2008
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HFA presents Teleflora Live!
What a great event - HFA and Teleflora teamed together to bring a high energy, hands on, vendors galore mini-convention in place of our usual 3 day event.
Teleflora brought in Hitomi Gilliam as the featured designer for the stage show and a hands on workshop. Hitomi has been featured many times in the Teleflora magazine and other floral publications as well as having several design books she has written and designed for. Smithers Oasis sponsored Gary Meehan for hands on workshops and Michael Derouin. All workshops were filled to overflowing and everyone came away with great experiences as well as new information to share when they return to their shops on Monday.
We had several business programs talking about our changing businesses. Teleflora's Tom Butler talked about business trends and some things we all need to be aware of as we build our businesses profitably. Dave Anderson of Smithers Oasis told us of new products Oasis is working on and current market trends to help us compete in the marketplace today. Shane Leath of Equiflor gave a presentation on Customer service and to never ask " how much do you want to spend". Shane also brought Buzz the Bee to greet attendees and share "Bee Cookies" at lunch. Mark Schaefer of Teleflora showed their new technology system just for entry level shops with point of sale and many features available now.
The stage show with Hitomi gave many new style ideas and techniques that everyone could use. She pointed out many things and techniques to use in our shops to increase interest and bring customers in to see what is new.
Marie Ackerman of Teleflora commentated the stage portions of the programs and surprised several designers that had participated in the design competition. Four designers were called to the stage and given containers, flowers and supplies to make a design in a 6 minute time frame. This was a real crowd pleaser and declared a tie. This was fun for everyone to see and realize how short a time 6 minutes is. Contestants received a book of Hitomi's designs for their stage appearances.
Prizes were drawn for the 50/50, silent auction winning bidders were announced and Design competition winners were announced. There were 10 advanced contestants, and 3 apprentice designers. Winners were, apprentice Karuna Russell- Park Florist, advanced First Place, Crystal Garnett-Kitty's Flowers, Second Place, Debbie Gunnell - Country Florist, Third Place, Karen Watts- Raimondi's Florist. Peoples choice were Apprentice, Karuna Russell Advanced, Debbie Gunnell.
A special thank you to all of our vendors for your support and attendance, Floral wholesalers for Floral products used for stage and workshop presentations, Marie Gaydos and many of the Raimondi employees for all their organization and manpower to make this happen, and our Board of Directors for their work and help the night before and Sunday for the programs.
Thanks for attending the event to those of you that came, and for those of you who couldn't you missed a great day of programs. Keep up with us we will have other programs coming.
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