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REVIEWJJ 



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MEMORIAL DAY and 



^ THE FLORISTS 



Large as are the quantities of floivers sold for Christmas and Easter. 

 Memorial day calls for more blooms than any other one special flower 

 day in the year. The increase has been something notable since the use 

 of printers' ink became general. And yet the retailers who have scored 

 the greatest gains have done so with the aid of artificial material. 



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1 





O YOU favor featuring ar- 

 tificial material in flower 

 stores! Whether you do 

 or not, you will have to 

 admit that the use of sup- 

 ply-house stock has in- 

 creased of late years even 

 faster than the use of 

 flowers has increased. Per- 

 haps a part of this is due 

 to the merchandising ability of the 

 bright men in the supply business, but 

 the real reason lies in the fact that the 

 successful selling methods of the gen- 

 eral stores may more easily be applied 

 to imperishable articles than to cut 

 flpwers — more easily applied even by a 

 retail florist. 



If you look back a few years you will 

 recall the time when Easter was the 

 one big day, when there was no second. 

 Now it is different, decidedly different. 



How It Came About. 



It is not that Easter has become less 

 important — it still is THE big day 

 with a lot of florists; but Christmas has 

 come to the front as possibly the most 

 important day on the florists' calendar, 

 not only because of the quantities of 

 stock sold, but because the prices ob- 

 tained are the highest 

 of the year. And 

 while Christmas has 

 been making its strides 

 along the lines of qual- 

 ity and good prices. 

 Memorial day has been 

 making an even better 

 record along the lines 

 of quantity consumed 

 at moderate prices. 

 There are parts of the 

 country to which Me- 

 morial day has not yet 

 penetrated, but in 

 many a good sized 

 flower c e nt e r more 

 flowers are sold for 

 May 30 than for any 

 other one day in ttie 

 year. 



Memorial day was 

 first observed in 1868, 

 when it was estab- 

 lished by the G. A. E. 

 as an annual national 

 holiday for the deco- 

 ration of the graves of 

 those who died in the 

 Civil war, but it was 

 not until a few years 

 ago that the event 

 came to have any im- 

 portance for florists. 



So long as it was an old soldiers' day 

 it did not really count in flower 

 selling. 



Wben tlie Public Game In. 



Perhaps it was only coincidence, but 

 the general public began to observe Me- 

 morial day at the time retail florists 

 discovered newspaper advertising to be 

 a powerful factor in influencing the use 

 of flowers. When it began to be the 

 fashion for the general public to take 

 flowera to the cemeteries May 30, the 

 trade naturally got a big boost. For a 

 time it was a question of supplying the 

 demand. It early became apparent that 

 Memorial day never will stand high 

 prices, as people will not buy expensive 

 flowers to leave in the cemeteries, but 

 that immense quantities of the showier 

 kinds of flowers could be sold at mod- 

 erate prices. This was the peony 

 growers' opportunity and it resulted in 

 the planting of an immense acreage in 

 the sections of the country that are 

 reasonably sure of a mid-May blooming 

 season. Although all other flowers are 

 in demand, the peony has come to be 

 the special flower of Memorial day, just 

 as the chrysanthemum is of Thanks- 

 giving, the Beauty of Christmas, the 



Getting Ready for the Memorial Day Wreath Rush. 



violet of St. Valentine's day and the 

 lily of Easter. And of late years the 

 abundance of peonies has precluded any 

 shortage of stock for May 30 — it has 

 given the retailers the chance to push 

 for business with the assurance that 

 they would not be running prices up 

 on themselves, destroying their profit. 



Then Came the Magnolia. 



The greater part of the cut flowers 

 sold for Memorial day still go to the 

 cemeteries in the form of cheap bou- 

 quets, especially in the country towns, 

 but in the cities wreaths always have 

 enjoyed a good sale. It was the ad- 

 vent of the prepared magnolia leaf, 

 however, that gave the wreath business 

 its real boost. In the beginning 

 wreaths were not only too expensive 

 for general use, but they took so much 

 time in the making that a store could 

 turn out only a limited number. The 

 magnolia leaf solved both difficulties — 

 it is cheap and the wreaths can be 

 made up weeks ahead, to be trimmed 

 by the addition of a few flowers just 

 before delivery. "But why add natu- 

 ral flowers!" It was the question, of 

 course, of a merchant, not a florist. 

 Perhaps the suggestion first came with 

 an order for a wreath 

 to be sent out of 

 town, where natural 

 flowers were sure to 

 perish. 



In the wreath of pre- 

 pared magnolia leaves 

 trimmed with quite 

 natural looking arti- 

 ficial roses certain 

 flower stores found 

 just what was needed 

 to give scope to the 

 merchandising abilities 

 of the proprietors. 



When the artificial 

 wreath began to be a 

 factor in the Memorial 

 day business of certain 

 stores, a good many 

 florists refused to 

 countenance it — re- 

 fused utterly, with 

 righteous indignation. 

 Not by any means all, 

 but a good many have 

 since come to it. 

 They could not stand 

 the pressure of seeing 

 "the other fellow" 

 get the business. Many 

 a man does what his 

 competitor does, re- 

 gardless of his own 



