Friday, February 17, 2012

Rant on the dreaded V-day




As some of you may know, I work in a flower shop. The past week has been a living HELL for me. Yup, I said the "H" word, whatcha gonna do about it?

I HATE Valentine's Day!!! I have had no love of Valentine's day for as long as I remember. It's not because I'm perpetually single, I have had some V-day's when I am not single and I still hated them. For example, one year I was married, my husband bought me SHOES for V-day. SHOES!!! Not cute or sexy heels, not sensible, comfy work shoes, not even some nice house shoes, no, Justin bought me Adidas sneakers. They were a lovely white with green trim, but they were sneakers. UGH!! Ok, enough ranting on the ex-dipstick, I'll move on. Ha! I did move on!

Anyhoo, as you may have gleaned, I have no certain love for the day of lovers. But working in the floral industry, especially in a flower shop, makes that lack of love turn to hate. As this was my 3rd year to spend the week of V-day in a flower shop, I have especially come to hate it.
 I WISH that was me! I would DEMOLISH it, just like JG did! 
For a flower shop, Valentine's day isn't just a day, it is a week; a week of pure insanity. Gentleman, if you want to order flowers for your sweetheart on V-day, order at least a week, preferably a month ahead of time, and please, please, PLEASE, FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE, have them delivered a day or two BEFORE V-day. Not only does she get flowers for V-day, she gets them BEFORE everyone else, and it is one less delivery we have to worry about on V-day! All the other ladies at work or who come over for book club can be jealous that SHE got flowers by such a considerate hubby and she gets to enjoy them all week! Not only that, it saves you the worry of having them delivered by a certain time, because, Honey, no matter how early you order, if you want your flowers delivered by a certain time of V-day, you are absolutely, positively INSANE. We had over 400, yes, OVER 400 deliveries on V-day. We had to hire in temporary drivers so that there were 10 drivers out making deliveries on V-day. The day before we had 6 or 7 and Wednesday, the day AFTER, we had 3. The chances of you getting your delivery made by a certain time in all of the confusion that ensues in the madness of 500 orders (because there are "will call" orders as well and I am not including walk-in's either) on V-day alone, are slim pickin's gents.

Come spend 10 minutes in a flower shop, behind the scenes as a worker on V-day and you will understand. We try to route the drivers according to location so that time is not wasted going all over town. So, we are up nights, or early mornings, routing delivery areas, and (I had nothing to do with it) my boss did not care two cents whether there was a time marked or not.  AND we work off of a computer system, which generally makes keeping track of orders easier, but sometimes computers mess up and don't print out an order and it is lost in virtual space because if it doesn't print and if the order was sent from another store, how are we to know that it exists?  It happens.

So, I'm sorry if you didn't get exactly what you ordered or it didn't get delivered by the time you wanted because you wanted her to have the flowers at work all day, if you wanted her to have them all day to enjoy, you should've sent them the day before. And you know what, if you didn't get what you ordered, its because you waited until the last minute to order and we sold out. We did start asking for second options or if we could send something of the same value when you called in two days before V-day to order. So, if you got something completely different and you waited until the last minute, I have absolutely NO sympathy for your sorry, absent minded booty. (I do try to run a clean show here folks.) You should've ordered ahead of time, like a week or 4.

Maybe that is enough ranting about V-day. Maybe one day I'll change my mind...one day when I'm not working in a flower shop, it's not rubbed in my face that I'm single, and I have a husband who treats me to something better than a pair of sneakers. Perhaps that day will come...


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