Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1100407
04.04.19 10 INTERVIEW What is Serenata Flowers' business model? Serenata Flowers started out in 2003, when the company bought two flower shops in London. is was a great way of gaining information on the flower industry. In 2004, we launched a web- site, and from then on we took a different approach from tra- ditional flower companies such as Interflora and Euroflora. As a completely new brand, we shifted towards ecom- merce and started investing a lot of money into online marketing, which at the time wasn't very widespread. For instance, we used things such as SEO (Search Engine Opti- misation), and in this we were ahead of everyone else. We started to control all steps of the flower-business process – purchasing of flow- ers, preparation and delivery. Our company has its main flower warehouse in the Unit- ed Kingdom, which receives daily deliveries of fresh flow- ers, which, when sold, are de- livered directly to customers in Britain, hence cutting out the middleman. So customers place their or- der online, the flowers are then taken from our warehouse and delivered straight to the cus- tomer in the UK. We also have partner ware- houses in the United States, Canada and Australia. Our company noticed that most people would order flowers when they came home after work, so we managed to push up our cut-off time for next-day delivery from 5pm to 10pm, and we deliver seven days a week to the UK. Customers can request orders placed before 3pm to be deliv- ered on the same day. How is this different from other flower companies? If you look at Interflora, for instance, they operate a relay model in the way they sell. In- terflora uses local florists to fulfil its orders. In recent years, however, they have started to see the value of owning their own warehouse. Serenata Flowers gets fresh flowers daily from Holland, and we know that the flowers we send out have all been cut the previous day. is way our customers receive flowers that are a lot fresher than our ri- vals. Customers might in fact receive flowers the buds of which are still closed, meaning they will eventually last longer. Our company would never sell old flowers, because the business is built on our capa- bility to retain customers. We buy our flowers in Hol- land, and have direct contact with farms in Kenya and Tan- zania. We also offer a range of Fair Trade flowers. You joined the company in 2005. Since then, how have you changed it? e biggest thing I changed Business is blooming One challenging aspect of being based in Malta is that while it is easy to find developers to recruit, the case is not so when it comes to senior management. This is because the majority of these people prefer to work in the gaming industry Business Today speaks to Martin Johansson, managing director of Malta-based SerenataFlowers.com, the fih largest flower company in the world MASSIMO COSTA