How Florists Can Easily Increase Flower Sales and Order Values With One Report

In almost any shop some employees are better at taking orders than others. Some just have a gift for getting higher order values. Others may have studied the FloralStrategies order taking process. Some may just have more confidence.

Meanwhile others likely underperform, consistently generating smaller orders because they lack confidence or don’t follow best practices for sales and make low priced suggestions.

Too often we ignore this. In some floral shops the focus is on design and production, and taking orders is considered a distraction or chore. . It’s not uncommon to hear things like “I took the last one, you take this one”. Little thought is given to who is most likely to get a bigger order.

Very few shops would make this mistake when it comes to production. Skill is almost always factored into the decision of who does the designing. You want your best designers doing as much designing as possible. And you want to keep your bad designers away from the bench as much as possible.

Order taking should be approached the same way. You want your best designers on the phone taking orders because you know they will be bigger orders. And at the same time you want to keep the under performers away from phone (and get them the sales training they need).

The problem is that many shops aren’t really sure how their employees stack up when it comes to taking orders. The good news is that a quick look at a report from your floral POS system should have all the answers.

In FloristWare it’s called the Sales By Employee report. It shows you not just the total sales entered by each employee (not what we’re interested in here) but the average order value for each employee. This is what we’r really after. It tells us who is going to generate the biggest and most profitable sale each time the phone rings in your flower shop.

Now that you have this information what do you do with it?

1. Put your best order takers in a position to take orders. When the phone rings make sure they understand their priority is to answer it, no wait for someone else. No more taking turns.
2. Use your Sales by Hour report to make sure that your best order takers are on duty and able to take orders when your customers are calling. For most shops mornings are busy for phone orders, evenings are busy for walk-in cash and carry sales. You want your stars on duty when the phone is ringing.
3. Do the inverse with your under performers. Keep them away from the phone as much as possible. Schedule them for times when there are not as many orders coming in.
4. Share the knowledge. Have a sales meeting and get your stars to explain how they do it. Encourage your under performers to watch, and try and emulate the stars. Make resources, like the FloralStrategies Total Training package available to everyone.

These are easy changes to make. You’re not adding payroll. You’re not spending more on marketing. You aren’t adding to your workload as a flower shop owner. All you are doing is being conscious of who you ask to take orders, and maybe switching up your schedule a bit.

Of course it all depends on having the information you need. And if your POS system does not let you see order values by employee you are stuck. And you should really consider whether your POS is designed for serious flower shops. This is basic stuff, a simple report you absolutely need to run your flower shop efficiently and profitably. You need a POS that can help  you make these improvements.