Q & A: Should Florists Charge For A Consultation? with Alison Ellis

A florist asked the other day: “Should I charge for consultations? I do not charge for a consultation and I e-mail a proposal after we meet without a deposit. I feel like I am being price shopped and I’m wasting my time. What do you do to prevent this?”

Click to watch my A to her Q and find out why I don’t charge for consultations!

It’s not easy to charge for consults and proposals when others offer them for free, but pre-qualifying is the first step that florists want to perfect here. If you vet clients before meeting, that helps eliminate price shoppers. (A simple inquiry form is your first line of defense.)

Then, instead of meeting, which could take 1-3 hours of my day depending on the location, I start with a phone consultation. And then, I do a really quick, easy proposal so I don’t invest “too much time” before discovering we’re not a good fit….whether that be due to budget expectations or style or personality.

Additionally, I establish a minimum before we schedule the call. Again, that initial inquiry form helps confirm the expectations here. As a result, price shoppers are stopped in their tracks at that point so neither one of us is wasting our time!

My Wedding Templates for florists illustrate exactly how I write a proposal, request a minimum, and present a contract, so if you need some tips to improve your current booking systems check out my templates here: https://realflowerbusiness.com/pdfs/

Thanks so much for taking the time to watch.
Keep doing beautiful work!
-Alison

P.S. If you’d like to join me for a deeper dive into pre-qualifying clients, perfecting the phone consultation, and booking clients more quickly, check out this new thing I’m doing on Patreon.com! We start November 18th-20th and continue with monthly follow-up lessons and live Q&A thru April. (Note: This is an experiment. And I think it’ll be rad. You do not need to attend live to participate in the training. Learn more on Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/realflowerbusiness)

Alison Ellis
Fresh Event Design, LLC

See my wedding work: floralartvt.com
Find courses for Florists: realflowerbusiness.com