The first two Beyond Cost Plus sessions have been booked for 2015. They'll take place in March at the Great Lakes Floral Expo in Grand Rapids and the Wisconsin/Upper Michigan Florists Association in Green Bay. More details on dates and times can be found on the Beyond Cost Plus website.

These pricing sessions will be a little different than what we did in 2014. Those sessions focussed primarily on pricing the standard fixed price "catalog" type products that florists typically offer off-the-shelf.

The new sessions are going to look at different but very important part of the retail flower business – quoting weddings and events. It draws on our experience in the industry, the collaboration of a focus group of forward thinking and very successful flower shops, and an approach to quoting successfully used by (believe it or not) software developers as they price jobs from $500 to $500,000.

It really is a new take on quoting flowers for weddings and events – one that should mean fewer missed quotes and higher profits.