Here's something that's taken me a lot of years, probably months of courage, to be able to go back and look at the earliest days of the little bird bloom flower empire. So as a point of reference, we officially got our tax file number, business setup, whatever you want to call it, the logistics, we were officially a business on the 15th of August, 2014, which because it's before the pandemic, I was like, that was when the dinosaurs roamed.

We are all now billion years old, but August of 2014 is when I officially set up this business. In typical Kathleen style, I just registered our business, set up a website and then figured out how to make it all work. And there are so many things, so many aha moments I've had in the last few days around what I wish I had known, what would dramatically make my business building experience so different in terms of how to actually shortcut your progress.

It is in its foundation what I teach inside the flower boss bootcamp, because it wasn't until December of 2018. So four years, it took us to figure out how the heck to market and price and sell floral designs to a point of profitability, four years of two people working more than full time with a team, with a good amount of resources, with support, with a shop front four years to figure it out, my friends. And what I want to talk you through today is one thing that has changed the game for so many of you guys who are inside the flower boss bootcamp, but also it's one of the pivotal things I wish they would teach us whether we're going to formal design school, whether people are putting on workshops, I'm like this one concept changes the game, my friends. If I can go back to that version of me from August, 2014 and tell her what I'm about to teach you guys in this program, my friends, it would be a very different place.

To be able to answer that question of how do I get clients and customers to say yes to the work that I actually want to create. And this concept actually applies to all kinds of creative businesses. So you might be a stylist or a cake maker. You might be a photographer. You might be a floral designer. You might be an interior you're designer. You might be a graphic artist. This one concept really changes the game for creative entrepreneurs. And I remember right, all of this time, there was this window in our business. It was probably almost like 12, 14 months long where I just couldn't kind of muster up the energy you to post anything valuable on Instagram. And I constantly found myself in that energy of like insufficiency and not good enoughness and the total default comparison spiral of looking at some of my favourite.

Florist looking at some of my favourite designers and just being so envious of wishing that I either lived in an area with customers that had that kind of budget or wishing that my customers would come to me, asking me to create that kind of work. And I believed at the time that that was something that was completely out of my control.

I thought I had to wait until my customers came to me to ask me to create a certain kind of look. And because I was kind of in this striving graspy, insufficient energy, constantly living in my cycle of I'm not good enough. I didn't know. And I didn't realize that there's a missing piece of the puzzle. Today I want to introduce you to this concept that I refer to as the set menu and very functionally, very simply said, what is a set menu?

Well, you as the creative director in your business, you as the head honcho in your business, sit down and decide ahead of time. What formats, aesthetics ingredients and styles you want to create in. Yes, you get to decide, and this concept flies in the face of how we are taught or how our industry teaches us that the sales process should look like is how many of us have been okay, great. Well, send me your reference photos and then I'll start to create a quote for you. And that's exactly what I used to do. Like I remember that very first wedding that I booked for Paul and Peru spending hours. This was even before Canva existed. I didn't even know that there was like Dubsado or any of these fancy software solutions, but I spent hours creating this custom quote in keynote. I think it probably took me like two weeks to get back to her for a $3,000 wedding.

I was so stressy over the prices, not sure about what to charge for setup, delivery and pack down and just completely second guessing everything. There is obviously that old podcast episode where you guys can go back and go lessons learned from that wedding. Because there were so many of them, but one of the things where we go wrong in our business and the reason that so many floral designers get burnt out from spending so much time on admin and paperwork is because nobody's told you that you are the creative director in your business.

Once you recognize that you get to decide ahead of time. You get to sit down. Now, even if this is the first day of you running your business, or maybe you've been a designer for 30 years, you get to decide now the kind of work you want to put out into the world and idea flies in the face of all of us who have gone through our formal credentials or formal qualifications.

Who've been formally trained as floral designers to learn a very specific skillset, very specific design, aesthetics, very specific treatments or ingredients to use. And that there is a very right and a wrong way to do things. When we go through our formal design training, the way that they teach us to navigate the sales process with our customers is to have our customers send us a reference picture, have our customers tell us this is what I would like you to create.

Then we, as the designer are expected to be able to create a, all these different kinds of work. And I remember like one day we had an inquiry for a fully wired, like fully wired trailing bouquet. And then the next day it was like, could you create this kind of deconstructed, dried installation for us? And then you also need to be able to work with all these different kinds of ingredients.

It's like we are asking the impossible of ourselves. And when you can make the decision, when you have the courage and you take the brave, bold move of recognizing that you are the creative director in your business, it actually changes the game in so many ways because all of a sudden when you decide this is the aesthetic I want to to have, this is the kind of work I want to put out into the world.

These the ingredients I would like to highlight, this is the format I want to work in. You can sit down ahead of time, price out your work and no longer are you feeling bombarded and second guessing yourself every single time that a client comes to the door, it literally ensures that you have a formula to sort through what to order from your wholesalers so that you know, that you're making money every time out.

The concept of the set menu makes sales so simple because it cuts through the confusion and gives your clients the exact right number of choices and simplifies the wholesale conversation and makes it so easy for you to get back to them with a price, a quote, and the information to help them actually make a decision where we go.

So kind of off track in our industry is this idea that we're gonna put all of the design authority and expertise in our client's hands. And then they are in this bubble of like, oh my God, I'm panicking. I don't know what I'm supposed to know. I don't want to look like a fool talking to this expert, floral designer. I don't want to come across as completely ignorant. I think I should know how this whole thing works. And they're constantly second guessing themselves, which then brings up some crazy or erratic behaviour.

It's this crazy dynamic that we've created between the customer and the floral designer, but you can flip that whole thing on its head when you recognize that you're the creative director and you get to decide, it's kinda like as normal human beings, you and I, if we were asked to walk into the apple store and instead of them having these beautiful iPhones and then you get to choose from these colours and here's this iPad and the apple watch and the MacBook, and I don't even know what else they're selling instead of showing us any of those products.

If apple just had piles of components and parts all the around the shop and then you and I, as human beings who barely understand technology walk in and go, okay, so you want me to tell you what to do and you and I are like, I don't even know what's possible, right?

Anytime we, as human beings are in confusion or overwhelmed, it's always gonna lead to know sale. So one of the reasons that apple is so profitable and that they're able to continually make so much money, is that they recognize their customers. Don't know their customers don't know what's possible. Their customers don't know how this whole thing works. And one of the best things that they can do as a innovative creative company is decide ahead of time what they're going to sell.

Because even in today's day and age, what we probably get to choose between like six different colors of an iPhone, two sizes, maybe two different memory capacity of all of the infinite choices that apple can make in terms of how they produce and the features that they shove into that piece of technology, they are making it so simple for us as the human being and us as the customer or the client to just say, yes, I will take that one or no, thank you.

It's not for me. I'm gonna jump over here and get an Android. It changes the game because instead of having an infinite number of possibilities for your clients, right? And instead of putting the pressure on them to understand how this whole thing works, you are making the decision on their behalf. And this study that I just refer to as the jam study, and I think it's actually calls the parody of choice and you can Google it for those of you guys who are inside the bootcamp you'll already heard me talk about this study because it's one of the things I think that flies in the face of how we are traditionally taught to navigate the sales conversation with our customers. And the short version of the jam study is that a handful of psychologists conducted this experiment, where they went into a grocery store and they had a table set up.

The first week they set the table up with 24 types of jam on it. You and I would think, oh, that's good. Right? Like give customers choice the following week, they set up the same table, but they actually limited the choice to 6 kinds of jam. So the first week it was 24, the next week it was six. And what is so surprising is that the revenue generated during the period where they only offered six jams, surpassed the revenue of the 24 jams on offer.

So it's very possible. And in fact, in my opinion, quite likely that if you are giving your customers too many choices and particular, if you're leaving it to be completely open ended, you are losing out on making money. And it feels really counterintuitive. Doesn't it? This idea of, huh? You mean, if I offer 24 options, their brain is gonna go to no and then walk away.

Whereas if I actually limit the choice and I limit it to six options, they're gonna say, okay, great. I'm gonna pick that one. And I could potentially make more money, like very logically and particularly like scarcity thinking, it doesn't make sense, but the science is there and it works right. And it's why when I teach you guys how to set up your online menu and I go, here are the exact layouts and here the details, and this is how many bouquets, and this is how many in container things that you need to make for your clients here is a place to begin because I also saw that for me when we had, at one point, I think we had like 38 products in our online catalog, too many, and it all comes back to having learned about this parody of choice.

So if you know, if you've got your online catalog set up or you are navigating your wedding inquiry process, or you've got heaps of options in terms of your floral subscriptions, think about how you might be able to simplify it and really take on the parity of choice and the counter intuitiveness of this whole idea.

It's possible that you could make more money by providing less options. And the whole concept of the set menu came to me when I thought about how complicated the restaurant world is, right? And I know we deal with kind of angsty clients and customers all the time as floral designers because we're navigating hugely emotional situations.

But I do think the world of restaurants has it like one step harder because nobody wants to deal with hungry people. Like I don't, I don't want to deal with me when I'm hungry, but the next time you walk into a restaurant, look at their menu. That chef has made so many decisions ahead of time. That chef has decided, this is the cuisine that we specialize in. This is how many items are on our menu. And these are the prices that is the entire foundation for all of their creativity, all of their design and all their food preparation knowhow.

It has this massive domino effect in terms of the operations and logistics within their business. But it also is one of the most helpful things for us as the customer. Could you imagine, I have to think about this. Like if we ran a restaurant, if you and I were running a restaurant and we didn't sit down to create our menu and instead asked our potential customers to come in with a blog post, their mom's cookbook or something from Instagram that they might have seen, or these days something from TikTok that they might have seen and then it's our job to create it. So then all of a sudden we might be asked to create a vegan lasagna, a gluten-free brownie, some sort of bake, Italian feta, pasta extravaganza, and then maybe some grilled octopus. So we have to have all the ingredients on hands to be able to make all that happen.

We have to have complete confidence in our pricing model to make sure that we're accounting for all of our operational costs and profitability within every single one of those creations. And we have to have the skills as the chef to be able to make all of those things beautifully. I love thinking about that example because that's how our industry teaches us to show up, right? That's literally what I learned at school is your customer is gonna tell you what's to create, and you, you need to build the skill sets to be able to make all of those things on demand. You need to be able to work with all of these different kinds of ingredients, and you must be able to create in all of these different kinds of design aesthetics. Now do not get me wrong. I truly believe that we have to withhold a standard and we have to have a certain and a certain amount of professionalism to continue to make this work look like magic because nobody likes shitty mechanics, right?

Being able to craft and really hone your skills from a design and a mechanics point of view is valuable. And it's really important for the integrity of our industry, but something that's fairly controversial that I'm willing to say out loud, there are going to be ingredients that you find hard to work with. And that's okay. For example, you will never find until I figure out a better way to work with them, you will never find two lips in a wedding bouquet. You will probably never find pennies, big bunches of Hyde ranger or those epicly massive dinner play Dalias in a wedding bouquet because Kathleen, as the creative director, doesn't like the look of them. I've only just recently. I think maybe possibly still filled with doubt, kind of found my happy medium in terms of how to use snap dragons in a design. But the jury is still out on that one.

But instead of thinking that we need to be at the Beck and call of our customers, and we need to learn all, all the skills under the sun, to be able to cater to all of these different cuisines, you get to decide ahead of time. This is the kind of work I want to create. Now I'm gonna put in my 10,000 hours to figure out how to create that work to a professional standard and to the level to allow me to create the aesthetic and the impacts that I'm looking to create, which also means you get to decide the ingredients that you use. You get to decide what level of foliage, how much foliage you get to decide all of it, because you are the head chef in your restaurant. And this one idea of sitting down ahead of time to create your set menu will change the game for you in your business.

And no doubt, it's gonna bring up a lot of imposter syndrome. A lot of I'm a total fraud and who am I to decide that this is what I want to offer my customers. That's totally normal. I am 100% on board with the idea that if you feel like an imposter, you're doing it right, because you're stepping out of your, and you're growing as a human being. And there's so many reasons why I don't think this idea is taught. I certainly didn't learn it from anybody. I had to make it up myself, but there's kind of four reasons that have come to mind in terms of why we approach this whole sales, creative director, relationship it backwards. Our industry has taught our clients that the way to navigate an inquiry, the way to enlist the help of a floral designer is that they need to send us a photo.

And then that puts us as the florist in the back seat. And we must have the skills, be able to pull off the magic, to be able to recreate and replicate that exact bouquet. That is the dynamic of the traditional sales process within our industry. Client sends photo. We, as the designer must learn how to create that photo. And we must stress out and do everything in our power to make sure that we have those exact ingredients so that it looks exactly like that. Bouquet. Number two is this general concept of the customer is always right, which I will say from a customer service point of view is an amazing belief to carry, right? Because if you remember at the end of the day that your customers are also human beings with a human brain and they just want to be seen and heard, you can start to navigate any sales conversation with your customer with way more authority and empowerment.

But where we get off track, when we decide that from a sales process, point of view, the customer is always right. We get ourselves so wrapped up in the fact that all of a sudden we've assumed that our customers know as much as we do about floral design, seasonality formats. What's gonna look good, how to create the impact.

What is it appropriate thing to send at a sympathy? Like all of it we are showing up and our industry assumes that our customers know how this whole thing works. When we all know that that's not true. And that is like the bare bones, the foundation for so much of our frustration. There's a promise you're like, I don't know. You might be day one of your floral design career, or you might be like day 10,001, I can guarantee you, you're still gonna wake up and your customers, aren't going to know that pennies are not available 52 weeks of the year.

It's not gonna change. And that's perfect. It actually puts you at a strategic advantage when you start to see that as an opportunity, reason, number three, that we are taught to do, do this whole thing bash backwards is because of the secrecy within our industry. Like, I don't think you could Google and find information on sales tips for florist and what I would like to write at the top of the blog post. When I do write that blog post will be your customer. Doesn't know how this whole thing works. So please don't take their words. Literally. I still remember this conversation I had early on with a customer on the phone and he was like, oh, I'd like to order an arrangement, please. And I wrongly made the assumption that when he used the term arrangements, that that meant something in a container I was wrong from making that assumption.

So it's okay if you ask helpful questions to gain clarity, because it's very possible that your customer doesn't know the right words to say, and I will say, having your customers and your clients send you a reference picture can be very helpful as a tool for communication and understanding what's in their head because they don't know the words and they don't know how to describe what they're looking for. It's very likely that they're not a designer. They don't understand colour. They're not looking at texture. They have no idea how much the thing is and what it's gonna cost them. And that's all. Okay. So you can use your reference pictures as a way to communicate, to gain clarity and understand what is the customer trying to communicate with me, but you don't have to take it literally. And this is the selling that we get into.

This is about learning the skill of being a good salesperson. And instead of being like me, where I forever for years just said yes, to whatever the customer wanted without knowing, oh, when you own the business, you're also the creative director. Like you get to decide. And one of the best sales tactics that you can use is decide ahead of time and create a set menu in your business. And because our industry is so secretive and nobody talks about sales and marketing and how to actually scale your business and make money. You and I, as the human beings, trying to figure out how the heck to do this whole thing are like, well, I guess I must need to say yes to whatever the customer's asking and I need to move heaven and earth to find those purple roses. And that leads me to reason.

Number four, because nobody in our industry that I have found other than me is actually talking about sales and marketing tactics. Yes, there are people who offer up software solutions for quoting and proposals. There are designers who offer up their templates for creating mood boards and design inspiration, but being able to actually talk about sales, tactics, and sales strategies, this is where everything gets to a change in your business.

Because once you create your set menu, you take control and decide, this is the kind of work I want to create right now, because remember you can change your mind any dang time you want to, but this is the kind of work I want to create right now. These are the versions of my iPhone that I want to offer customers. Or this is the menu I want to create in my flower restaurant. All of a sudden you're like, okay, great.

So here we go. My bouquets are $340. My bridesmaids bouquets are two 50. My button holes are 25. My table arrangements start at 3.50. If you want a ceremony feature, it's $10,000. If you want a ceiling installation at that venue, it's $6,000. You sit down now and decide, this is what I'm gonna offer my customer, because this is what I think looks good. And this I know is gonna create great impact, not break the bank. And I love this kind of solution. You take that kind of authority. You get your pricing sorted. And all of a sudden you've freed up so much energy to pour into understanding marketing and sales. And that's where everything changes in your business. Because I've said this before, the problem is never the price. My friends, when your customers tell you it's too expensive, the problem is never the price.

The, so if you're anything like me, right? And you're like, I Don even know what to post on Instagram. I hate all the pictures of the work that I created. I'm really tired of feeling like I'm at the mercy of my clients. I'm tired of saying yes to whatever is coming my way and feeling embarrassed by the work that you're creating. I'm here to tell you you're not alone. I remember the deep, dark dog days of doing that work. Not even taking a picture of it, because I was like, that's a no for me. And when I finally learned that my clients and my customers were never going to come to me, they were never gonna be able to read Kathleen's mind or be able to think the way that you and I think about flower availability about design mechanics, about creating impact about how to make a small budget look like a billion dollars.

Like those are all skills that we have, but we don't get to use them when we allow our customer to take charge of the relationship. So when you can recognize that you get to change your approach and create a sales process that taps into your expertise. And over the years, I've learned to turn the entire process on its head, right? When you guys get into the study vault and you're like wedding inquiry process, okay? I'll be like, yep. Throw everything that you assumed out the window here is my entire wedding inquiry process. It takes everything that you've thought and turns it totally on its head consultations, optional mood boards, optional, custom quoting don't waste your time. Talk about pricing at the very first instance, here's every single template tool, email resource I've ever created in my business. Now put it to work in your business and then go out there and make it your own.

This is what I mean by sales process. Because if you feel like you're reinventing the wheel every single time out, if you're spending hours on these custom quotes, my friend, there is an easier way. And it all starts with this concept of deciding ahead of time. This is my set menu. So at the end of the day, no matter where you are in your flower business, whether you offer subscriptions, whether you do funerals, corporates, events, workshops, maybe you're setting up a flower school, you do daily flower deliveries, you do weddings, you do events, whatever it is are offering your customers. You are the creative director of your business. You are the head chef. You are the one in charge. You are the one with the expertise and the knowledge and the know-how in terms of being able to create the effect and the impact that you want to create.

So decide now of the kind of work you want to offer the world, decide now what you want to offer your customers, the ingredients you want to use and the formats you want to work in, put in your 10,000 hours to master that aesthetic, learn the design mechanics and really hone your flower care skills, price that work out, create yourself a little bit of a summary and actual menu of your prices, and then get to work, learning how to sell that to your customers. Then you'll have the reassurance that you're able to price accurately because you've priced everything ahead of time. It makes ordering from your wholesaler so much simpler, and then you get to work learning how to become a better salesperson. And what becomes even better is being able to take all of this work and train another person to be the head of sales in your business.

It really changes the dynamic because all of a sudden it's like somebody else on your team can actually have a conversation with a client. How much is a standardized bouquet? How much is that ceiling installation? What would you recommend for table arrangements? Instead of feeling like you're at the mercy and having to teach somebody else how the heck you'd even custom quote, every different design aesthetic under the sun. Boy, when you want to scale to six and seven figures, you have permission to decide, this is what I'm offering my customers. These are the formats that we work in. Let's get to work in pricing these out. These are the kinds of ingredients I want to use. Okay? Now let's develop a system and a process. So we can scale to the volume that we want to get to. This one concept of creating a set menu is a game changer for floral design.

It helps you take back the authority and take back the power and step into the discomfort of being the creative director in your business, cuts through so much of that overwhelming confusion for your clients and your customers and better yet you free up so much of your own time. So you're not spending so much time on admin so much time trying to navigate new inquiries. And you're like, oh, okay, well I guess I have to go start over again because this person wants that design aesthetic. And this person wants that design aesthetic. It's like, no, this whole example works no matter what kind of floral design you offer the world, you get to decide the ingredients you use. You get to decide the design aesthetics. You get to decide the format, price it out and then get to work, learning how to become a boss salesperson.

And if you want to get access to my exact step by step, if you want to learn how to do this, just sign up to the flower boss bootcamp because I go through it all in great detail. And it's one of the biggest changes that you can make in your business. That's gonna have a dramatic impact on your pricing, your profitability, your systems, your processes, your ability to bring other people into help. And I think the icing on the cake is you will actually like the work that you are creating. So if you are anything like I was, and you are not loving the work that your clients are coming to, sign up to the bootcamp and I will show you a better way. My friends drive safe, get some sleep, drink some water, eat your vegetables. And I will talk to you again next week. Bye for now.