MAYESH AND PARTNER FARM PHOTOS COURTESY OF MAYESH
FIELD TRIP BY BRUCE WRIGHT
NEW APPROACH At all of its 19 locations, Mayesh Wholesale Florist has been known for lavish displays of fresh product. A weakened supply chain, however, means that for the foreseeable future, open inventory will likely be more limited, said Mayesh CEO Pat Dahlson (bottom left).
TALK AND LISTEN, THEN DO
> Like so many others in the past three months, Mayesh Wholesale Florist’s CEO Pat Dahlson has had to make some difficult decisions about closing and reopening, keeping staff or letting them go, and how to plan for a future filled with unknowns. At Mayesh, the decision-making
process has involved active consultation and communication with customers, growers and other industry partners. “We needed to understand what they’re going through,” said Dahlson. That takes some effort. It’s even
more complicated with branches in 10 states and a shipping operation that provides service to customers nation- wide — not to mention suppliers from all over the world. It helps that Dahlson, an industry veteran of more than 40 years, has far-ranging, trusted connec- tions — “people I can call up and talk turkey,” as he describes it.
Building Community Online It also helps that Mayesh had already initiated a robust program of online communication, with frequently updated educational programs and resources, including live programming responsive to customers’ questions and concerns. “We had all that in place before
COVID,” confirmed Yvonne Ashton, direc- tor of marketing at Mayesh. “When busi- ness came to a screeching halt, it made sense to focus on helping to share stories, Mayesh’s and others, as best we could.” Mornings with Mayesh — a series of
Facebook Live Chats and podcasts that launched in May of 2017 —was a vehi- cle ready to hand. Previously dedicated mainly to design, business, flower choices, and care and handling, the live chats quickly pivoted once the pandemic hit. Temporary shutdown of Mayesh
locations began in mid-March with the swift and sudden closure, by executive
order, of the San Francisco Flower Mart (where Mayesh had acquired the venera- ble Brannan Street Wholesale Florist, now Mayesh Brannan Street, in July 2019). “By the third week in March, we were
pretty much shut down everywhere,” said Dahlson. It was painful. The tempo- rary closures meant not only discarding hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of fresh-flower inventory, but sending 90 percent of employees home, right out of the gate. On March 30, Dahlson appeared on
Mornings with Mayesh to answer ques- tions from customers about the supply chain and what might lie ahead. About the future, there were not many answers — but Dahlson could at least encourage retail customers from his broad perspec- tive as a wholesaler. “We need to support each other,” he noted. “We are an indus- try full of people who know that rolling up our sleeves is the only way to get it done.”
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FLORAL MANAGEMENT | June 2020 |
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