To price cut flowers, work out what a stem costs to grow, add the greens, sleeve and flower food for a bouquet and the minutes it takes to arrange, and price for the margin you want after card fees. Price = full cost ÷ (1 − margin − fees). In the example below, a flower farm's stems cost about 45 cents each to grow, so a market bouquet of 15 stems has $6.75 of flowers, 85 cents of greens, sleeve and food, and five minutes of arranging: $9.52 in all. At a 50% margin after 3% fees, that's $20.25, so the farm's $20 market price leaves $9.88. A grocery store paying $12 leaves $2.12. Below is a stem's cost, a bouquet's cost, the price, stores and florists, and a free calculator.
The short version
- Work out a stem's cost from a bed: seed or plugs, soil, water, and the field hours, divided by the stems it gives.
- Cost a bouquet: the stems, the greens and filler, the sleeve, the flower food.
- Add the minutes to harvest, condition and arrange it.
- Price = full cost ÷ (1 − margin − card fees), rounded up to a dollar.
- Count the stems you don't sell: a bucket that wilts is a cost of the ones that do.
- Florists buy by the bunch; grocers by the bouquet, at a little over half the market price.
- TaroStack keeps each day's harvest as a lot, dated, and costs every bouquet. More below.
What a stem costs
Moonfield Flower Farm, a made-up flower farm in Michigan, I use in these examples, works out a stem's cost bed by bed. A 100-foot bed of zinnias:
| A bed of zinnias, one season | Cost |
|---|---|
| Seed | $8 |
| Compost and fertilizer | $15 |
| Drip line and landscape fabric, its share | $10 |
| Planting, weeding and watering, 6 hours at $20 | $120 |
| The bed | $153 |
The bed gives about 340 stems over the season, so a zinnia costs 45 cents to grow. Dahlias, lisianthus and peonies cost more a stem; sunflowers, which give one stem a plant, cost more than you'd think. Do the sum for each crop, at least roughly, because a stem's cost is the base of every price.
A bouquet, costed
| A market bouquet, 15 stems | Cost |
|---|---|
| Stems, 15 at $0.45 | $6.75 |
| Greens and filler | $0.40 |
| Sleeve and band | $0.50 |
| Flower food | $0.10 |
| Harvesting, conditioning and arranging, 5 minutes at $20 | $1.67 |
| Cooler and buckets, a share | $0.10 |
| Full cost | $9.52 |
The price
| Bouquet | |
|---|---|
| Full cost | $9.52 |
| Price at a 50% margin after 3% card fees | $20.25 |
| Rounded up to a dollar | $21.00 |
| At the farm's $20 market price | $9.88 left |
A 50% margin covers the buckets that don't sell. If a fifth of the stems cut for a market go home and wilt, each sold bouquet carries $1.69 of stems that weren't sold, and the margin drops to about 41% at $20. How a whole flower farm's season adds up is in flower farm business plan.
Stores, florists and subscriptions
| Sold to | Price | Left after cost and fees |
|---|---|---|
| Market or farm stand | $20 | $9.88 |
| Bouquet subscription, weekly | $18 | $7.94 |
| Grocery store, a bouquet | $12 | $2.12 |
| Florist, a bunch of 10 stems | $8 | about $2.30 |
A florist's bunch needs no arranging, so it costs the stems, a sleeve and a couple of minutes, about $5.47, and $8 leaves about $2.30. Grocery bouquets leave little, but they take whole buckets at once. Subscriptions sell for less than the market and are paid ahead, which is worth the discount in a wet summer. How florists count what they hold is in florist inventory list, and what flowers become when they're dried in dried flower business plan.
Get the calculator
Download the cut flower pricing calculator. Type the stems and what each costs to grow, the greens, sleeves and food for a run of bouquets, the minutes to arrange them, overhead, your hourly rate, card fees, the margin you want, a store price and a price to test; it works out the full cost of a bouquet, the price for your margin rounded up to a dollar, and what each price leaves. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.
Where this stops working
Flowers don't wait. Twenty crops come into bloom at different weeks, each day's harvest goes into buckets in the cooler, and what wasn't sold on Saturday has to go to the florist on Monday or the compost on Tuesday. A calculator prices a bouquet; it can't say which buckets are oldest.
How TaroStack does it
TaroStack keeps each day's harvest as a lot, dated, and costs every bouquet.
Each harvest a lot. Each day's cut of each crop can be received as a lot with its date, counted by the stem, so the picking list sends the oldest buckets first.
Bouquets as recipes. A market bouquet is a recipe of stems, greens, a sleeve and food, so making bouquets takes them off stock with the minutes recorded, and "what could I make right now" says how many the cooler allows.
Losses with a reason. Stems that wilt leave stock as an adjustment with its reason, so shrink is a number by crop.
| The job | Calculator | In TaroStack |
|---|---|---|
| Stems in the cooler | Count the buckets | Stock by the stem, by day |
| Oldest buckets first | Tape on the bucket | Each harvest a lot, earliest first |
| Bouquets the cooler allows | Count and hope | What could I make right now |
| What wilted | Not written down | Adjustments with a reason |
Lots, recipes, adjustments and sales orders are on every plan, from $49 a month. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.