Proflowers

Full review
Sending flowers to someone can make a big statement. It’s for that very reason that you have to agonizingly and thoroughly think through what you send because for every combination of variety, color and quantity there seems to be an equally complex message that arrives with your floral gift.

When I wanted to send flowers to a loved one recently, I decided to try proflowers.com, only because they were the most prominent advertiser on the talk radio show I listen to on the way home. Shopping online at proflowers.com turned out to be far easier and more rewarding than the response I received from the recipient of those flowers.

For the uninformed, proflowers.com offers a flower guide – a popup window that provides information on how to pick the best flowers for an event, what meanings the various colors and varieties have attached, how to care for the flowers, interesting facts, and much more. (They should also offer a guide on how to deal with rejection.)

Selecting flowers is made even easier by choosing from the pre-populated occasion categories. Or, you can shop by type of plant, specials, price and many other options.

If you’re like me and you pick flowers on gut instinct, proflowers.com provides what I consider to be the most important part of buying flowers online: large, colorful pictures of what your bouquet will look like, replete with different shots for each different style of base or vase.

The Order Process

The folks at proflowers.com have made it quite easy to order, distilling the whole process of selecting your flowers to three simple steps:

•    Select a bouquet
•    Select a vase (there is usually an option for a less ornate free vase with most purchases)
•    Select a delivery date

While each step also provides options to upgrade your purchase (50% more stems for only $9.99; a square green vase for $12.99; next day shipping) they manage to keep it from becoming laborious.

Click “Order Now” and you enter the message screen where you can type your message and signature that will appear on the card which hopefully will be read with tears of joy, and fond thoughts by your loved one.

Next you fill in the delivery address. The proflowers.com website provides an automatic address-checking feature to ensure the accuracy of the address, and thus their ability to deliver it to the right person, (which may or may not matter in the end).

Finally, you enter your billing information and place your order. This can be done with an account, or you can skip creating an account and make purchases as a one-off event.

They Care

Even though I never interacted with anyone at proflowers.com, I got the feeling that they cared about my order as much as I did. I received an immediate e-mail with my order information, another when my flowers were picked up to be delivered, a third confirming when and where they were delivered (and who signed for them) and a fourth for $15 off the S&H of my next order. Even the e-mail address (wecare@flowers.com) intimated the same level of concern for my order that I had for the person I was sending them to.

It’s much easier to use proflowers.com than trying to find a florist in the area, especially if you are sending them out of state. They also accept all forms of payment including major credit cards and paypal.

With that said, I think it’s time to go send myself some flowers. I wonder where the self-pity category is…