Episode 050: Vonda and Lori chat with Ace Berry AIFD, PFCI about his experience as a participant on the HBO Max Show, Full Bloom. Tune in and hear Ace's take on everything from the process of selecting the participants to how he dealt with each new challenge. Ace wants to pay it forward and share his experience in a few different ways. Spoiler Alert: We discuss the winner in this podcast.
Don't miss the episodes!
Stream on HBOMax
Full Bloom Description:
Inviting us into a vibrant and wondrous world, Full Bloom finds ten talented and innovative up-and-coming florists bringing their spectacular creative visions to a grueling but gorgeous competition series. In each episode, the budding botanical artists are put to the test in both individual and team challenges that determine whose stems get cut – and who remains in the running for the career-changing $100,000 grand prize to kickstart their business. Floral masterminds Simon Lycett, Elizabeth Cronin, and Maurice Harris host and judge, bringing their invaluable experience, discerning eyes, and hot takes to the flower shop to determine who will be the first-ever Full Bloom champion.
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Business and Pleasure of Flowers
Flower Clique
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Sponsored by:
Flower Clique
Flower Clique Prep School
Real Life Retail Florist
Episode 050: Vonda and Lori chat with Ace Berry AIFD, PFCI about his experience as a participant on the HBO Max Show, Full Bloom. Tune in and hear Ace's take on everything from the process of selecting the participants to how he dealt with each new challenge. Ace wants to pay it forward and share his experience in a few different ways. Spoiler Alert: We discuss the winner in this podcast.
Don't miss the episodes!
Stream on HBOMax
Full Bloom Description:
Inviting us into a vibrant and wondrous world, Full Bloom finds ten talented and innovative up-and-coming florists bringing their spectacular creative visions to a grueling but gorgeous competition series. In each episode, the budding botanical artists are put to the test in both individual and team challenges that determine whose stems get cut – and who remains in the running for the career-changing $100,000 grand prize to kickstart their business. Floral masterminds Simon Lycett, Elizabeth Cronin, and Maurice Harris host and judge, bringing their invaluable experience, discerning eyes, and hot takes to the flower shop to determine who will be the first-ever Full Bloom champion.
Our Podcast Sponsors
Business and Pleasure of Flowers
Flower Clique
Flower Prep School
Sponsored by:
Flower Clique
Flower Clique Prep School
Real Life Retail Florist
Did you ever get frustrated when the judges would come over and stop you in the middle of it and you had to stop and talk to them, or is that just good editing
Speaker 2:Laurie, as promised today, we're honored to have ACE Berry superstar of the HBO series full bloom with us. As you know, in episode 48, we interviewed Beth O'Reilly and had a great conversation about her thoughts and experiences on full bloom. But now we have another Texan and friend joining us for those of you who don't know ACE, he's an accredited member of the American Institute of floral designers, a professional floral communicators international member, and has a shop in Houston, Texas. He's a floral artist designer and a great personality. We're so excited to have you join us today, ACE. Hey guys, how are y'all? We are good. We are excited. We've got lots of feelings going on. I did get up at 4:58 AM and I thought, well, I'm already up to go to the bathroom. I might as well. I did. I snuck out of my room and went and made coffee and sat down and watched the last two episodes. And, um, I'm excited. It was so good. I was so invested in this whole thing, but I'm just, I'm frustrated. I'm just back up, back up, back up.
Speaker 3:Did it bring out all the emotions and everything?
Speaker 2:So many emotions, so many emotions, which is the Mark of a good show, right?
Speaker 3:Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Uh, the Mark of a good shows. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I have to say about reality shows. I'm not a big reality show watcher. I think Fonda and I like the voice we like American night. We like those kinds of things, but like the bachelor, the, any of that kind of stuff, I don't want to ever watch any of it, but we do watch the cooking shows. Yes we do. And so in my brain watching this show, I'm looking at it kind of from a perspective of an incredible bake-off or the best Christmas cookie, those kinds of things. Does that make sense?
Speaker 3:Yeah, totally. Um, it's a very good show, but it's just like the British baking shows except for flowers. I mean, I think that they are just as passionate, but I think flora stir in like a category of their own when it comes to passion with flowers and stuff, especially. Yeah.
Speaker 2:We asked Beth this too, but I want to ask it to you because everyone has a different story. What made you even sign up to try out for this show? That story on it is that
Speaker 3:There's actually a plant, a wholesaler out in my area and she was tagged by one of her friends and she tagged me in it. And the mystic art ad, when it first came out, I got like four messages from them. And when I got them, I actually thought they were all scams. So I wasn't going to apply. And then the very last one was from a guy named Benjamin Baldwin. And he was the casting guy for me and asked if I was interested. And I was like, Oh, so this is a real thing. And uh, we actually got on the phone and we talked and he goes, would you want to apply? And I said, yeah, I'll apply. Next thing you know, I am having to do an arrangement here in my store to do a Skype interview with them. And the rest was history. I guess I got called out to LA to do the top 20. I was considered in the top 20. And then a week later they called and said, Hey, we'd like to have you on full bloom. Wow. Yeah. I will say there was a lot of back and forth with my wife and my daughter, my mentor patients. And I talked to her a lot about it and just kinda trying to look at it from all sides, not just the emotional part of it, like, Oh, I want to be on TV.
Speaker 2:Right. Right. Well, so that kind of brings me to my next question. I can't imagine that conversation with my spouse on, Hey, good news is I get to be on TV. The bad news is I'm going to, I might be gone for three or four months. Can you man, the Fort, you know, that workout.
Speaker 3:So it's two different things because it's very odd. The very first time we knew it was the top 20 and we flew out there, we actually had to fly out there on Valentine's day, week. Wow. Yeah. I remember when they called us to tell us that I was like, y'all do understand this is Valentine's day, week and we're florist
Speaker 2:What they did.
Speaker 3:Uh, I'm not sure, but I flew out there on a Tuesday morning. I want to say a Valentine's day, week. I got a red eye home at 1:00 AM on Wednesday and got home at 6:00 AM and came straight to work like, yeah. So there was that. And then after being cast, I flew out the first time in March and we filmed two and a half episodes and that's when COVID happened and it shut down. Wow. And then we flew back out there, July 28th and I flew home on August 28th, 30 dash 30 days. There was a lot of crying, a lot of nights because of the time difference between Texas and California. Lots of times when I was getting home, it was eight o'clock there. So it's 10 o'clock in Houston. So it was a lot of talking on the weekend, face times, early morning, FaceTime late at night, just to kind of see what home was doing
Speaker 2:When you went. I mean, because you actually own a brick and mortar flower, which is different than Beth. So who ran that?
Speaker 3:I have a, an amazing staff. I mean, they're not just employees, they're friends, which she's up front actually right now, crystal, she manned the Fort. She held it down. We transferred all of our social media stuff to her to get orders and everything like that. So she had to hold all of it down and she would call me probably every three days and say, Hey, this is what's going on. This is what's going on. But you have to have a really good staff to do something like this, for sure. And thank goodness that I had crystal. I had a good friend of ours, Alan master. He came in and worked for me. He did, he came in freelanced for us to help me out. Um, Nicola Parker came in and spore us. I have my college girls, which is Savannah Covar, uh, she's on the a and M design team. She was working. I have another employee named Susie. It was all hands on deck just to kind of make sure it all happened.
Speaker 2:It's interesting that you talk about Allen and Nicola because when you posted that season two is going to happen. I was like, they need to apply. I thought of both of them, they would be fun to watch my biggest issue with all of it. And this is with cookie Josephus, the timeframe I just makes me so mad that you're stuck to only certain amount of hours, but that's a competition. Lori, that's a competition.
Speaker 3:What's really weird is when you're actually filming all of that stuff for a 45 minute episode, we filmed for roughly a 12 hour day for two days. I mean, a lot goes into it. I never understood how much really goes into it until being literally shoved in into a reality TV show. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Well, I want to go back to the very first scene because yeah. Laurie wants to jump ahead to the end, but I want to go to the first thing. This was my observation episode one, you came out, you had your pink shirt on. I felt. Yep. That's it? He's in his comfort zone. This is good. He selected pink flowers again, keeping it familiar, working with products that are your strength. Yep. Was your mind all over the place or did you feel like, yeah, this really helps to be able to have these things in my control.
Speaker 3:That was pretty spot on with what I knew I was going to do, which is weird for everyone that watched the first episode. That was actually the back of my arrangement though. Everything they show was the back of my arrangements. So the actual front, the pink started at the top and actually spiraled around the, the driftwood. And then serpentined out kind of how water would maneuver way. It makes its ways around. It finds a path that was kind of the fun part of it. But I knew exactly kind of where my strengths were at that point. And especially that first episode, you want to kind of start off on the good foot
Speaker 4:[inaudible] which challenge was the most difficult for you on team and solo or just solo? Let's just do solo.
Speaker 3:The hardest one was probably the broke challenge, which was episode four. Um, before all of that, the judges were like, we want to see who you are. We want to see who you are, which is very tough because I never noticed that I throw up walls, but I guess I kind of throw up walls around certain things. Uh, so just to let loose and be okay with designing in a totally different aesthetic from what is my kind of bread and butter design aesthetic, it was a little difficult, but I really kind of just dove straight into it and tried to make sure it was the best outcome for me, which, which is, was I got first place on that.
Speaker 2:Interesting that that was the most difficult. And yet you want it,
Speaker 3:It was all about like just kind of being so free to just design, but also when you do that, you still have to stay true to yourself. If that makes sense, it's a very fine line. You kind of walk because you can go, that's something that is not even anything remotely like you, but I wanted it to have like who I was in, which was a very structural architectural designer, but still be free and loose where it's still had the movement that it needed to have.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I have a question about the individuals. Again, you only had a couple of hours each time. Did you ever get frustrated when the judges would come over and stop you in the middle and it, and you act they had to stop and talk to them? Or is that just good editing?
Speaker 3:No, and actually it really never bothered me that I had to stop and talk to them. Cause I would legit leads like stop designing and all that conversation. Yeah. And there's lots of times they're like, Hey, keep working. I was like, I knew where my strengths lie, which was my speed. When you design with a knife and after being kind of educated and really studying flowers and design stuff, I knew where my strength was and my strength was in design a speed. I had to be fast. You know, when you're in a retail shop, people want things five minutes ago. You're right.
Speaker 4:Cemetery. So
Speaker 3:I knew that's where I, I could always handle myself would be like, I was faster than a lot of the other competitors. Yeah. So that being said, I would actually have full out conversations with them and stop designing and then go back to working. So it didn't really bother me. I was kind of used to that because I had people come in and want to talk to me while I'm designing.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That's true. So you, you are probably really good at multitasking. My other question about that is at the end, when they would say you have minute and they show everybody and I'm like, there's no way that they're, he's gonna finish again. Is that editing or are they okay? Cause panic.
Speaker 3:Yeah. A lot of it's editing. I mean, I've competed for like Texas designer of the year Houston designer of the year and all of those, I knew times very well because I've gotten used to that. Even when I tested for AISD, you have 15 minutes left, you have to be done. Like there is no second chance. So I always gave myself a buffer, like when they said 15 minutes to go, I was finishing up or I was already done and just, you know, fine tuning going back and pruning and stuff most of the time.
Speaker 2:Okay. You, you brought up AIF. D am I correct? That you and Beth were the only two there that were AI FD?
Speaker 3:No, there was one more I don't want to do from a Minnesota. He was, he was inducted. I believe in DC. If I'm not mistaken DC or Vegas is when he was inducted.
Speaker 2:Do you feel like they held that against you or expected?
Speaker 3:I'm not sure if they held it against us or not. I think when you don't know a lot about AISD, it's kind of sometimes intimidating if that makes sense. Because a lot of the contestants that were there didn't know much about it. Like Kristin, she didn't know about it and Spencer, and so being able to talk to them about it and tell them, Hey, they're about education and it's networking and education and you're learning different things. Yeah. It was just a different thing. I don't know if they held it against us because I mean, Beth and I made it to final four. So
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Absolutely. They stress mechanics a lot with that. And I never really note, again, it's all editing. Right. They didn't really stress that with anybody else as much as they did with it.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I think that they kind of sometimes possibly held us to a different standard because we were so mechanically sound on everything that we did. I really never had mechanical issues with anything I made in episode two when everybody runs for flowers and we're doing the floating piece. Yes. I was just like, I'm not, I have to make sure this thing is sturdy before I do anything else. Like I've got to make sure it's going to hold the way that I want to put onto it. I think that it just got to the point where they were like, okay, these two are going to make sure that their stuff is not going to fall apart. Right.
Speaker 2:Right. Which I thought was interesting when you said everybody did always run to the flowers and as AI IFD designers were like, used to like, okay, let's get it structurally where it needs to be. And we can bring in anything really and make it beautiful if we can't that's that surprise package that we get. Right.
Speaker 3:I always looked at it like that. Like very rarely did I run for flowers because there was always anywhere from 50 to a hundred thousand dollars worth of flowers in that flower shop. Wow. Why did I need to run for flowers? There was always doing something that was beautiful there that I can make something pretty with. Yeah. And that's the way I always looked at it in the mornings. They would ask, Hey, what are you think about today? And I was always like, I haven't thought about it yet. I'll wait to see what's there. Like I was just so nonchalant about pretty much everything. So
Speaker 2:Did you know, prior to them telling you what the challenges did you know before?
Speaker 3:Well, we found out about like two to three hours before. Sometimes we'd find out the night before, so we could start thinking about it. Usually they would hand us that piece of paper and say, this is what it is. I usually folded mine up and put it in my back pocket and didn't look at it really. Uh, I didn't want to stress out. I didn't want the stress of it. I wanted to get good night's sleep. And I didn't want that keeping me up at night and making me worry. Like at the end of the day, they can give you everything that that's going to happen. But without the little details of what flowers are in there or what containers are in there and any of that stuff, there was really no point for me to worry about it.
Speaker 2:So they gave you kind of a glimpse of what it was going to be, but not the details of what it was. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly. So I mean like, um, the waterfall challenge, they, they said, okay, we're going to make a waterfall. I was like, okay. And they're like, Hey, what do you think you're going to do? And I was like, I have no clue, five minutes before they're you don't know what you're going to do. It's like, I have no clue, but when I get there and I start making an I'll figure it out. Yeah. And honestly it helped me out in a lot of, a lot of ways.
Speaker 2:So here's my question. Vonda asked you, what was the most difficult arrangement? What was your favorite arrangement that you did
Speaker 3:Over the whole thing? Or just it's solo. Okay. Um, wait, are we talking all eight episodes? Yes. Oh my room for sure was. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, okay. Okay. So let's talk about the seven, the room monitor here. We're not, we're not going there yet. Something to behold, but
Speaker 3:Yeah, the bicycle for Kristin was probably my favorite thing that I made all season.
Speaker 2:And so we can go there now because between you and Connor on that bicycle, there is no way he won that. No way. Sorry, just had all to the metal. You hit Kristin perfectly. You nailed her so perfectly. I looked at Connor's bike and I said, I don't see ACE in that bike. I see him some pink. I see some of this, but that doesn't look to me like you.
Speaker 3:Um, I think, I think it was in certain spots. I think what's weird is, um, they only see what you kind of put out at that because we all kind of just met each other. So they only see kind of what you put out in those instances. The funniest thing is, is the entire time of filming. I never touched a tropical flower except for, or an orchid. And like the, what is my, honestly, my strong suit, which is really high style, architectural designing with tropicals. I refuse to touch them because I didn't want them to just think like, he's a one trick pony and I wanted to show them that I was so well educated in design and like in a hole that I could try to beat you with whatever I can pull out of my pockets at that point. Interesting. I looked at it as like that. I wanted to be so well-rounded that no matter what it was that I could do it and I could do it really well.
Speaker 2:That is interesting because Connor's stayed in his wheelhouse kind of the natural, even up to the very end. And they didn't seem to mind, even though they would say to you and Tibet, we want to push you. We want to push you. I thought it was interesting that they didn't really do that with him.
Speaker 3:I never know what the, what the judges were looking at. I just knew that I had to grow. They're amazing people. I love all of them. They're great. I just know that it's like, okay. I knew that I had to grow, which growing meant I had to be vulnerable, which personally I don't like being vulnerable. I think it's from a different background that I looked at vulnerability as weakness. A lot of times, like it's something that someone can use against you to hurt you even more. And so by learning to be vulnerable on that show, it opened me up to like the growth that not caring what someone thinks of me, because I know who I am as a person, but I think Kristin's bike was so spot on with, with her.
Speaker 2:It was so good. Yeah. Spot on. That was awesome. You know, just the killer combination, but still the way you did color blocking and the way you put it all together,
Speaker 3:It's just spot on. They told us beforehand, we were going to get you to pay people. And they were like, who do you want? And I was like, if I want anybody, I want Kristen, I wanted either Christian or Connor, but I really wanted Kristin, just because I knew that I was like, I'm going to blow this out of the water for her. And it was one of those things that it wasn't something I was so used to designing with, but it was like, I know I'm on a knock to Salah park
Speaker 2:And she loved it. Like she wrote around, she was so excited. You know, I loved her. She, I mean, again, I don't know her, but the one thing I did notice, all of you guys did seem to really truly like one another. Is that real?
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah, yeah, no, that's completely real. So Kristen is definitely one of my favorite people. She Connor, Spencer, like those tears and episode four real tears. Like I, I genuinely felt responsible for Spencer going home. Like I felt that it was my fault. And that's why I said at the end of the day on this challenge, I was the team leader. It was my fault. And that's, that's just how I felt. I knew I was like, this is my fault. And this is, it got him sent home. And that they really affected me. Same with like Kristen, she's such an, a true artist. And you're taking someone that really is an artist and shoving flowers into their life. And she's only been doing it for like three years, something like that. Like not a long time. So there's a lot that she didn't know that she's learning and come to find out later that she didn't know anyone in the floral industry really before, before like the show. Wow. But I talked to her probably twice a week. I talked to Connor regularly. I talked to Justin, I talked to Beth, I talked to, I talked to
Speaker 2:Justin, tell me about Justin.
Speaker 3:Uh, that guy is
Speaker 2:Underdog. Like, to be honest, if I'm being honest, I'm like, how is he in the top three? I did not think that would, not that he was a bad designer, but I really was focused on like Kristin and Beth and Spencer. And he kind of came out from behind. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Justin, I think he played the underdog role very well, like at the beginning because he did, he was last in that first episode, but he had such a drive to beat to learn to be better. Yeah. I mean that, that right there was what honestly helped propel him in and kept going. He always strives to be better than he was the day before, but he was just an amazing, amazing person. He's very smart, very business smart too. And just an awesome, awesome guy. Uh, he definitely deserved to be there in the end. If you go from, you know, first episode, you're the last place to the final three and he worked for it. I mean, he really, really did work for it and make sure,
Speaker 2:You know, it's funny on the tablescapes, which I loved all of those. Um, I do think best should have got first. I know she got second, but I do think she should have got first and I think your should have been second, but again, I'm not the judge. It's interesting to me. He got last I can understand from there, but from a customer perspective, his would be the only one I would want at my brunch. It's the only one that made sense. All the others from like, Oh, I don't know. You know, I know it needs to be over the top.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I felt the same Rosie all day is just, I think it's such a hard concept to try to come up with something and trying to figure out how to, how to do something like that. Where I will say like myself Connor and Beth, we had, I think a lot easier path because we had a, more of a defined theme than Rosie all day. So I think it's more of a little bit of an uphill thing for him, but I mean, just to come out and make something beautiful and then turn around and him and Connor, they just killed that float challenge killed it. So
Speaker 2:Do they cause you're watching it like we are, but you are also there in person. Does it do it justice? The way we're seeing
Speaker 3:There's little things that I wish that were in there better, not that got edited out, like on, uh, on that actual float challenge. Connor and Justin were actually both on their float doing something that needed more Moss. And I was running back to get something for Beth and I they're like, Hey, can you bring us Moss? And I literally brought them Moss. Like that's kind of the whole thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:There was never a time where we were designing out of like malice for each other and wanted each other to lose like genuinely. It was tough for us to watch one of our friends go home and we always tried to be like designing from a good place of like caring and giving to each other. Yeah. That's what all of us kind of, when we first got together, we all talked about, we're like, we're not going to talk crap about each other. We're not going to do this. We stuck true to that. Like we, weren't going to talk bad about each other that wasn't there for that I wasn't there to, uh, rip apart another designer and a fellow florist. Right.
Speaker 2:We don't tell that though. Don't you Vonda? I mean, watching it, you could tell, even when it started dwindling down, the judges would get so emotional because it's like, they loved every one of you. So I could tell y'all were a really tight community. I don't know if it's, cause you had to quarantine together and you were, you know, you've been together a lot, but you can feel that like the judges were having a hard time.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah. Yeah. There was times that like I saw like Elizabeth would cry and like she, she talked to us and I'd be like, how are you feeling in episode eight and episode five are the ones where you see them kind of more of emotional, the judges. I wish they would have humanized them a little bit more because I think people would have understood kind of the chemistry that we all have with each other. Yeah. Like they were trying to bring out the best in us as much as we were trying to bring it out in ourselves. You know, the thing about judging is you didn't have to agree with them all of the time they were just trying to do their job. Right. And uh, I mean, that's kinda how I looked at it.
Speaker 2:Well, let me ask you something a S on those three judges, they were judges who have experience in, you know, obviously I, I worked for the queen. I did this, I did that. Instead of anyone with formal training, we have to take certifications, become judges or evaluators. Yeah. And a lot of times when you see shows like the baking shows, it's people who have some type of a degree, or they have some kind of expertise in it, besides just being the best chef. Do you think that would add a different and better dynamic to have a judge that has a certification, even the Rose parade? You know, they usually have an AISD member at the Rose parade doing some of the judges.
Speaker 3:Uh, I'm not sure. I think that a lot of it is that you have to get ratings a part of it. I mean, I think there's a lot, you never know. I mean, I've been asked that before, like you put someone like regular chef there, which is, he's not AIV or anything, but he's like just a world renown, amazing artists florist. So I don't, I don't know if that's it or not, to be honest. I mean, there are certain things that like, when they would tell me stuff, there's there are things that I didn't agree with, but I also understood that it was parts of it is always subjective.
Speaker 2:I thought it was very subjective. I thought most of it was subjective. I didn't think there was many things that were objective criticisms. I think they were very,
Speaker 3:Yeah. Um, but other than that, I mean, an assignment said some stuff one time about it was about color. I said, putting colors that normally wouldn't go together, making them work. Yeah, me, I'm sorry. But like, you always have to make them work. Like you can't put certain colors with certain other things. Cause if it doesn't work, it throws off everything about the design. Right. But there are like, you're seeing it now more than ever where your people are more trying with different colors, but they're doing it with tints and tones where the underlying color is, what pulls it together. And that's what they're not understanding about all of that, that it's an underlying color in one of those secondary colors, that's helping pull it and make it work.
Speaker 2:Let's go to the final room, Lori. Oh, the final room. Okay. So this is, I think we're being pretty objective Fonda. We're not like playing favorites. Yes. We love the ACE and Beth because we know them, but if they had room a and room B and we did not know who did what we both would have picked ACE a for ACE, put the picture room. And again, we weren't there in person. Right. And I'm sure it could be different, but your story in your room, I mean, they kept going back on our not quite understanding story. And so many of the things, your story could not have been more clear. So I really don't know what tipped them over clear path to that clear path where everything was hanging, except for the area you were supposed to walk in. It was just like, Oh my gosh, I'm just so drawn in. Just
Speaker 3:It's awesome. I don't know. I I'll say that. I mean, being that I, I know what it was like I saw Connor's back wall and that thing, I think that's probably what, what did it, to be honest, I think that his back wall was in the top five of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. Wow. It was really that good. Wow. Um, I, I wanted to win, but seeing that back wall, I think that's probably what did it, and he's, he's such a fabulous designer. He really is what you see at the, in the middle of eight, how we started that, we started with the hug. We came from a place of very much caring for each other and loving each other. Yeah. There were times that I was down and he was the one that lifted me up. There were times that he was down and I tried to make sure that he was okay and lifting him up. So I'm not, I'm not sure, really. I don't understand what they did flag. They didn't understand my stories. I was clear on that. Like I was a broken individually.
Speaker 2:Yes. Right. Yeah. Your story. And even Simon even said your story. So that part was a little frustrating to me, but I didn't see the wall the way you saw it. So I have, I have two questions. Number one, after you guys created the rooms, before you knew who the winner was, were you able to walk through each other's rooms? Nope. Really
Speaker 3:Let us. So all Connor could hear on my room was the heartbeat the whole time I was
Speaker 2:So cool.
Speaker 3:And that's like the whole thing about designers. And I'll say like the whole concept of my room was that I've, I've met a ton of different florist that we all kind of come together once a year at a symposium or a, or a SAF or just state conventions. And all of us kind of have the same, same stories that we either were doing something else. And it led us to flowers and we all had some type of traumatic, something of where flowers are mending us back together and really did put us back together and gave us a sense of community and friendships. Like I tell people I've known some people for 20 years that didn't know my first name. And I know, I don't know how many floors that know my first name though. Everything about me. Like, that's just how it is when I think we're such a caring community. So the whole concept for that is like patients' picture. And I like, like we have talked about it. Like, she's my mentor. When I met her, I was not AISD. She really invested a lot of time into me helping me grow and as a designer and as a person and just being an amazing friend. And uh, I mean, I can't say enough great things about her. She's so amazing. There was a thing one time when she and I were talking about how flowers saved our lives and help helped us and how it mended us back together. Like she, wasn't supposed to be a business owner in South Dakota and I supposed to be doing flowers. I was supposed to be in the oil field and how flowers have brought two people from two incredibly different areas. And we formed this awesome friendship and mentorship, like that's all because of flowers. And it, what it did is it took two, almost broken individuals sometimes. And, and kind of shoved us together where it's made a beautiful, beautiful friendship. So yeah,
Speaker 2:That's how flowers are. You're exactly right. And you and patients are such good friends. She is, she is such an incredible designer. I mean, she's a hard person, you know, isn't it interesting that we talk about they're great designers, but how wonderful of a person they are first and foremost, it's the personality, it's the person they are because of what they've done in our lives on for us and for other people.
Speaker 3:W she and I, and my wife and her husband we've went on vacations together. And we're the kooky little flourish creatives that are like ripping stuff out of trees, places in our spouses are like, Oh my God, just get away from these two. Uh, I thought about her a lot when I was kind of trying to come up with the idea of that room. I thought about my wife. I thought about my kid. I'm very open and honest about everything. Like when I was in the oil field, I wasn't a happy person. I was pretty miserable. It was not fun. I was doing it because I had a child and I needed, she needed insurance and food. And when I started doing flowers, that really helped mend a broken person back together. It's the first time that I felt a sense of community. And it's such an amazing thing that it literally unites people around the world. And it, if they also have such an amazing power for like healing people and helping, like, I can't imagine ever doing anything else now. And I've had opportunities to go back to the oil field and do other things. And I'm like, I've told someone recently, all I'm ever going to be as a florist. I don't want to do anything else. Yeah. It's a very awesome feeling to know that like yeah, had all these other opportunities. All I want to do is what I'm doing. Cause I'm completely happy with what I do. Love it.
Speaker 2:I love, let me ask you this before we wrap up. What's next for you? Are you just going back to day job? I mean, what what's next? I know you and patients have some cool stuff going on. Right?
Speaker 3:Well, the first thing that's next is patience and I have inspired design retreat in Austin. Uh, that's June 7th, eighth, and ninth. That's going to be amazing. We're going to talk things full bloom, talk things business there. I really love the part of like their young designers out there and people new to the industry that need someone like patients and I, that need to have like that person in your, that has your back. That's pushing you and saying, you got, you can do this. You can do this. You're a cheerleader. Uh, when I first got into this industry, I don't think I really had that as much. And so now that I have a platform, which I, I had it kind of before, I want to do that more and push people and who better to do it with and my best friend patients and getting to help cultivate new designers,
Speaker 2:Fire design. Is that, who's your perfect audience area? Is it for someone like Vonda or is it for someone like me who
Speaker 3:This was the best way I can say it it's for all flower enthusiast. Oh,
Speaker 2:That's a good that's well said.
Speaker 3:Yeah, because not everybody's going to be like myself, a veteran or a seasoned designer. There's going to be people that have one month in there and they're gone. They're trying to do it for something totally different than someone like myself. I want it to be safe for no matter who is there to come in and feel like they walk away with a tribe, like a really tribe. That's tight, that's close knit, that's got your back. That's going to help get you where you need to go. I want them to walk away with, you know, knowing that they learned something amazing and that's going to help make them more profitable and more money walk away with that knowledge that, that, you know, in a couple of years, you're going to test for AISD and you're going to, you're going to be one considered one of the best in the world because of that. Um, that's what I want. I, I think that a lot of people don't try because they don't have cheerleaders. And I think that's that people need cheerleaders. And I was blessed with the ability to inspire people sometimes. So yes you are. And what else is next? I don't know, just growing my business, traveling. I want to teach more. I really want to teach more. I want to do a book. I really want to do a book. I want to do a book of a, a book that's like never been done that shows the concepts of every day. And that's what patients in are working on everyday, work that and how you make money doing it and breaking it all down the littlest stuff. Um, and maybe a TV show that of how to help fix flower shops. You know, it's, it's no secret that flower shops are, uh, very much of a failing industry right now, you know, flower shops closing, right. And left, you know, especially during like this pandemic, it's gotten even worse, but my actual store I'm up on my year than I was last year.
Speaker 2:Yeah. We find that with flower click too. And that's what we do at flower click ACE, which you probably know is we help them survive. I mean, probably much like you, our members, some of them are up 150 hundred and 25%. It's like, what the heck? And it w like you, when you're doing it right, it makes a difference and you can hit it out of the park.
Speaker 3:I would love to see, like, have you ever seen bar rescue? I would love to see a flower, a flower shop version of that.
Speaker 2:Oh, wait, I just sent Vonda a link to that. There is a show on Hulu eight. One of the episodes is about a flower shop. It's like called profit something. They usually do restaurants. They do small businesses. They went and did a well, I'll send you the link.
Speaker 3:Oh yes. See, that's what
Speaker 2:Really good. It's really interesting. It's really,
Speaker 3:I want people to know that, like I always say this, I don't care where you buy your flowers. As long as you're buying flowers, our clients have me in the grocery store. We're worlds different. That is not my clientele. Right. But as long as they're buying flowers, that's awesome. Like, that's the main part. So there's enough business out here for everyone. You just have to be smart enough to learn, to adjust it the right way that works for you and what you're doing.
Speaker 2:All right. So we have one, uh, question and this is kind of a yes or no question. So it won't take very long. And I already checked with Beth on this and she said, yes. So the pressure's on to a full bloom launches because they are having a season two. We thought it'd be really fun for you and Beth to come on. If you times and be kind of commentate on here's what we do. Wouldn't that be fun? Or the old bachelor or bachelorette, come on and tell the behind the scenes,
Speaker 3:I will do it. I don't even have to think about it. Yes. Um, I'm actually hoping that they'll call me and let me be a guest judge.
Speaker 2:That was my other thought is they need one of y'all to come back and be a guest judge. I think that would be fantastic. That would give a great spin on it.
Speaker 3:Well, I was not shy about telling them, literally when we went back in July, I was very upfront and honest. And like my biggest goal now is to be a judge on this show. And they were like, wait, what there? And they literally, one of them told me, well, make it to the finale and we'll see what we can do. I held up my end of the bargain shoot did so, um, I'm hoping that, that, uh, again with the platform like that and young designers and people that are just budding florists, as they say, I have, I have an ability to tell them half went through this and inspire them the right ways and show them how to grow and things I can say not to do that I've done. That's maybe been a mistake and things that I've learned that I did that worked out, that people said I shouldn't have, and just eat a little easier for me know that someone is got their back no matter what. And also bringing that, that caring eye to it from the start. But I will say the one thing that I always thought they missed was that I didn't have them saying, well, if you pull this out and put it here, instead, it would have strengthened this. So I always had to like, listen to them and find very like good ears and say, okay, this is what I needed to adjust and really learn it. I think by having that, someone, if they're visual, that would really help them.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Great point. I agree. I agree. So, okay. Here's our question. We ask everybody that comes on. I don't know if you've listened to our podcast prepared. What is giving you life right now? Like what are you just sitting there and you just so much joy when you think about,
Speaker 3:I don't really know my dog, my dog, my daughter, and my family. Um, flower wise, honestly, just kind of looking forward to symposium next year. That's kinda getting me there. Uh, setting up this retreat is really, what's helping me. Like I am so eager to see what people create and inspiring others. That's really what's, you know, what's give me life as the platform that I was given to, to turn it into something where I get to give back to someone else. Like I actually got asked recently, what was I going to do if I had one? And I always told them, I was like the whole answer. Cause they kind of cut it short was I was going to take my wife on a trip because she is the breadwinner of our family. Like she that's, she's made it possible for me to do this. But the other thing is I was going to give$25,000 to AISD to start a scholarship for people that were like me, that they had a career change, they had this, and they've never gotten to experience flowers in the way that I've gotten to experience flowers. And so I realized how much it was to have it completely endowed. So I knew I was like, this is exactly what I'm doing. Like that was the very first take her on a trip by patients picking her firsts and uh, and give$25,000 to AISD because I, I, I do. That's the one thing that I believe in more than, you know, in this industry is that education is key. And I wanted to make sure that for however long, I'm still alive, that young people, new people to the industry, we're going to be educated the right way. And we're going to get to walk away knowing that, you know, someone had their back that was long gone, but they had their backs still.
Speaker 2:That's a good one. I can't top that one, but Vonda would, what's given you life, right? Actually just listening to full bloom in ACE and finishing that series. I was just like, Oh my gosh. And now, cause I kind of went through it really fast. So now tonight I'm going to sit down with a glass of wine and rewatch it all. Yeah. I totally in that weird. Cause I want to rewatch it from different eyes now that I know the outcome. Yeah. Thank you so much. I mean, this has been fantastic and we really enjoyed you on the show, your personality, your talent and everything you shared with us.
Speaker 3:Thank you. That is actually what's given me life. There you go. I'm ready to be on stage where patients are at a symposium. I'm ready to just kind of share with the world, like just a glimpse into what she and I have had to kind of endure through our lives of the broken and that that's like the whole, we've talked about it a long time and I think that's probably the next, the next big thing. So
Speaker 2:We're looking for that for 2022.
Speaker 3:I'm hoping I'm, I'm really eager about it. So
Speaker 2:Laurie, did we hear, what's giving you like, gosh, I got nothing compared to the two of you. I will say these days, no one can see them, but you were saying you just don't care where you get flowers, just buy flowers. I did pick these up at trader Joe's. They're my peonies grabbed some they're not designed the way U2 would have them, but they're just databases.
Speaker 3:Beautiful design. That's a good design right there. It's a middle. It's called a minimalist design.
Speaker 2:Sometimes I like just, just minimalist. Just, yeah.
Speaker 3:That's exactly how my wife is. And now I've got to go to trader Joe's and buy up all their beans.
Speaker 2:That's what all of our flower click members are like they're they're in stock right now. I didn't know. There were winter peonies. Yeah, they are. I don't know that they'll open. I'm a little worried. They're not gonna open up, but we'll see, I guess again, thanks ACE. We will talk to you again soon.
Speaker 1:We have certainly enjoyed our time together today and we look forward to being with you guys again, if you have any questions, concerns, comments, anything we would love to hear from you. You can always email Laurie at flower, click.com. Also, if you enjoy our little podcast, go ahead and click that subscribe button. That's very helpful for us and you can even leave a review and we hope you join us next week. Yes. So please come back and join us and discover how a bit of knowledge and one small change in your mindset can take you to new levels in your life and business.[inaudible].