going to be anything specially 

 new in this line of work. The only 

 thing is that the hest work will sell 

 first, and we know many a good cus- 



tomer has been caught through having 

 finely made wreaths on exhibition f o • 

 Christmas. If! you use ribbon it should 

 not be cheap looking nor too small. 

 Silks will be better than satins, but 

 neither should be the best part of the 

 work. 



Speaking of ribbons there promises 

 lo be quite enough of it useil this sea- 

 son. Don't abuse it and be careful of 

 the color harmony. ICverything is suii- 

 liosed to be briglil and cheerful for the 

 great festival, and whilst we may take 

 a greater latitude in our fanciful crea- 

 tions there are often times if we could 

 only see our work midst the surround- 

 ings they often get among we would 

 have cause to disown it. This applies 

 lo the milliner florist who cannot han- 

 dle ,1 carnation or violet without want- 

 ing to put a sash of ribbon around it. 

 and the exuberant crepe paper artist 

 who imagines every plant a doll and 

 dresses it accordingly. As we have 

 often said before, anything is almost 

 preferable to a dirty plant pot. but, 

 heavens, Where's the sense of choking 

 up the plant? 



'i'he best stores this year will show 

 their plants in baskets. Some very 

 fine work is seen already. Most of the 

 baskets are of green luffia and the 

 shapes are mostly after the classical 

 antique vases, though there are some 

 fine effects made from palm fiber in 

 natural color. Small orange trees look 

 elegant and have a native touch about 

 them in these basket vases. All man- 

 ner of plants will be sold singly, but 

 most will be made up in baskets to 

 .sell for $5, $10. ?1.5 and upwards. Al- 

 most any variety of flowering plant 

 in good condition will sell well; top 

 the pot off with green moss, holly or 

 small ferns. You are liable to sell 

 quite a few palms, ferns and foliage 

 plants, but must put them where they 

 can be seen. 



In the matter of cut flowers one can 

 never be positive until the last. Cat- 

 tleyas will be scarce: they are now- 

 bringing .50 cents wholesale and should 

 not be sold for less than $10 or $12. 

 that is, fairly good ones. Cypripe- 

 diums will he plentiful: 1214 cents is 

 what they are costing now and they 

 are too plentiful to raise very much In 

 price; they will retail at $4 or $-5. Den- 

 drobium phalaenopsis are plentiful 

 and will retail at 15 or 20 cents a 

 flower. Orchids are almost a nonen- 

 tity for Christmas. They are mostly 

 used to fill the delicate little vases 

 customers send you to take care of 

 weeks before. Valley, paper -whites 

 and Romans promise to be plentiful 

 and cannot be very high in price. It 

 is the fine grades of roses, carnations 

 and violets which make us anxious, 

 and from what we have seen there will 

 be lots of carnations, few violets, and 

 not a large quantity of extra fine 

 roses, and from what we see now 

 prices will not differ very much. 

 Plants will interfere with and keep the 

 market rates steadier. 



Harrisiis will sell for good figures, 

 say $.5 or $6. New flowers will be in 

 demand. We hear one new carnation 

 in New York is retailing now at IfG 



