Mark’s Bloomin’ Journal

We had it cracked! Great growers, great orders, great flowers, and now I have a great staff scrambling to notify some great customers of impending late deliveries as atrocious winter weather systems converge on the FedEx shipping hubs east of the Rocky Mts and many of out largest markets. If you read below you will see the bulletin that galvanized me this morning. It is important that we nail “the last mile” down as all the miles proceeding, from as far away as Ecuador and California have been perfect. The thought of the wasting of all that hard work and all those beautiful flowers is disheartening. We are putting our best foot forward and using every insight gained over the past decade to get the very best of this hand just dealt…

FedEx News

National Service Disruption

FedEx Express National Service Disruption for Tuesday, February 14, 2007

Continued severe weather at the Memphis Hub and snow at the Indianapolis Hub has extended the service disruptions for FedEx flight operations. Consistent with the provisions of the FedEx Service Guide, the Money-Back Guarantee is suspended for U.S. domestic packages and shipments inbound into the U.S. from international locations with a delivery commitment of February 14, 2007.

For specific shipment status information, please track your shipment at fedex.com.

Here we are again, the week prior to Valentine’s Day and the whole world’s fancy turns to roses, or something akin to that. For the most part the rose growers around the world have done their part and the air freight companies are now in full flight (or attempting full flights) and will be through the week and into the coming weekend when the FedEx squadrons get hit by the huge spike created by the ecommerce players and the usual last minute guys shopping online. Yall know who you are!

Here is your hottest and best tip for Valentine’s day 2007. The world’s best,nee Ecuadorian, two dozen roses, (a growers bunch) red or any other color are available from $99.00 (Mixed Colors) to $125 (red) from now through February 15th 2007. Only at www.flowerbud.com. Read on and you will see why. (more…)

The following exerpt by Lance Armstrong from”Saving Your Life” broke the all-time page view record on CNN’s site just this weekend. As some will know Flowerbud.com has been a very active supporter of Mr. Armstrong and his foundation over the years and has contributed many thousands of yellow roses to cancer survivors around the US as they peddle, run and walk across finish lines at the Challenge Series. It has been our privilage to have participated. Last summer at a dinner held In the Tiger Woods building on the Nike Campus in Beaverton, Oregon, Lance Armstrong informed the assembled that with biking now a hobby, lobbying on cancer related  issues would be his proffession. Well, as good as his word it looks as if he is now hard at work at the coal-face! We wish him the very best.

Lance Armstrong, one of cycling’s all-time greats and possibly the world’s best known cancer survivor, founded the Lance Armstrong Foundation with the goal of inspiring and empowering people with cancer. He now campaigns for more government funds for cancer research and treatment.

AUSTIN, Texas (CNN) — I’m not known for my patience. Patience is a polite quality and often appropriate, but it rarely gets things done. Impatience, however, is the hunger for results and intolerance for excuses and delays. Impatience got me over countless mountain passes, across the finish line in New York City and through four rounds of ruthless chemotherapy 10 years ago.

Yet this election season I patiently waited to hear a candidate for office explain to constituents what he or she planned to do about one of the leading threats to the health and well-being of all Americans — cancer. My patience was greeted with silence. (more…)

For those not familiar with the jargon, NAP stands for the North American production ratio. Something that Toyota is being chastised for as of this writing and this particularly interesting and politicaly sensitive moment in the globalization vs nationalism debate.

All of this on the eve of their (Toyota) landing on the sacred beach head, that of the full size pickup truck. It would seem to me that while it is viewed by some as poor form to buy a car manufactured in Japan it is more palatable for that critic to buy the same car when manufactured in the USA and it is of little or no consequence to purchase other products manufactured by foreign corporations from across this “flat earth” that have never seen the light of day in the US, that is, until the cargo container has it’s door cracked open at the distribution center. (more…)

Amsterdam on a cool, grey day that alternates between miserable downpours and patchy blue skies. Awaiting a train, killing time, propped up in a bar drinking coffees served by a woman that thinks much blue eye shadow works wonders for this day. To one side a couple of Irish guys, fresh from the neighborhood of red neon, are far into the beer and the table behind me is full of locals making like Harley Davidson billboards. My feet slide like pucks on the sand-strewn floor as I depart into a rising tide of puddle splashing bicycle riders and the world’s youth coming to and from the hostels.

The Brussels train slides quietly into the Central Station. The bright orange seat that I am going to warm as far as Antwerp is the brightest thing in sight. Although the station is nothing short of packed with pushing, shoving, and mostly scruffy people there is a dearth of color from men and women alike. A dreary day, one of a long string I am sure, might warrant some more gaiety in the wardrobe surely! This miserable grey day is matched in color by palls of cigarette smoke and the ever present grit and sand of a city underfoot. This is a rather bleak place in early November. The train leaves on the minute as advertised and I am still astonished that despite the people present, from both in country and from on the tourist trail, literally from all over the planet, this is such a colorless place. Women are in dowdy coats and boots while men wear the ubiquitous black leather jacket. Maybe, just maybe, everyone is too busy making things run efficiently to be bothered with wardrobe and grooming. (more…)