Simply Stems rose to the challenge

Shepparton’s Simply Stems owner Rachel Matthews said in her 10 years in the industry she’d never seen anything of the sort.

“Last year was really hard because we had the snap lockdown ... the night before Valentine's Day, so we were left with hundreds of roses,” she said.

“This year there's been a lot of talk about not being able to get them at all and the pricing is just so high we don’t think it’s viable.”

Another casualty of the pandemic, the shortage has affected florists across Australia as prices surge.

While the shortage is a layered issue, with weather, freight and import costs all among the cause, it’s made it an uncertain time for those gearing up for Valentine’s Day.

A combination of the shortage, an Omicron wave and having Valentine’s Day fall on a Monday has resulted in a perfect storm.

Ms Matthews said the store put up its usual annual Valentine’s Day range before having to take it back down.

“We didn’t want to over-promise our customers on arrangements that we could do it,” she said.

“A Monday Valentine’s Day is also the quietest you can have, so it was already going to be a difficult day for us.”

While a challenging time, Ms Matthews said the store was still receiving orders but not so much for the more typical Valentine’s bunches.

“We are really just doing what we can, just moving away from the traditional and looking outside the box for this year,” she said.

Foliages and snapdragons are proving to be popular replacements to more traditional flowers on what would typically have been one of the busiest days of the year at Simply Stems.