Tips & Tricks: August 2006 Archives

One of the new features in FloristWare Version 2.0 helps you generate the greatest possible revenue from your outgoing wires.

First you enter the rebate that you receive from each of the wire services in your settings. Then, every time you send an outgoing wire, you see a list of all your services along with the rebate that you will receive from each. This makes it easy to select the service that pays the biggest rebate to maximize your rebate revenue!

To get started visit the "Wire Services" section of your settings and enter the rebates that you receive from each service.

We are pleased to announce that FloristWare 2.0 is now available for download. This new version of the FloristWare POS system for florists features many new features and enhancements which make it better than ever.

One of the single biggest improvements is complete integration with BloomNet's BloomLink network. Florists can now send and receive BloomNet orders and messages right directly from/to FloristWare. This offer tremendous advantages to BloomNet members as they can now send outgoing wires directly from FloristWare with just two clicks. Incoming orders are entered directly into FloristWare and, if accepted, a worksheet will print and the order will be added to a special BloomNet reconciliation report.

Another exciting new feature is address verification. FloristWare now verifies all US addresses on entry. This means that FloristWare will check any US addresses you enter to make sure that they are valid and, whenever possible, provide the zip code. This saves you the time and expense of attempting to deliver (or mail invoices, marketing material, etc.) to invalid addresses.

There are countless other new features and enhancements including (but not limited to) an employee timeclock that automatically keeps track of hours worked and wages earned, and internal messaging system and many, many more. For more information please visit the Version History page.

Any florist who has been thinking about switching to a POS system (or switching from their existing POS system!) needs to give FloristWare 2.0 a try. It is the best version of FloristWare ever!

Sending and receiving wire orders can be time consuming. On an outgoing wire you typically have to take all of the information from the customer, complete the sale and then enter the order into a wire service terminal. With incoming wires many florists take the order off of their wire service terminal and then enter it into their POS system.

The new BloomNet BloomLink interface in FloristWare Version 2.0 makes it faster and more convenient. When you take an order from a customer sending it to another florist to be filled is as easy as clicking two buttons. You have dealt with the order in a matter of seconds.

Incoming BloomNet wires work just as well. The order comes directly into FloristWare and is presented to you for review. If you choose to accept it the standard FloristWare worksheet prints and all of your reports, statistics, etc. will reflect the order.

Reconciling to your BloomNet statement is easier than ever too. FloristWare prints a "reconciliation" report that you lay out beside your BloomNet report and you can then reconcile them line-by-line to make sure that you are getting credit for all of your activity.

Using FloristWare and BloomNet is the fastest and most affordable way of dealing with sending and receiving wire orders.

Changing product prices in FloristWare is very easy. Simply enter at the Manager Level, click "Settings" and then choose "Products" from the pull-down menu and click "Continue". From there you can access all of your products and make changes as you see fit.

If you need to change a lot of prices because it's a floral holiday you might want to try another approach. For example, all of your rose prices are probably higher at Valentines Day. Instead of changing the prices for all of them you may find it easier to create a special category of Valentines roses with Valentines pricing. You will turn this category on during the Valentines season and off the rest of the year - that way you won't have to see it. This will save you the trouble of changing the prices back and forth.

As you may know FloristWare Version 2.0 includes a built-in employee timeclock that automatically keeps track of the hours worked and wages earned by each employee.

This information is summarized on the "Punchclock Report" which can be generated just like any other report. It is a real timesaver when you are doing payroll.

For more information please search for "timeclock" in the Support Library.

Many florists are reluctant to be so aggressive as to market to recipients (people who have not bought anything from you but have only received flowers from you) and they should be. It is something that must be handled very delicately.

Why? Your first loyalty should always be to your customer. If a customer buys flowers from you and sends them to his wife he wants you to help make sure that she feels good about it. If you send her a tacky flyer the next day proclaiming that you have the "CHEAP, CHEAP, CHEAPEST ROSES IN TOWN - $AVE $$$$ - BUY NOW" then you devalue you the gift - you have told the wife that her husband bought her the cheapest flowers he could! Not a nice thing to do.

You can however do it with some class. Here is what we would suggest - once a week you could prepare a postcard or letter for everyone who received flowers the previous week. Send them a message explaining that you hope they liked their flowers. Assure them that you pride yourself on the level of service and quality of work that you provide.

You can then suggest that they consider you they next time they or someone they know buys flowers. If you handle it like that you can really increase your sales without insulting anybody!