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-   -   Weird Valentine's business (from the past)! (http://www.sowpub.com/forum/showthread.php?t=7961)

Dien Rice February 14, 2012 10:24 AM

Weird Valentine's Day business (from the past)!
 
I've delved into some newspaper archives again, looking for interesting, yet odd, businesses...

Anyway, I stumbled across the following "offbeat" Valentine's business, from 1987!

Sure, we know what to send to our loved ones... But this seems to fill the "niche" of what you should send to your "ex"!

-----
Valentines: A pot of gold for sellers of cards
Judith Crosson
Reuters; United Press International
14 February 1987
St. Petersburg Times

Flowers with a twist

NEW YORK - It's the thought that counts, and sending an ex-lover a box of dead flowers for Valentine's Day says it all.

Manhattan entrepreneurs Bill Verderosa and Mark McConnell on Friday credited a lot of trampled feelings for a recent boom in their unusual business, Drop Dead Flowers.

Operators of the 6-month-old venture deliver a black lacquered box of very dead flowers, replete with dirt, taken from the dumpsters of local cemeteries, and wrap it all in a purple bow - all for $37.50.
-----

Hmm... On the face of it, it's a great business. If you get your dead flowers from the dumpsters of local cemeteries, the costs to acquire your "product" is almost zero! The rest is pure profit...

Not sure why this business doesn't still seem to be around... ;)

Best wishes,

Dien

Dien Rice February 14, 2012 10:30 AM

More info on the weird Valentine's Day business from the past!
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Dien Rice (Post 30078)
I've delved into some newspaper archives again, looking for interesting, yet odd, businesses...

Anyway, I stumbled across the following "offbeat" Valentine's business, from 1987!

Sure, we know what to send to our loved ones... But this seems to fill the "niche" of what you should send to your "ex"!

-----
Valentines: A pot of gold for sellers of cards
Judith Crosson
Reuters; United Press International
14 February 1987
St. Petersburg Times

Flowers with a twist

NEW YORK - It's the thought that counts, and sending an ex-lover a box of dead flowers for Valentine's Day says it all.

Manhattan entrepreneurs Bill Verderosa and Mark McConnell on Friday credited a lot of trampled feelings for a recent boom in their unusual business, Drop Dead Flowers.

Operators of the 6-month-old venture deliver a black lacquered box of very dead flowers, replete with dirt, taken from the dumpsters of local cemeteries, and wrap it all in a purple bow - all for $37.50.
-----

Hmm... On the face of it, it's a great business. If you get your dead flowers from the dumpsters of local cemeteries, the costs to acquire your "product" is almost zero! The rest is pure profit...

Not sure why this business doesn't still seem to be around... ;)

I just discovered - there's a lot more info about this business available...

More info here...

http://67.199.116.138/DNN/Archive/1998/980212/news5.htm

-----

From the East Hampton Star, Feb. 12, 1998.

Say It With Flowers, You Rat

"You can send me dead flowers every morning,
Send me dead flowers by the U.S. mail,
Say it with dead flowers at my wedding,
And I won't forget to put roses on your grave."

- Keith Richards and Mick Jagger

Like lemmings to the sea, men will swarm into florists this Valentine's Day, shelling out up to 75 bucks for a dozen long-stemmed red roses and just the right mushy card to keep them out of trouble with their wives and girlfriends for another year.

But what about the miserable rodent who forgets, or doesn't even bother?

William Verderosa of East Hampton has an answer for the jilted lover or ignored wife that is a little more subtle than a rolling pin or cast-iron skillet over the head.

Love's Labors' Losers

For just $37.50, Mr. Verderosa's company, Drop Dead Flowers, will wrap a dozen roses - well-preserved, but plainly deceased - in a black lacquered box with purple tissue and ribbons, and ship it, with a somber card expressing the sender's disdain for the recipient, anywhere in the world.

While a wilted bouquet, sent with an appropriately sentimental card that reads, say, "Drop Dead," makes for a great Valentine's Day gift for losers in the game of love, Mr. Verderosa sees a broader niche for his company.

Dead flowers also come in handy to thank your boss for that agreed-upon promotion which never came, to tweak the nose of a teacher who failed to see the hidden genius in your term paper, or to let your neighbor know you are not pleased he lets his dog roam through your yard and dig through your garbage.

Revenge Is All

"This whole concept is about revenge, to get something off your chest," Mr. Verderosa said.

In one of his most popular arrangements, he said, he cuts the heads off the roses and sends the stems and thorns with a card that reads simply, "Prick."

Other suggested cards include "Let's bury the past" and "Why are you killing me?"

Mr. Verderosa, whose name means green roses in Italian, uses only the highest quality roses for his bouquets, which he purchases at a wholesaler and painstakingly kills by hanging them in the garden shed behind his Pantigo Road house to dry for a month or more.

"They make lovely dried arrangements, too," he remarked.

Drop-Dead Beautiful

Customers who think they are too late for Valentine's Day need not fear. "I can send them overnight mail," Mr. Verderosa promised.

During the week, Mr. Verderosa works as a probation officer for the Westchester County Criminal Court. The job's four-day work week leaves him plenty of time for his moonlighting.

He started Drop Dead Flowers early in 1987, when he was living in New York City. The summer before, he had had a share in a house on Fire Island, and one of his housemates was a florist who brought out exquisite arrangements each week.

Pie Alternative

"One weekend, I looked at the flowers that were already a week old, and I said, 'Those are still drop-dead beautiful.' " Then he thought about what he'd just said, and the wheels started to turn.

"You have to be a twisted person to do this," he said.

Mr. Verderosa took out an ad in The New Yorker, offering his flowers as "an elegant alternative to a pie in the face."

The advertisement caught the attention of a Wall Street Journal reporter. The story was picked up, in turn, by CNN, Channel 7, Channel 2, over 30 radio stations, and newspapers as far away as Japan and the Netherlands.

"It was a flash," Mr. Verderosa said. "It was a novel idea that really took off."

Within weeks, he and his then partner, Mark McConnell, found themselves selling up to 100 bouquets a week.

At $37.50 and more a bunch, that made for a fat profit margin, especially since the overhead was so low. "I used to get the flowers from cemeteries," Mr. Verderosa confided. "I was a garbage-picker."

Living in an apartment building that had its own post office made deliveries a snap. "If there was a big enough shipment, the post office would pick them up," said Mr. Verderosa. "I didn't even have to leave my apartment."

Local deliveries were made personally. "The funny thing is, people would tip you. They'd give you five bucks."

The partners rarely waited for a reaction. "We'd turn around and run like hell," Mr. Verderosa said.

Not The Same Thing

While most recipients were good sports, Mr. Verderosa did receive a few complaints.

One came from the Nassau County Police. It seemed that a woman who had been receiving a weekly bouquet from her mother-in-law felt threatened.

"I told them, 'To tell someone to drop dead is not the same thing as telling them you are going to kill them,' " Mr. Verderosa said.

"But it's not all so serious. A lot of it is tongue-in-cheek."

Looking for a new challenge, Mr. Verderosa sold Drop Dead Flowers just two years after launching it. The buyer planned to market it nationally with a toll-free telephone number, but the idea never got off the ground and the company languished.

Last year, Mr. Verderosa, who had never received full payment, got the name back and decided to take the company on line. He invested $5,000 designing and launching a Web site on America Online and waited for the flood of orders. Instead, he received a trickle, four or five a week.

"The problem with A.O.L. is, who would ever think of buying dead flowers?" he said. "This idea has to slap you in the face."

Next Up: Mail Order

Mr. Verderosa considered a mass E-mail campaign, but dismissed the idea. He does not like junk mail himself, he explained, and besides, the cost was prohibitive.

He has now taken a detour from the information superhighway and plans to advertise in major metropolitan papers in an effort to turn the company into a successful mail-order house.

"For now, this is a hobby," he said. "It's a goof. It's fun."

STEPHEN J. KOTZ

GordonJ February 14, 2012 01:21 PM

Who else wants to join the NEW "Hallmark"...
 
or American Greetings?

Send me your USED

greeeting cards...

birth day, anniversary...anything...

My NEW White OUT greeting card company will recycle those long past thoughts of good wishes, love long dead, and we'll make a killing...

It might be a fast HOOT and FAD...let's cash in quick...

The truly RECYCLED Greeting Card...When you care enough to use someone else's words, who sez it better than you ever could...

WHITE OUT CARDS. By Gordon Greeting Company.

GordonJ

sandalwood February 14, 2012 03:30 PM

Re: Weird Valentine's business (from the past)!
 
It would seem to me this kind of "fun" can be done every day of the year. Somebody has a birthday, anniversary, funeral, bar/bat mitzvah and on and on and on. Some deserve dead flowers while the remaining deserve white outed cards.

I wonder if we could increase the revenue by segmented marketing - gays- straights, abortionists - anti-abortionists, men - women, lovers - haters, black - white, christians - moslems - jews, etc.

It'd be fun trying, right?

Damn, the thinkers have the fast track again...

Dien Rice February 14, 2012 05:03 PM

Re: Who else wants to join the NEW "Hallmark"...
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by GordonJ (Post 30080)
or American Greetings?

Send me your USED

greeeting cards...

birth day, anniversary...anything...

My NEW White OUT greeting card company will recycle those long past thoughts of good wishes, love long dead, and we'll make a killing...

It might be a fast HOOT and FAD...let's cash in quick...

The truly RECYCLED Greeting Card...When you care enough to use someone else's words, who sez it better than you ever could...

WHITE OUT CARDS. By Gordon Greeting Company.

Thanks Gordon...

That's hilarious!

I love it! ;)

Dien

Phil February 14, 2012 07:42 PM

The NEW "Hallmark"... Don't Forget, Plantable Greeting Cards, Smart {ECO} Marketing!
 
Don't Forget to Add the Following into The Swing of Things! Especially within and For [All] your Direct... And Specialized, Specialty Marketing campaigns with those Nice Smart {ECO} related Tie-ins... ;)
http://www.google.com/search?q=Plant...ient=firefox-a
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/...tines-day.html

Phil

Phil February 14, 2012 08:24 PM

Weird Valentine's Day business (Past & Future)10+ Far-out Valentine's Gifts/Biz ideas
 
A little Too Late for February 14, 2012...

BUT! ... Any DAY... Or [Ongoing] Time... Now & into The Future! ... :)

Some Very interesting... Especially {Twistable}...

10 Far-out Valentine's Gifts and Specialized, Specialty business ideas...

To Consider... Getting into! ...

Wheeling, Dealing, Brokering, Importing, Exporting etc. etc...

Marketing Daily! ... Mixing into other Business related models, Concepts and Innovations... ;)
http://www.google.com/search?q=10+Fa...ient=firefox-a

Phil


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