Enter our Christmas photo competition & win an amazing Christmas gift set worth £80!

If you’re stuck for present ideas then you could always win some with our very special Christmas competition.  With a chance to win a bouquet, some Champagne and Prestat chocolates, the finishing touches to your Christmas shopping could be done with one (very) imaginative photograph.

How to enter?

1. Download our Christmas logo from here
2. Take and imaginitive picture of yourself (or anybody else) with a print out of our Christmas logo or display it on your mobile phone, computer…
3. Upload your picture on our Christmas Competition page on Facebook.  (Please note it can take up to 24 hours for your photo to be approved.).
4. Get friends to ‘like’ your photo.  More likes means more of a chance to make it to the final selection that will be hosted on this very page from the 12th of December.
5. Make it to the final selection, get the maximum public votes and win an amazing luxury Christmas gift set worth £80.

Terms and conditions apply, please visit our competition page to view.

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**Voting now closed. Many congratulations to our winner, Yasmin B who chose the name “Mistletoe Blush”.  We have sent out her order and hope she enjoys the flowers and treats! Congratulations, Yasmin.**

We’ve had a huge number of responses to the competition and thank you to everyone who entered.  It has been no easy feat to decide on the finalists, all the ideas were great, festive and fun and a fair amount of punning.  We loved them.

We did, however, have to whittle it down to 15 finalists and now we turn it over to you all to vote for your winner.  Just to remind you (so you consider carefully where you cast your vote).  The winner is to receive a gorgeous Christmas gift set with a deluxe version of the bouquet, some delicious gift-wrapped Belgian chocolates and a Christmas teddy bear from our Christmas flowers range.

Please vote for your winner below.  Voting closes on the 15th of December and the winner shall be announced shortly thereafter.

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Entry is now closed! We’ll soon be revealing the 15 finalists. Come back then to vote for your favourite!

We make new bouquets from time to time.  Ok, we make a lot of new bouquets all the time.  Our florists delight in it, their creative juices flow.  The product team love to photograph them and then put them up on the site for you to enjoy and send to friends and family.  Sometimes, however, we do have problems coming up with names for our bouquets.  So to launch our new range of Christmas flowers we thought we’d ask for your help.

In return, the winner will receive a wonderful Christmas bundle including a deluxe version of the Christmas bouquet, some delicious gift-wrapped chocolates and a cute Christmas teddy bear.  You can send this to the recipient of your choosing (or to yourself of course), to arrive for Christmas.

Here’s how it works.

Leave your name suggestion for this bouquet in the comments of this blog post (here) before Friday the 3rd of December 2010 (please remember to include your email address in the email field).  We will choose the top suggestions and then the public vote shall begin!  Voting will end on the 10th of December and the winner will not only have a bouquet which they have named, but also a lovely prize which they can send to anyone of their choice for Christmas.

The spoils.

The winner will be treated to a deluxe version of the bouquet (worth £60), a beautifully gift-wrapped box of delicious chocolates and a very cute and festive teddy bear.

Some handy hints.

There are no rules for the naming (however, we can’t call the bouquet something which is already being used, if you’d like to check the name hasn’t already been used please see our Christmas flowers), you can make it as silly or personal as you like.  To get you started:

• Names including Christmas song titles work well
• Puns and rhymes on Christmas themes are clever and catchy

Thinking caps on and…. Good Luck!

Our Terms and Conditions.

1. This competition is open to all nationals (over the age of 18), however delivery restricted to the UK, Belgium, France, Germany and the Netherlands only.

2. Period of promotion: Name Suggestions must be entered in the comments field below this post between Monday 22nd November 2010 until Friday 3rd December 2010, inclusive, UK time.  Arena Online Ltd reserves the right to revise this date and extend the period.

3. Voting on the short-list of names will start on the 3rd December and end at 16:00 GMT 10th December 2010, when the winner will be announced.

3. The winner will be awarded a deluxe version of the bouquet, 200g gift-wrapped luxury chocolates and a festive Christmas teddy bear.

4. The lucky nominees will have the suggestion submitted used on this site for purposes related to the competition, so please be happy with this before entering the competition.

5. If you have any questions or queries relating to this promotion, please contact our team via customer@arenaflowers.com.

6. If we believe anyone is abusing the promotion or seeking to defraud Arena Online Ltd we reserve the right, at our absolute discretion, to rescind this or any other offer without notice.  We believe in fairness.

7. The competition is as stated and there will be no alternative offer or cash substitute.

8. By entering the competition, customers will be deemed to be bound by and have accepted these terms and conditions.  Entrants must read and accept the website terms and conditions and privacy statement to be eligible.

9. By entering the competition you will automatically be signed up to the Arena newsletter, aimed at offering exclusive deals and promotions, we will not spam you.

10. English law applies and the English courts shall have exclusive jurisdiction over any proceedings in connection with this competition.

11. Arena Online Ltd reserves the right to vary these terms and conditions in the event of circumstances arising beyond its reasonable control.

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This is my third post on Flowers…uncut, but my first as an Arena Flowers employee.  I’ve been a friend of the company since the early days and have written some guest posts on brand reputation and making the most of off-line advertising.

The temperature in London has dropped; it’s started snowing, however things are definitely hotting-up at Flowers HQ.

It’s just over a week until Christmas; we’re busy and bustling, getting out flower deliveries.  We know you are all in full swing too with Christmas shopping and Christmas parties.

This can be a stressful 10 days coming up and we at Arena Flowers want you to feel good this Christmas, so we’ve put together a Top 10 Guide to survival over the next week or so:

1) Going to a Christmas party and hoping to meet Mr. or Miss. Right? Well, you are clearly going to need some mistletoe.  The tradition of kissing under mistletoe is believed to have originated in Scandinavia where mistletoe is associated with peace and love.  Mistletoe is also thought to promote fertility…so use wisely!

2 ) Hosting a Christmas party? Why not coordinate your floral arrangements with your decorations? The Christmas White Bowl is a fantastic table piece. Made with white roses and white candles all kept in place with wonderfully fragrant pine fronds and cinnamon bundles (it almost smells as good as it looks). Our florists also add pine cones and waxed apples for a traditional Christmas touch. This all sits in a wonderful glass bowl wrapped inside with aspidistra leaves.

3) Recovering from a party? Try a lavender and vervain tea with some honey for sweetness. Vervain is known for its soothing effects and lavender for relaxation.  The honey should give you a natural energy boost.

4) Spending Christmas day with family? Why not send them flowers in advance? A lot of effort goes into making Christmas day magical, how best to show your support if you can’t help in person than by sending Christmas flowers in advance?  Try the Festive Fun bouquet. The bright gerbera and traditional warm tone roses contrast with sparkly silver thistles. With just the right amount of greenery, this is a beautifully balanced bouquet.

5) Are you hosting the family Christmas? Dr Edward Bach was one of the pioneers of homeopathic medicine and he championed the use of flowers as natural remedies in his very famous Bach Flower Remedies, still popular today.  Why not try Bach’s Hornbeam remedy? It is used to combat feelings of tiredness before a large task ahead.  A perfect boost on Christmas day morning.

6) Entertaining kids over Christmas? Children love Christmas and there seems to be no limit to their energy. Why not take advice from the Victorians and get the kids’ creativity flowing by having them make some paper flowers? There’s a great video guide and some step by step instructions from the BBC and don’t forget to send us photos of your paper roses so we can compare them with the real thing!

7) Room for more? Complement a hearty Christmas meal with some refreshing mint chocolates and you don’t get any more fantastic than the Prestat mint chocolate box.  Plenty to choose from with peppermint creams and coffee mints.  These are truly luxurious, but don’t take our word for it, Prestat has been awarded the Royal Warrant by Her Majesty The Queen.

8) Saying thank you? What a better way to thank your hosts than to send them some cheery flowers.  The Yuletide gift wrap is a wonderful, vibrant bouquet of gerberas, lilies and our grand prix roses.  Or try any of our Thank You Flowers as a perfect way to show your appreciation.

9) Cheering up left overs? How about making some flowery garnishes to cheer up those inevitable turkey sandwiches and brussel sprout salads?  It takes no time to carve carnations from carrots or turn cucumbers into chrysanthemums.  We liked this handy guide to flower garnishes.

10) Treating yourself? Christmas is about receiving as much as giving and it’s important to put your feet up and relax in preparation for the new year ahead.  Why not treat yourself to this Christmas Faerie bouquet?  It’s an unusual and very elegant bouquet.  The dusty pink roses fit perfectly with the alstroemeria (also called the Peruvian Lily).
With a touch of festive decorations such as cinnamon bundles and sparkling thistles it’s really stunning.

Happy Christmas from all of us at Arena Flowers!

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Getting hitched in the chilly months of winter doesn’t mean that you need to compromise on your winter wedding flowers.  Although relatively rare compared to summer weddings, winter ceremonies can indeed benefit from all the sparkle and glamour of the party season, with family and friends close to hand for the festive period. Wedding planners will normally recommend against sourcing for the low season as flowers can be much more expensive, and less available. However, if you’re all set for marriage in December, January or February – Arena is here to guide you in making the most of your winter wedding.

If you look out into the garden, it may seem that the selection of winter flowers is limited, but many varieties are available all year round. For instance, roses, lilies and carnations – the nation’s favourite wedding flowers – may traditionally be known as summer flowers but they can be found in virtually any colour throughout the year. Winter weddings may also be brightened by using lilies or chrysanthemums. Again both of these are a popular choice and are available all year round so you will not have to worry about breaking the bank when it comes to choosing your wedding flowers.

While the prices for winter wedding flower bouquets may run a bit on the high side, there are some great seasonal bargains to be found. For a real festive touch, what better than red or white amaryllis for an extra showy effect (as illustrated by our bridal bouquets above), or perhaps even poinsettia, holly or winter berries – mixing with winter evergreens such as firs and spruce.

Alternatively, there are also many varieties of lilies or orchids that make beautifully exotic winter wedding flower arrangements (as illustrated by our bridal bouquets below) and won’t necessarily cost you an arm and a leg. An exotic or tropical themed wedding in the bleak midwinter can make a lovely break from the cold.

Fire & Ice – Decorating Your Winter Wedding Flowers

Winter Bridal Bouquets
Winter white or very light ivory flatter any bride’s skin tone, and make the perfect canvas for bright, bold colours – bringing life to an otherwise monochromatic winter hues. When selecting a theme for your winter wedding flowers, a favourite choice is to opt for shades of white, rich greens and tones of copper or red and burgundy.

Buttonholes, Boutonnieres & Corsages
Continue a seasonal theme with spray roses coupled with holly and/or berries, or alternatively take the low season as an opportunity to experiment with exotic flowers such as orchids or asiatic lilies.

Flowers for the Ceremony & Reception
If opting for a ceremony in December or early January, it is likely that the wedding or reception venue will already be decorated in red and green for seasonal events however you do not need to feel constricted by these colour schemes. Metallics and whites will complement your festive setting, while extra colour can be added by lightly spraying petals with glitter to add that little extra winter sparkle.

Candles are highly recommended for adding warmth and glow to any venue, and decorating your winter wedding flowers with light or crystal embellishments also brightening your scheme. Mirrors, glass pebbles and baubles will add a glamorous touch to table decorations for your wedding reception. Wax apples, pine cones or cinnamon sticks will also add an extra festive feel to your centrepiece arrangements. For more ideas and inspiration for your wedding flowers visit our online portfolio.

Seasonal Availability & Christmas Flower Prices

In this day and age of under soil heating and imports from as far afield as Africa and Asia, most flowers are available to buy in the UK all seasons. However, the more ethically aware bride may have issues with the perceived carbon emissions associated with their availability – as well as inflated marketed prices over the Christmas period! Sadly, it is likely that wholesale prices for some flowers are set at a much higher market price then at other times of the year because of the increased demand for them for festive flower arrangements – something florists cannot control.

However, here’s a list of winter and all-year-round availability without the need for vastly inflated prices or air miles: Agapanthus, Alstromeria, Amaryllis, Anemone, Anthurium, Aster, Bouvardia, Calla Lily, Carnation, Chrysanthemum, Craspedia, Cymbidium Orchid, Euphorbia, Freesia, Gerbera, Gloriosa, Gypsophila, Heliconia, Hyacinth, Iris, Leucospermum, Lily (Asiatic & Oriental), Lisianthus, Muscari, Narcissus (Daffodil), Nymphaea, Ornithogalum, Phalaenopsis Orchid, Phlox, Poinsettia, Ranunculus, Rose, Sunflower, Strelitzia, Tulip, Veronica.

If you enjoyed this post, you may also enjoy this one about about our family summer wedding, or perhaps this post about spring wedding flowers or even this one about getting the best from your wedding photography.

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Unless you’re  living in a cave somewhere, you’ll know it’s Christmas very soon indeed – Google has even added holly and sweets to the ads shown for Christmas related searches.  It’s very busy at Flowers HQ right now too, as well wishers send flowers home to loved ones.  We’ve even sold out of Father Christmases (though Steve got all sentimental and decided to keep the last one as a memento).

Given the economic environment and the weakness of the pound, we’ve spent an awful lot of our time recently trimming unnecessary costs to make sure that our customers continue to get great value for money out of every pound they spend with Arena.  We try very hard to deliver a great product at a great price and we hate wasting money.

One example of where we’ve trimmed cost is in our marketing.  Like other online businesses, we always look at our marketing channels in peak periods to see how we can bring in new visitors and orders cost effectively.  This Christmas we have been amazed how much some of our competitors are willing to pay to buy traffic and orders, especially given it’s “credit crunch Christmas”.  One might expect marketing budgets to go down in this environment, but in fact some companies are being extremely aggressive and, frankly, throwing their customers’ money away.  Who pays? The customer of course, with a substandard product being delivered as there’s no money left for flowers because of the inflated marketing spend.

Here’s a concrete example from one of our competitors, to illustrate the crazy commission deals currently on offer and some of the tricks they’re using to try to claw some of that cost back.

Here’s what they are paying for their affiliate marketing:

• 20% commission to affiliates who send them orders
• 6% to the affiliate network
• 10% off for the customer, through a promo code given out by the affiliates

That’s 26% marketing cost plus a 10% reduction in sale value.  But that’s not all.  The commissions are all payable on the gross sale price, including VAT.  But sales are only recognised ex VAT.  So for a bouquet listed at £40 on their website:

• The gross value of the sale is actually recognised at £36 because of the 10% discount
• The net value of the order once VAT is deducted is £31.31 (£36/1.15)
• Marketing cost is £9.36 (26% of £36), fully 30% of the ex VAT value of the order!

Believe it or not, it gets worse.  Given this competitor runs a relay service, there will also be a hefty relay charge in there, at least 20% but probably more, taken by the competitor as a fee for passing the order to a local florist.  I don’t know the exact relay cost % because we don’t use the relay model, as we believe it’s a waste of money to pay middle men plus relay means you can’t control the quality of the end product.

But I digress.  The point is that with this huge marketing spend and the relay fees, over 50% of a customer’s money is spent on, erm, not a lot! With 10% knocked off the overall sale value of the bouquet anyway, one has to wonder how much is actually spent on  flowers and floristry once the order makes its way to the local florist.  It must be virtually nothing, otherwise this would be a heavily loss making offer.

Or so it would seem. But the competitor has pulled some pretty Machiavellian tricks to mitigate the impact of its marketing largesse.  For example, there’s a £4 standard delivery charge on top of the bouquet price.  The 10% discount doesn’t apply to the £4 delivery charge, only the £40 bouquet price.  There’s also a minimum £40 spend (excluding delivery charge) for the promo code to work.  Yet the lowest priced bouquet over £40 is actually priced at £44 so if your original budget was £40, after the promo code you’re back to where you started (plus have the £4 delivery charge on top). Try to find a bouquet at £40, £41, £42 or even £43 and you’ll come up empty handed.

We saw this offer and didn’t even consider matching it.  Our marketing spend percentage is way way lower than those figures as we like to put our customers’ money into flowers rather than to blow it on middle men.  We don’t sneak a delivery charge in (we offer free standard delivery) and we don’t use clever tricks to get ourselves out of tight spots created by our marketing, as we think that that will just annoy visitors and customers.  If people want to get really good discounts and special offers from Arena, the only real way to do so is to sign up to our free newsletters or to become an Arena Flowers follower on Facebook.

I guess the fact that we refuse to offer such sky high commissions means that less affiliates will want to promote Arena and we’ll grow a little more slowly.  But on the other hand, we’ll deliver a high quality product with transparent pricing and we’ll wow and retain our customers (hopefully) so that the next time they want to send flowers they’ll (hopefully) come straight back to us. And for that second order, we’ll spend exactly nothing on marketing and our customer will continue to get great service from us because we haven’t blown all their money on relay fees and marketing – everyone’s a winner.  With 40% of our orders coming from repeat customers we feel that this strategy is working out pretty well so far and that’s exactly what we’re going to keep on doing.

On that note, “Bah, Humbug!” to wasting customer’s hard earned money, thanks to all our readers and customers, and Merry Christmas to everyone!

PS If you want to send Christmas flowers with no hidden costs or jiggery pokery, click here. :)

If you enjoyed this post, you may also enjoy our other marketing posts.

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It’s my birthday today.  Hooray!  Birthday flowers, birthday balloons, birthday greetings cards all round!  Oh, and I’ll have some “healthy” chocolate too – I am getting old after all. Right – that’s the search engine optimisation bit out of the way.  I’m 33 today. Ouch!  11 years til my next symmetrical birthday.  Best enjoy this one while I can.  Apparently I share the date with Britney Spears.  Hmmm.  Hardly Albert Einstein or William Shakespeare, but hey, beggars can’t be choosers.

The thing I like about my birthday is that it signals (to me only, obviously) that Christmas is officially on its way.  Before the 2nd December, I see the decorations go up, I hear the people moaning about the adverts on telly but it all just slides over me and doesn’t go in.  It might as well be another language.  That is until the 2nd of Dec when my birthday comes round and I start to get into the swing of it.  Maybe it’s the card that I get from my grand mother every year that kick starts the good will – 85 years old and every year a card with a £20 note appears on my doorstep like clockwork.  Doesn’t matter how old you are, you’ll always enjoy receiving a card with a £20 note in it. :)

Anyway, my unerring march towards old age gives me the opportunity to point out that our Christmas flowers range is live and kicking and bigger and better than ever.  Among last year’s most popular were the alternative Christmas Tulips, the traditional Christmas Basket and the Winter Reds Christmas cube.  Of course if you want to impress and / or upstage your siblings by sending the biggest and best, then you can’t do much better than go for the Christmas Celebration. It’s the Daddy. Or Father Christmas. Sorry. That was terrible.

So what’s with the bicycle picture?  Well, that’s back to my birthday.  Having woken up way too early I decided that rather than go back to sleep and pretend I’m still 21 I’d brave the sub zero London weather and frosty roads in a vain attempt to prove to myself that I’m not over the hill.  So I decided on a 13 mile round trip to Tower Bridge on my bike, along the Embankment.  During peak flower delivery periods it’s all hands to the pumps at Arena, and we all get out on the road delivering, typically on frosty London days like today’s.  So my early morning ride was a nice reminder of fun days past.  Hopefully when I next get the chance to take more pics like this during the Christmas rush, I’ll be in a nice warm van and not on my bicycle.

Merry Christmas shopping!

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We love our customers – we really do – and absolutely nothing gives us more pleasure than to make someone’s day by delivering our flowers. But sometimes customers can make life very interesting for us here at Flowers HQ, and they sometimes think we have almost magical powers of divination!

Here, in a light-hearted, tongue-in-cheek way, are some of our favourite customer interactions over the last two years…

To speed up your order, always have your recipient’s full address to hand:

♥ Arena CS: “I’m afraid the order to Mrs X will be delayed, as you indicated that the delivery address, in Columbia, South America, is within Greater London, UK.”

♥ Customer: “I don’t have the full address of where he lives, can I send you an aerial image of the house, taken from space?”

♥ Customer: “I know he lives in Bromley but I’m not too sure where; your driver can ask a local shopkeeper, he’s very popular in the area.”

International enquiries are sometimes a challenge:

♥ Customer: “I’m trying to find out the price of the flowers, but I can’t see it. They all have a funny looking L by the side of them.”
Arena CS: “That is a pound sign, madam.”

♥ Arena CS: “And what is the delivery instruction, madam?”
Belgian Customer: “No!!!!!!!!!!”

When it comes to the goodies to send, we can be quite flexible with the delivery of our service, one of our favourite orders has included:

24 pink lilies
24 balloons
Prestat Banoffee truffles
Bailey’s Irish cream
A Mohican chicken
Plus a request from the sender that Arena’s driver sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to the lucky recipient on delivering the flowers!
Pure genius.

Although we’ll cross hot coals to get your order delivered within the time frame published, sometimes – especially on our ‘Mega Days’ – you can’t always expect the moon on a stick:

♥ Customer for Valentine’s Day: “My girlfriend is going to be in lectures from 11am-12pm. Can your driver deliver them at 11.59 and give them to her in her class?”
Arena CS: “On the busiest day of the year!! I’m afraid not, sir!”

When our beautiful fresh flowers are delivered to the safety of the recipient, the fun doesn’t always end there…

♥ Customer: “I have received no message card with my order”.
Arena CS: “I’m so sorry about that, there should be a card in with the flowers.”
Customer: “No. All there is is an orange card with your logo on it.”
Arena CS: “If you open it, you’ll find that the card message is inside the card…”

♥ Alarmed Elderly Lady: “I’ve received a large box with a clear lid, sent by a florist. I didn’t order anything! Can I ask what’s inside the box, my dear?”
Arena CS: “They are flowers, madam.”
Elderly lady: “Really? What a lovely surprise!”

And it’s a hard life being a Customer Service Team professional – what with all the amorous advances, Vanessa spills the beans:

I received a call from a customer who wished to send flowers to a girl he had just met in a restaurant. Whilst he was giving me the address and message, which stated how much he wanted to get to know her, he was flirting shamelessly with me. At the end of the phone call, he said that he enjoyed speaking to me so much that he was going to send me some flowers too. I thought nothing of it as I’ve heard this before and it had never happened. But lo and behold, a couple hours later, a bewildered looking lady walked in carrying some pink roses and asked for me. I was so happy having received some flowers that I didn’t initially care that they were delivered by another company (Interflora no less).

He called the next day to ask if I liked them and why hadn’t I called to arrange ‘something’. I answered, that I liked them very much but could not be possibly entertain the idea ‘getting to know him’ whilst he was sending other women flowers. He then said that if it didn’t work out with her he’d give me a call. So I’ll just be waiting by the phone then shall I..?!

Similarly, a customer called up wishing to have an arrangement of flowers made up in the shape of boat and then said that he found talking to Josephine such a pleasure that he proposed! (Prank call??…We think so!)

For more on our adventures at Flowers HQ, check out the following blog posts: The Mother of All Orders, Everlasting Orchids, and Our Lips Are Sealed.

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Quick intro from Will: We often get asked “So why is Arena Flowers so much better than John Lewis, Marks & Spencers or Interflora then? After all, you only sell a set of standard bouquets, just like them.”  Well, that couldn’t be further from the truth.  Unlike the bigger players, we do numerous bespoke and tailored designs every week; it’s just that there has been nowhere for us to show them off on our website. Until now.  Recently Stan has made it her mission to correct this misconception and has been very busy building our new bespoke flowers gallery to showcase the full breadth and depth of our florists’ brilliance.  Enough from me (I’ll write a post about the other reasons Arena’s better for customers than Interflora another time!). Over to Stan and the joys of bespoke flowers!

Whether it is a birthday celebration, wedding to be planned or Christmas party to organise, you want it to be perfect, with perfect beautiful flowers to match. Perfection comes from the heart, a passion for getting things right and just how you want it to be. No compromise.

Our flower arrangements are far from set in stone, and we know that one size (or colour or flower stem!) doesn’t always fit all. We’ve been fulfilling the individual wishes (and whims) of our varied customers since the inception of Arena Flowers back in July 2006, and this has included the sourcing of unusual and exotic flowers, flowers out of season and flowers in massive numbers, with arrangements designed in all colours and all sizes.

‘Bespoke’ is not just a description of what we can do for customers and their flowers. It also describes how we approach our service, by treating each customer as an individual. From the moment we receive a bespoke enquiry, our team takes the time to listen and understand your unique requirements and take great care and attention to detail, to interpret your dream into reality.

There is no greater satisfaction for our exceptional team of award-winning florists than in the challenge of creating a flower arrangement just for you – to your specifications.

So Why Choose a Bespoke Flower Arrangement?

Bespoke Wedding Flowers
• Your dream wedding bouquet unique to you: No other bride anywhere will have the same flower arrangement as you!
• A choice of embellishments – intricate beadings, grass looping and leaf embroidery to add extra originality
Visit our Wedding Flowers section for inspiration >>

Bespoke Bouquets
• Congratulating a special occasion? Say it with flowers with specific meanings and symbolism.
• Whether it’s a specific number of flowers or a combination of colours, it’s your choice!
Visit our Bespoke Bouquets page for inspiration >>

Bespoke Floral Displays
• Looking for that extra special centrepiece for an event or venue? Amaze your guests with a fragrant work of art – designed by you or our florists.
• Have fun with a variety of floor standing, table top or pedestal arrangements, created for specific decorative functions.
Visit our Bespoke Floral Displays page for inspiration >>

Bespoke Table Arrangements
• Where there’s good food there should be great flowers! Complete your dining tableware with a contemporary table arrangement.
• A versatile range of vases and containers to suit your business or home decor.
Visit our Table Arrangements page for inspiration >>

Bespoke Corporate Flowers
• Match your branding with coloured coordinated flowers, arranged to suit your company’s style.
• For work or pleasure, Arena Flowers offers a personal professional service for professional people.
Visit our Bespoke Corporate Flowers page for inspiration >>

Bespoke Funeral Arrangements
• Specify floral tributes that have significant meanings and evoke emotion unique to the sender’s sentiments.
• Our customer care team who will guide you through the process of ordering your funeral flowers with respect and integrity to your wishes.
Visit our Funeral Arrangements page for inspiration >>

If you have a bespoke enquiry, please do not hesitate to contact our friendly and helpful customer service team with your requirements. Email customer@arenaflowers.com or call us free on 0800 0350 581 (+44 20 8993 5400 for international customers).

Similar posts: If you enjoyed this post, you may find this one about the supermarkets pumping out uninspiring flowers and arrangements interesting.

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Hi. My name’s Rupert and I’ve been working as a customer service rep at Arena Flowers for a few months now to earn some cash to support my glamorous student lifestyle of baked beans on toast. Everything had gone as expected in the CS role, happily answering calls, updating orders etc until the 20th of December, a day very different from those that went before.

I should have known something was up when our managing director (who also happens to be my eldest brother) approached me with a disconcerting smile plastered over his face. He asked me if I’d like to go out delivering some of our beautiful Christmas flowers and gifts across London. You may be wondering why the managing director would be going out delivering plus recruiting one of his phone jockeys to help him. The answer is simple: Christmas + flowers = lots of orders, so it’s all hands to the pumps at such times…and it was a great day!

We grabbed the 15 Christmas bouquets and gifts for our first run and set off on our merry Christmas jaunt. As we had got all the flowers and thoughtful gifts in the van, our head of distribution, Mariusz, came with the list of all the recipients all the other information including the vital special delivery instructions which we do our very best to follow. On every run drivers also get a one page Google map with a marker for every delivery that needs to be made printed on it, so that the drivers can map the fastest (and most fuel efficient) route quickly and easily. Having planned our route, we set off at 11:15 to one of the furthest points on the map. There was method to our madness – to make sure that customers who had paid for a timed delivery got their flowers delivered within the relevant time slot. Our first drop of a Chrismas Celebration deluxe to a Mrs Mackintosh was completed by 11:50.

Using a PDA system developed by Zach, our technical whizz, we were able to immediately update the system which in turn alerted our customer that the flowers had been delivered, by sending an email and a free text message confirming delivery.

On our way to our next drop we learnt an important lesson, which was that Sat Nav can be useless – it guided us down the King’s Road at midday on one of the busiest shopping days of the year, so it took nearly 40 mins to travel just over a mile! After this failure was followed by several instructions to go the wrong way down one way streets, we took it upon ourselves to prove it wrong and find more sensible routes to our destinations. The next delivery also took far longer than intended due to an incorrect postcode but using Sherlock Holmes like skills we deduced that the flowers were for Baker Street not Baker’s Close. After this meticulous piece of detective work we finally had a chance to beat the sat nav – rather than doing the 10 minute circle to deliver down a one way street we stopped where we were and I simply got out and walked around the corner and delivered a dozen white roses to a delighted recipient.

Here’s Will ignoring the Sat Nav again – eyes on the road might have been a better idea!

With these extra ten minutes under our belts we then delivered another and went on to deliver a whopping ten more orders without a hitch and enjoyed some beautiful views of London in winter in the process. I’d never expected driving round London to be such a picturesque way of earning funds to pay for my studies!

The Natural History Museum:

Delivering flowers to flower lovers is fun:

The London Eye:

The Houses of Parliament – in December we delivered flowers to the great and the good, including the Prime Minister, Prince Michael of Kent and even to the Queen at Buckingham Palace, which got everyone in the office fairly excited!

Next up were two orders to the BBC the first was easy (see left) but the second turned out to be harder than we thought: we couldn’t leave the flowers at the correct building so we had to go in search of the main BBC post room (after I’d called to let the customer know, of course). The post room happens to be next door to a major BBC satellite beaming station (no vehicles fitted with radar allowed apparently) which was very sci-fi.

Our morning run done, we headed back to Flowers HQ…where a smiling Mariusz greeted us with another four London flower deliveries to make. Although initially we doubted we could we could manage them all in time, after a quick pep talk we realized that with the aid of arena power anything is possible and off we went!

Post from: Arena Flowers - Flower Delivery London & UK

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It has to be said that our florists are some of the jolliest people I have ever met. It’s not difficult to imagine that spending every day with flowers puts a smile on your face so it’s always nice to come in to the office via the warehouse in the morning.

A typical path in involves a game of hopscotch around various flowers and arrangements as the drivers organise their deliveries and a ‘hullo’ to the ladies (who are often singing along to the radio) as they put the finishing touches to the last of the morning’s bouquets. So it came as no surprise to find them all wearing Father Christmas hats and singing along to “Do they know it’s Christmas…”. Honestly! *reaches for his camera*

Christmas is always a busy period for us so it’s nice to hear the Christmas spirit coming from the warehouse as we are all hard at work and, in my case, trying to keep warm!

I love Christmas – who doesn’t? But why does it have to be sooooo cold?? Will, Steve and I all work in one room that is situated at the end of our building and next door to our neighbours, a company that I am convinced make igloos for a living. Perhaps not, but I do know that we are at the furthest point from our flower fridge so it can’t be that and yet as I write this I am conscious that my mouse is actually cold to the touch and my knuckles are too stiff to hold it properly. HAHAHA! Not even my Arena fleece can help me out there :) But that is small beer compared to my journey in to work.

Those of you who read our blog will know from my last post (Pimping Our
Rides) that I ride a bike to work which is a laugh in Spring, a joy in Summer, pleasant in Autumn but bitterly cold in Winter! On Monday I found myself chipping frost off my seat and thinking about Will who was in his flip flops on a last minute family holiday in the sun, probably heading down to the beach for his first Daiquiri of the day – bah! In truth, a well deserved holiday for a man who seems to actively avoid taking time off.

True to form he jetted off without a camera and so when faced with Christmas, tropical style, he was forced to whip out his trusty camera phone again - take the company photographer along next time I say! ;)

The pictures may be small but I think it is evident that despite not having snow on the ground they know how to make an island festive in the Cayman’s (apparently this was just one house!):

Back at home the Christmas orders are coming in thick and fast so with the increased work load it’s nice to know that we have the Arena Christmas party to look forward to. Last year we all went to a karaoke club and quickly found our singing voices (good and bad in equal measures!).

Christmas 2006
Will and I murder Wonderwall:

“Today is gonna be the day that they’re gonna throw it back to you..”

The dulcet tones of Steve and Ronald:

Vanessa and Ruth (who could sing!)

Richard – A voice to be reckoned with!

This year we are keeping it simple and going bowling! I know full well that I bowl as well as I sing but I can’t wait to see over 30 florists and drivers taking to the lanes…I am sure we will make a unique impression on the other parties :)

Post from: Arena Flowers - Flower Delivery London & UK

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