ProFlowers: The E-commerce Business Offering Next-Day Delivery Service
ProFlowers is an e-commerce business that ships flowers all across the country and even offers a next-day delivery service.
This article is more than 2 years old
Giving flowers is a custom that is seen consistently throughout the year. There is no off-season, nor is there a bad time for it with the many holidays and birthdays that fit right into its wheelhouse. You can go to the florist to make your selections, or you can use a next-day flower delivery service, such as ProFlowers, to do the job for you.
PROFLOWERS OFFERS DELIVERY THROUGH SHIPPING OR LOCAL FLORISTS
ProFlowers is an e-commerce company, which means it doesn’t have a physical store. Instead, you go to their website to start your flower order. Once there, not only will you see the hundreds of flower and bouquet choices they offer, but also the holidays they cater to.
As a flower delivery company, ProFlowers does offer next-day flower delivery. They offer it in two different forms: flowers that are shipped in a box or flowers that are arranged by a florist. The flowers that are florist arranged typically come in a vase and can differ from the pictures you may see online, though there is a specific reason for it.
As Proflowers is not a physical store, their orders go out to different floral companies across the country. Not all florists are going to have the same exact setup as you see online, though they do make every attempt to get as close as possible. You will see that flowers or bouquets arranged by a florist are typically more expensive than their boxed counterpart.
As for the boxed flowers, they should arrive exactly as seen online. These are typically arranged and boxed at the same location, so what you see is what you should get. Also with these, Proflowers will give you the choice to buy the vase or not on certain bouquets and they will also include instructions on how to care for your flowers along with feeding packets.
THE COMPANY WAS SUED FOR FALSELY ADVERTISING FRESH FLOWERS
Although FTD is now the principal owner of ProFlowers, their history is a messy one. ProFlowers was later called “Provide Commerce” so it could offer more products than just flowers, and in 2006 was bought by Liberty Media Corporation for $477 million in cold hard cash.
But a year prior to that, FTD sued ProFlowers. The lawsuit was filed in August 2005, and the suit was for false advertising and unfair competition. FTD was questioning ProFlowers’ claim that their flowers were shipped directly from the fields, and that they never used a middleman.
FTD claimed that ProFlowers stored many of their flowers in refrigerated warehouses. ProFlowers fought back, denied the claims, and countersued. Things bounced back and forth for a year when both parties finally settled.
This wasn’t the only legal issue ProFlowers would be involved in. Barely two months after FTD went after ProFlowers, two more law firms took their shots at the online flower company claiming deceptive marketing practices. Like FTD, they also went after ProFlowers’ claim of flower freshness.
ProFlowers countered, saying it was a copycat lawsuit. Although ProFlowers never admitted to doing any wrong, the suit was settled with ProFlowers offering a $10 store credit to the millions of customers who were involved in the lawsuit as well as paying the $250,000 in attorney’s fees and changing the way they do their advertising.
Two more lawsuits were brought against Provide Commerce, one in 2009 and another in 2011. Both suits had to do with fraud as ProFlowers customers unknowingly were signed up for a service that charged a monthly fee. Who knew online flower shops could be so devious?
Things changed dramatically for ProFlowers in 2014 when their former enemy became their new boss. This is when FTD agreed to purchase ProFlowers and its gifting brands from Provide Commerce for a cool $430 million. This purchase created a company that produced revenue of over $1 billion.
FTD got a whole lot for the $430 million it put out. On top of bringing in ProFlowers, it also got Cherry Moon Farms, Personal Creations, and Shari’s Berries. Someone came up smelling like roses.
JARED POLIS STARTED PROFLOWERS AND IS NOW THE CURRENT GOVERNOR OF COLORADO
ProFlowers was the 1998 brainstorm of Jared Polis. If the name sounds familiar, it should. Polis is the current Governor of Colorado and has quite a colorful history.
Even before Polis brought life to ProFlowers, he was already knee-deep into business. While in college, he co-founded the internet access provider American Information Systems (AIS). In 1996, the ever-busy Polis then co-founded bluemountain.com, a free electronic greeting card website, that he held onto for three years.
In 1999, Polis made the wise move to sell this electronic greeting card website to Excite@Home for $430 million in company stock and another $350 million in cash. Polis was well on his way to making his vast wealth, and his foray into politics would follow shortly. He first served one term (from 2001-2007) on the Colorado State Board of Education.
There are a bunch of firsts on Jared Polis’ road to Governorship. Polis, as an openly gay man, became the very first same-sex parent to get elected to the U.S. Congress. When he was finally elected as the Colorado Governor, he became the first openly gay man and only the second openly LGBT person to be elected governor of a U.S. state. The first was Oregon’s Kate Brown.
PROFLOWERS PROVIDES QUALITY BOUQUETS IN A TIMELY MATTER
Falling under the FTD umbrella has not changed the way Proflowers continues to do business nor has it lessened the quality of service. Of course, all of this is dependent on where you live in the United States and where you plan on sending your flowers. Time of year (holidays) may also play a big part in availability.
According to those over at Reviewed, who gave ProFlowers a test drive, they were extremely pleased with the results of not only the florist-arranged bouquets they received but also with the quality of boxed flowers they ordered. One of the only issues they could come up with was the fact that the final product didn’t look quite like the picture that was provided when the bouquet was ordered. It didn’t seem to faze them too much as they concluded that they would for sure order from ProFlowers again.
