A florist’s sustainability strategy

Many florists embrace some sustainability measures. Maybe you avoid floral foam, promote local, seasonal flowers, or wrap with recycled paper.

But without a plan to follow and a record of your actions, it’s impossible to calculate your impact.

Are you being consistent, or did you let things slide during a busy period? Have you improved since the same time last year? Have you really shrunk your carbon footprint?

Lana Lorenzo founded Bituin, a Melbourne-based family-run florist for weddings, events and daily flower deliveries, with a mission to create and leave a positive impact through flowers.

“I wrote a sustainability strategy for Bituin because I believe that meaningful sustainability requires structure and accountability, not just good intentions,” says Lana. “The strategy serves as our roadmap, helping us make intentional decisions about everything from sourcing to waste management.”

No matter where you are on your journey toward greater sustainability, writing a strategy offers many advantages.

Customers, confidence and credibility

Consumer demand for more sustainable products grows year-on-year, and market researchers consistently predict it will continue to rise. As global consultancy Simon-Kucher wrote in their report Sustainability 2024: Navigating consumer behavior, “Sustainability is no longer just a ‘trend’ – it’s a standard consideration influencing consumer behavior.”

As conscious consumers, we look to experts for advice. When we want to choose the most sustainable fish, the most ethical bank, or the lowest-impact fridge, we rely on people who understand the sustainability issues in fishing, banking and manufacturing.

Flower-loving consumers rely on florists for advice. Consumers generally aren’t aware that the workers who grew and picked their flowers may not be earning a living wage, that the flowers themselves may carry an unjustifiably large carbon footprint, or that floral foam can easily disintegrate into harmful microplastics.

A good strategy, available for your customers to see, demonstrates that you understand the issues and you’re taking specific steps to help.

“Rather than making vague claims about being ‘eco-friendly’,” says Lana, “our strategy outlines specific practices and commitments that demonstrate how we’re actively working to reduce our environmental footprint while creating beautiful floral designs.”

Guesswork and greenwashing

We wrote about greenwashing last year. In a nutshell, greenwashing occurs when a business portrays itself as more sustainable than it really is. It’s often intentional – a marketing ploy to deceive consumers looking to shop more sustainably. But it can also be unintentional.

Carbon accounting software company Normative calls unintentional greenwashing a combination of “good intentions and bad math”. For example, a business, motivated by optimism or ambition, may commit itself to reduce its carbon footprint.

But what does that include, and how is it measured?

As Lana explains, a sustainability strategy is the best defence against greenwashing because it “enables measurement and accountability. Instead of making general claims about being eco-friendly (which is a word I try to avoid in most of my writing), we track specific metrics that can have a definitive or measurable result.”

“This is so that we can identify where we’re succeeding and where we need to improve, creating a cycle of continuous progress rather than maintaining the status quo.”

Don’t underestimate your customers. They may not be across the specific issues in floristry, but thanks to advocacy groups, investigative journalists and regulators, they are becoming increasingly sceptical of sustainability claims.

A plan for consistency

In his book The Checklist Manifesto, Atul Gawande explains how the simple checklist makes everything – from surgery and skycrapers – safer and more successful. Checklists work because it’s impossible to keep all the knowledge we need in our heads all the time when we’re busy, stressed and tired.

A strategy solves this by creating a consistent plan of action that can refer to.

“When we’re faced with time pressures or budget constraints – like during peak wedding season – having documented commitments prevents sustainability from becoming optional or something we’ll ‘get back to later’”, says Lana. “It establishes sustainability as a non-negotiable part of our business rather than a nice-to-have when convenient.

Prepare now for requirements down the track

Many countries have introduced mandatory sustainability reporting for large businesses and financial institutions.

While small businesses generally aren’t required to report on sustainability, it will come. And when that happens, any small business that has already started will be in a much better position.

Even now, small businesses may be asked to supply data by larger organisations who need to report on their supply chain. For example, a bank might need to report the sustainability of all its annual events – including the flowers.

So how do you write a sustainability strategy?

Here’s Lana.

“I started by identifying the areas where my floristry practice would have the biggest environmental impacts, from foam use and plastic waste to water consumption and carbon emissions from sourcing. This helped me prioritise which issues to tackle first based on both environmental and social significance and our ability to influence them as a small business.”

“From there I came up with the values I wanted to uphold and created sustainability targets and initiatives that upheld those values. I researched industry best practices and adapted frameworks from larger organisations (not just floristry industry) to fit our scale. In terms of other companies’ strategies that inspired me, Patagonia and other sustainable fashion brands were influential when first creating my business and researching goals. However, I was particularly inspired by the UN Sustainable Development Goals, which helped me ensure our strategy was comprehensive while remaining practical for everyday implementation.”

How the SFN can help

The SFN’s Foundation in Sustainable Floristry outlines a pathway to a sustainability strategy based on our Design and Business Principles.

Find out how to become a more sustainable florist via our industry program.