Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Ep. 87: Jenny Rae Swan: Ten Years of Flowers, Failures, and Finding Joy
2.5k Plays18 days ago
Some of the best flower farming stories start with a moment that changes everything. For Jenny Rae Swan, it was losing her mother at a young age and realizing that the only place she felt truly at peace was in a garden.
That grief, paired with a wild amount of courage, led her to quit a stable career in higher education, rent a small plot on a local blueberry farm, and start growing flowers with no land of her own and very little money. She told everyone she knew she was going to be a flower farmer. Most of them thought she was out of her mind.
Ten years later, Flower Well is an ever-evolving operation with multiple acres, a dedicated team of women, a thriving wholesale business, a wedding design studio, dahlia tuber sales, holiday wreath classes, and a garden-inspired design style that's earned her a reputation for movement, texture, and color. Jenny Rae is proof that you don't need to have it all figured out to start. You just need to start.
Key Takeaways
- You don't need land, money, or a perfect plan to begin. Jenny Rae started on a rented plot with savings from selling antiques on Etsy.
- Telling people your dream out loud builds accountability. Jenny Rae told everyone she was going to be a flower farmer before she had any idea how.
- Farming and floristry feed different parts of the creative soul. Jenny Rae needs both to feel fulfilled.
- Hiring help is scary but essential. Your team members will bring strengths you don't have.
- The real cost of flower farming is far beyond what most people expect. Tractors, delivery vehicles, equipment, land preparation. It adds up fast.
- Gardens are the greatest design teacher. Jenny Rae designs by thinking about how a garden moves, clusters, and breathes.
- Joy is the through-line. On the hardest days, an evening walk through the flowers brings everything back.
If this episode encourages you, would you share it with a friend who needs to hear Jenny Rae's story? And if you haven't already, subscribe so you never miss a new episode of The Backyard Bouquet Podcast.
Guest Bio
Jenny Rae Swan is the owner and founder of Flower Well, a cut flower farm and floral design studio in the countryside of Rochester, New York. A first-generation farmer florist, Jenny Rae started Flower Well in 2015 on a rented plot at a neighboring blueberry farm. Her work is known for its garden-inspired design, focus on color and texture, heirloom varieties, and the way her arrangements move. She recently welcomed her second son and celebrated 10 years of growing flowers.
Connect with Jenny Rae at Flowerwell:
Website: https://www.flowerwellny.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/flowerwellny
Sign up for our podcast newsletter: https://bit.ly/thefloweringfarmhousenewsletter
Recommended
Transcript
Intro
Introduction to Jenny Rae Swan & Flower Well
00:02:04
Jennifer Gulizia
Today, I'm joined by Jenny Rae Swan, the owner and founder of Flower Well, a cut flower farm and floral design studio located in the countryside of Rochester, New York.
00:02:17
Jennifer Gulizia
Jenny Rae is a first generation farmer florist who didn't grow up on a farm, but whose love of flowers was shaped early on through the time spent gardening with her mother. While she explored languages and arts in college, she always felt a pull towards nature. a calling that eventually led her to flowers, farming, and design.
Flower Well's Growth and Design Philosophy
00:02:37
Jennifer Gulizia
Established in 2015, Flower Well began as a small plot on a neighboring blueberry farm and has since grown into an ever-evolving operation spanning several acres. Jenny Rae's work is known for its focus on color, texture, heirloom varieties, and a modern garden-inspired design that blends locally grown specialty blooms with thoughtful floral artistry. Jenny Rae has trained and worked with some of the most respected designers and growers in the floral world. But at the heart of Flower Well is something deeply personal, a desire to share the joy, creativity, and connection that locally grown flowers bring.
00:03:17
Jennifer Gulizia
Jenny Rae, welcome to the Backyard Bouquet Podcast.
00:03:21
Jenny Rae
Thank you so much. That was such a kind introduction and kind of got me a little teary just thinking about the journey.
00:03:29
Jennifer Gulizia
Isn't it such a journey to get to where we are today?
00:03:32
Jenny Rae
It's incredible. like Last year we celebrated 10 years of Flower Well and it's a mind blow because it seems like it went so quick, but then it also went so long. Those were a lot of long years, but holy cow, like 10 years of flowers. How incredible is that?
00:03:51
Jennifer Gulizia
i was just thinking it's kind of like raising a child, the saying, the days are long, but the years are short. Does it kind of feel like that?
00:03:58
Jenny Rae
Amen
Jenny Rae's Journey and Challenges
00:03:58
Jenny Rae
to that. Yes, especially as I'm in early years of motherhood, that hits that hits home perfectly. i love that.
00:04:07
Jennifer Gulizia
That's a good analogy. Well, since we're talking already about your journey, let's start by going back to the beginning, not just of flower well, but of you and your love for flowers, because your path into farming and floral design feels rather intuitive and also very intentional.
00:04:25
Jenny Rae
Yeah, I grew up in the countryside and every summer my mom would grow a large raised bed zinnias and cherry tomatoes.
00:04:36
Jenny Rae
And we would take these walks on our road and we would deliver zinnias and cherry tomatoes, basin jar in hand, little bowl in hand to all of our neighbors.
00:04:45
Jenny Rae
And it really, yeah it stuck with me how much joy that brought and how simple it was, but it was so unexpected And I grew up gardening with her. i was, you know, every summer I was forced to weed and, you know, pick up stones and all that kind of stuff. But it it brought me a lot of joy. And that element of being in nature just kind of stuck with me as being so important and probably the place that I felt most at peace. Um, so I always kind of had that in me. And when I entered my adulthood, even when I was living in an apartment, I had as many pots as I could humanly have on like our back door, back patio area. And i just, I felt a calling that I need to be growing something at all times, no matter what it was. That's where I felt the most happiness. Um, and I i just, I needed to do it.
00:04:45
Jennifer Gulizia
Oh, I love that.
00:05:46
Jennifer Gulizia
I love that. It's amazing how those seeds that were sown in our life so early on, it almost takes time for them to develop those roots and be nurtured so that you can truly bloom with where you are now.
00:06:01
Jennifer Gulizia
When you were studying language arts in college, did you already feel that pull towards nature or did it show up more quietly and was it a more gradual shift into farming?
00:06:13
Jenny Rae
So when I was studying language in college, I really, I wanted to study language so that I could travel. And I did, I studied abroad a couple of times.
00:06:18
Jennifer Gulizia
Mm-hmm.
00:06:20
Jenny Rae
And I think that that helps to just broaden your world. Visually, i was really drawn to parks, to gardens. um And I had this creative side of me that i I couldn't quite justify going into college for art, but I took a lot of painting classes. And then I happened to end up with in art history professor that I just adored. And i think I think it all is kind of interconnected somehow. I was always painting flowers in my painting classes. I took painting for four years. even though I didn't major in it. um And I don't know, i think it's I think it's that right brain, left brain a little bit where it all is kind of connected, even if it doesn't make a ton of sense. But like visually thinking about traveling, thinking about all the colors that you see. And I just, it's it's like candy. um
00:07:10
Jenny Rae
for me and it really helped to one broaden my horizons and two just remind you that the world is such a big place and we don't always need to be so boxed into maybe the opportunities only that we see around us like there are so many amazing people doing amazing things that aren't by the book and that are maybe a little off or a little odd um And even post-college, I still went into kind of a traditional field.
00:07:38
Jenny Rae
I went into higher education, but I had experienced a personal tragedy. My mom had passed away and I was i was heartbroken.
00:07:45
Jennifer Gulizia
Mm-hmm.
00:07:47
Jenny Rae
i just i felt i felt so lost and so deeply with like a hole in my heart. And I found that the only way i could really feel a sense of happiness in those like early years of grief was gardening.
00:08:01
Jenny Rae
and so i kind of clung to that and i eventually um even though we were still just living in apartment my now husband and i i was like i i have to grow flowers like i i need to quit this job i need to grow flowers i need to figure it out and um i did it helped that my husband also quit his job and he started his own business And I was kind of like, well, screw it. If he can do it, I can do it. And I was like, you know what? I would rather be eating Cheerios my entire life and be happy than maybe have a lot of money and a very yeah promised future, i guess, like state pension, all of that.
00:08:45
Jenny Rae
then I just, but I'll be miserable. So I'm going to do it. I'm going to grow flowers with no
Building a Flower Farming Business
00:08:50
Jenny Rae
land. um I had no money. i had, I did not have a house, but I was like, I can figure it out. And that's how I ended up renting land at a local blueberry farm and just starting just, I just did it.
00:09:07
Jennifer Gulizia
You just had so much wisdom in your story right there. But I want to first acknowledge and say I'm so sorry for the loss of your mom at a young age. That would be such a hard thing to go through. And it sounds like the way you have turned to the flowers to find healing and joy is really beautiful.
00:09:29
Jennifer Gulizia
You said so many things there. My mind is just spinning, trying to wrap my head around all of it because it's like, wow, at such a young age, you had so much wisdom. You saw your husband start a business and you said, if he can do it, why can't i Which probably goes back to your studying abroad and having this bigger vision view because you said you weren't you weren't boxed in to what was right in front of you. You saw more potential, which... um I could talk to you for hours, I'm sure, just about the studying abroad.
00:09:59
Jennifer Gulizia
I studied abroad myself, um which really does open up your eyes to more ways of doing things.
00:10:01
Jenny Rae
Oh.
00:10:05
Jennifer Gulizia
And you go, well, there's not just one way to do this. But then you realized, I love your analogy of eating. Did you say Cheerios or what was it?
00:10:14
Jenny Rae
Yeah, Cheerios.
00:10:15
Jennifer Gulizia
I mean-
00:10:16
Jenny Rae
I was, you know, you're living in an apartment and I'm like, okay, well, I could live off Cheerios probably theoretically or like very inexpensive food. Like how much money do I really need? And is money the thing that's important? And it was at the time when Florette had been blogging really intensively. she was sharing a lot of her knowledge. And you know i just thought, I'm like, you go into the grocery store and you see all these fairly ugly flowers, and yet my garden is full of beautiful flowers. like Why am I not seeing these incredible blooms in somebody's wedding, in a supermarket, on somebody's table. And why is it so shocking when you bring somebody flowers from your garden? like how Why is that such a surprise?
00:11:06
Jenny Rae
and it It took a long time to convince myself because I had a good job. I was i had a good career kind of rolling. i was applying for higher level positions. um And I very well, had I gotten one of them, i could have still been stuck sitting in a desk today and just dreaming about it. But I just started telling everybody, um I'm going to grow flowers. That's what I want to do. i want to be a flower farmer. And by telling everyone and look at the looking at the really ridiculous um
00:11:38
Jenny Rae
look on their face when I told them that and how they, one, didn't understand and two, thought it was like absolutely absurd and that that was stupid. I eventually just built up enough courage to be like, I've pitched it to enough people.
00:11:52
Jenny Rae
i'm not going to wait any longer. i thought maybe I'd wait until I was 30 with a house and with land and with kids and maybe that would be the right time. But I just, I was like, I can't, I cannot wait any longer.
00:12:04
Jenny Rae
i need to do this now for myself And if it fails, it fails, but at least I'll be happy and I will have known I tried, you know?
00:12:15
Jennifer Gulizia
That is so beautiful. I think so many people come up with those excuses in their mind and it's like, well, once I get to this, then I can do this. But you had started telling people, I'm going to grow flowers.
00:12:25
Jenny Rae
Yeah.
00:12:27
Jennifer Gulizia
I'm going to be a farmer. You embodied what you wanted to be. So you literally manifested it yourself because you started taking the actions and believing that you were capable of it and you didn't wait.
00:12:31
Jenny Rae
Yeah.
00:12:39
Jennifer Gulizia
Like, I think we so often get trapped. It's like, oh, I will start growing peonies when I have more space, or i will learn how to make really pretty arrangements once I have more filler flowers or whatever it is.
00:12:47
Jenny Rae
Thank you.
00:12:54
Jennifer Gulizia
we We're always coming up with excuses, but that someday gets pushed further and further down the line when you did do that. So I absolutely love that you just, you didn't wait.
00:13:06
Jenny Rae
I didn't wait and it did, it held me accountable by telling so many people. um and I really was, i was at a low point. i was so deeply unhappy um at work, even though I was i was good at my job. i just, I just felt empty inside. And i do think um even though losing my mom was a really difficult thing, there is something to be said about when you go through something incredibly difficult or some sort of a tragedy. It it does wake you up a little bit to kind of recognize, you know, time is short
00:13:41
Jenny Rae
You don't know if you've got tomorrow. You don't know if you have next year. So is it better to just give it a role? And what do I really have to lose? What's the worst case scenario? And when I played out that worst case scenario, what does it look like? Cheerios, having to restart my career.
00:13:58
Jenny Rae
i you know i'm like, I can do it. And in the midst of telling people that I was like, I want to be a flower farmer, um i was selling antiques on Etsy, really random, but I used that to kind of fund my flower career.
00:14:09
Jennifer Gulizia
Ooh.
00:14:14
Jenny Rae
So I felt like you know it wasn't just going to be money out of my pocket, but I had a little... a little honey fund. I was just selling teacups to like bridal showers and stuff like that. um so I at least felt like, okay, I've got some safety. I've earned this money. It was bonus money. it was trying to fill a little bit of a void, but like let's just do it and Some of the misconceptions that I think I had at the time were, um it's not going to cost a lot of money. It's going to be easy
00:14:44
Jennifer Gulizia
Yeah.
00:14:44
Jenny Rae
all which were very incorrect. But man, like that first year of growing and in all honesty, kind of failing, I made so many incredible mistakes, like holy cow. And I i knew so little, um but I was so happy. And there were nights when I would leave work And my husband, we would then go haul manure to bring it to the blueberry farm. And all I could think is like, I would be i would rather be shoveling poop every night and growing flowers and eating Cheerios than I would be sitting at my desk. And that fall, I just quit. um I had done both the first summer.
00:15:26
Jenny Rae
i just did it at night. And then i was like, i'm no,
Balancing Roles: Farmer and Florist
00:15:28
Jenny Rae
I'm done. I'm just going to do it. And we're just going to do it. And it it you know, that was the first year of Flower Well and it was really, really memorable and I was so incredibly happy.
00:15:40
Jennifer Gulizia
I love it. Oh my gosh, you are such a delight to chat with. I'm really enjoying this conversation already. I love that you said in your mind when you got started, you were thinking, this is going to be easy. It's not going to be expensive.
00:15:54
Jennifer Gulizia
Because there's a lot of propaganda out there that makes it sound like, oh, just go buy a packet of seeds and throw them in the ground and you're goingnna have a cutting garden.
00:16:02
Jenny Rae
Yeah, that's exactly what I thought it was. It was so wrong because in my head, when my mom would grow zinnias, she would literally just go to the store, buy a packet, sprinkle them in, and they grew beautifully. And I thought that that was all of flower farming. And so my first year was just me weeding every single night because that's how I thought to farm.
00:16:24
Jenny Rae
um And then i was like, okay, there's definitely, and i learned i learned a lot very very quickly. And that first year I grew some dahlias, which was a really exciting kind of dip into that. It was fun to see the excitement from everyone when you'd show them flowers. And I did a lot of pop-up shops where the reaction was, these are real?
00:16:45
Jenny Rae
Wait, these are real flowers? And I thought, oh, that's so interesting. Like, you know, these are fairly basic cutting flowers. ones that I was able to grow in my first year, but they still really stunned people. And thought, you know, this might, we might be onto to something. And even in that first year, i had got a couple wedding inquiries. and i was like, I have no idea what I'm doing, but deep down, I'm like, I know even with no knowledge, i can probably give someone prettier wedding flowers than the florist next door.
00:17:18
Jenny Rae
And that's not to say that that florist doesn't have amazing skill. It's just all about the access to flowers. and Like the reality is, is that these flowers, even kind of grown in a crappy first year farm, are still stunning. They were still surprising people. and That encouragement, I thought, you know, maybe maybe we are onto something. Maybe we can do this. And the next year we started a CSA. I dabbled in the first couple weddings. I learned that I had a lot to learn design-wise and that that was
00:17:53
Jenny Rae
going to be pretty important um to me. And one of the things that I always tell people, because our business, it is a little strange in the fact that we we have a decent sized farm. We grow for wholesale, which is a pretty big part of our business, but we also do weddings and not a lot of farms do both. um And then we also sell Dahlia tubers and we do holiday wreaths and classes. Um, but I've always said I wouldn't be a farmer if I wasn't a florist and I wouldn't be a florist if I wasn't a farmer. For me, i really needed both to feel fulfilled, um, to kind of use that creativity, to use some of that like experience and traveling and seeing the world. But I also equally needed my hands in the dirt.
00:18:43
Jenny Rae
I needed to sweat. I needed to work hard. um I needed to come come inside at the end of the day and feel like I just kind of had my butt kicked. And I think a lot of that helped with the healing and feeling inspired again and and really finding joy.
00:19:03
Jennifer Gulizia
So much of it comes back to joy. i would love to talk about, gosh, there's so many things I want to ask you right now. i think I actually, going to ask you about what you just said.
00:19:14
Jennifer Gulizia
You said, i couldn't be a farmer without being a florist. And I couldn't be a florist without being a farmer.
00:19:18
Jenny Rae
Yep.
00:19:21
Jennifer Gulizia
And I think it's such an important distinction that they're two very different roles. So pack or help us break that down and help us understand what that looks like in your business.
00:19:31
Jenny Rae
Sure. So in that first year, you know, you're growing all these amazing flowers and it was at a time when dahlias were kind of just kicking off like the cafe. o like Lay dahlia was still like a wow.
00:19:42
Jenny Rae
I've never seen that before.
00:19:43
Jennifer Gulizia
Mm-hmm.
00:19:44
Jenny Rae
um And i I just saw these beautiful flowers and I had a florist who had reached out. She asked to purchase from us and she asked for exclusivity, which was really interesting.
00:19:54
Jenny Rae
So I was like, the fact that she's asking for that makes me think we have something that she isn't finding elsewhere. But i felt I felt a little bit of envy giving away these amazing blooms, selling them.
00:20:07
Jenny Rae
And I was so proud that somebody else was going to get to use them and create something beautiful. But I just had this itch that... I too wanted to create something beautiful from them. Like I wanted to put my own spin on it. You know, you spend all winter dreaming about these flowers. I had spent years dreaming about these flowers as I told all these random people that I was going to be a flower farmer. And I would show them pictures and just be like, look how beautiful this is. um And I was like, you know, all those images, all those flowers have been dancing around in my head for so long. i I'm going to feel envious if I don't get to design with them. And i I wasn't getting enough satisfaction just putting them together in a bunch and like handing them off.
00:20:51
Jenny Rae
it just didn't it didn't fulfill me in that way but on the flip side you know i have other friends who are phenomenal growers and i lean on them sometimes to supplement and they've kind of posed the idea like you know why don't you just design and let us let us do the growing but i i don't think i would feel satisfied um i equally love the challenge of growing something I love each year trying to cultivate a farm that feels a little bit different, kind of feels like it's with the trends, the colors are different. You know, it's what I dream about all winter long are all these varieties. And then i i love the first good day of spring to get out there and get after it. i love it. I live for it.
00:21:36
Jenny Rae
So I don't think I could design flowers constantly. Like we don't do retail, for example. um We don't really do subscriptions. We don't do a CSA anymore. But being able to design for somebody's wedding day, that's a really special thing. And in combination with growing the flowers specifically for them, it just, it all for me makes sense.
Expanding with a Team and Scaling the Business
00:22:00
Jenny Rae
um And now my team, or we have like a couple divisions in a sense. We have a farm team who focuses more on wholesale. And then we have a wedding team that focuses more on our weddings. But we all come together as a full team when it comes to planting,
00:22:15
Jenny Rae
when it comes to dahlia harvesting and digging up the roots. And so it's ah it's just an interesting mix. But I think, A, it kind of keeps us on our toes. It makes it so that it doesn't get stale. And um it keeps me inspired as a creative person ah to to switch it up every year, have control over what I'm growing, and then just get to dream about those blooms I get to design with. Like,
00:22:42
Jenny Rae
you know, all winter long and all spring long. It's it's just thrilling.
00:22:47
Jennifer Gulizia
Well, I love how hearing you talk about you have your farm team, you have your florist team, and how you all help each other. i would love to hear how you went from you and your husband shoveling manure at nighttime to now having not just one, but two teams that help you at Flower Well. How did you evolve and grow your business over, i guess, the last decade? Yeah.
00:23:10
Jenny Rae
Yeah, that's such a great that's such a great question. I had a lot of support from family and friends, especially in the early years. I leaned on neighbors. I leaned on a lot of random people to just kind of pitch in. And eventually the demand for our flowers grew significantly.
00:23:29
Jenny Rae
i was starting to get a little tuckered out. um Our farm wasn't on our property. we hadn We've moved farms now. We're technically on our fourth fourth land and the fourth piece of land is finally our land, which is super exciting.
00:23:45
Jennifer Gulizia
Congratulations.
00:23:46
Jenny Rae
Yeah, so exciting. But I was driving a lot. i was just hustling. um And I'd have people that would show interest and I kind of thought of those people and I'm like, you know, I do think that they would be a good fit.
00:23:58
Jenny Rae
i think that they love the flowers. They love being outside as much as I do. And it just, it was like kind of a slow accumulation. um and I think it really kind of boomed when we entered the wedding market a bit more seriously in that the weddings were getting bigger.
00:24:16
Jenny Rae
i was teaching more classes. and There was one point where during the holiday season, I would teach 19 wreath classes
00:24:24
Jennifer Gulizia
Wow.
00:24:25
Jenny Rae
Yep. And so just, it's a lot.
00:24:26
Jennifer Gulizia
That's a lot.
00:24:27
Jenny Rae
It just eventually grew. And as I accumulated these great people, i realized like I needed to hold on to them. I didn't want to lose them They were just such attributes to our business.
00:24:40
Jenny Rae
And so i grew the business to be a year round business so that we can employ people year round. But that did take a long time. That probably took until about five years where I could ah keep employees mostly through the winter, um starting with part-time and then going into full-time.
00:24:58
Jenny Rae
And it is a pretty big business now. um It doesn't run on autopilot, but my team is phenomenal. And I really encourage our our team members to...
00:25:12
Jenny Rae
kind of like take autonomy, take control, um flourish, like run with it so that, you know, i don't have to do management constantly and I can also still do the things that I love. So it's it's kind of wild. um Some days I dream about making it a little bit smaller. Again, my husband owns his own business, so he you know he contributes a couple days of the year, but that's about it. ah So it's I don't know. I play with it, but I've always believed that your business can evolve. It can grow with you. You can change it. um You're not stuck on a path and you know kind of like lean into what's making you happy at the time. And so right now what we're doing i love and maybe eventually i'll change it but for right now i just i'm surrounded by a phenomenal super talented group all women which is super cool we do have some male freelancers from time to time but all women um farmer team and they are like pardon my language just totally badass they're amazing
00:26:24
Jennifer Gulizia
That's awesome. And you can just tell your expression, you light up talking about them. So for those listening, because I think a lot of us got our start in the late um teens.
00:26:36
Jenny Rae
Yeah.
00:26:37
Jennifer Gulizia
i Is that how you call it? in like twenty I started in 2018.
00:26:38
Jenny Rae
Yeah.
00:26:41
Jennifer Gulizia
It was kind of after Floret's Cut Flower Book came out. so I think that was really, it really spurred a lot of local flower growers. And so now i mean, I'm going into my eighth season and there's a lot of people that are in that five to 10 year phase right now that have scaled a little bit.
00:26:58
Jennifer Gulizia
But I think one of the scariest things is scaling the personnel side of the business, because I mean, i can scale the growing.
00:27:03
Jenny Rae
Yeah.
00:27:06
Jenny Rae
Mm-hmm.
00:27:07
Jennifer Gulizia
I know how to grow the flowers in each year, especially with perennials.
00:27:09
Jennifer Gulizia
It's a little bit easier to add just a few more plants. But it's a whole different thing when it comes to managing people. What advice do you have for flower farmers that are listening, that are scaling?
00:27:20
Jenny Rae
Oh, well, I do think it is really important to accept help. I think lean into that because as scary as it can be, and it is a lot of work on the computer end, on the logistics end, and we live in New York. So like just, oh, it's just, there's just a lot of tape, a lot of things. But um if you can just get past that, be brave enough to tackle it Be brave enough to know that you're going to make mistakes, right? The amount of hours I probably spent crying over bookkeeping mistakes
00:27:53
Jenny Rae
a lot a lot of a lot of mistakes. um But just be brave enough to accept the help and enter into that because I i do really think you need to. Farming herming is not a one-person job. um you know i think maybe it could be done with a couple of part-time people with some help, but running yourself into the ground and becoming exhausted when you're trying to grow, that can be really defeating. and You know, you just there's amazing people out there who are super talented. And what I have learned about hiring a team
00:28:30
Jenny Rae
is that each individual person brings something incredible to the table that you probably don't have. And I try to find that in each person and like lean into it and accept the fact that they're going to be much better than me at XYZ and to kind of give the reins and allow myself to lean into something that I might be better at and that I might enjoy. um And i have they have taught me so much, which is kind of wild. So as soon as you just like dip your toe in, you accept a little bit of help, you'll find that the positive aspects of it far outweigh the difficult, challenging, scary aspects of it. And there are ways to kind of do it
00:29:16
Jenny Rae
slowly and steadily. um you know I'm not saying go like balls to the wall all at first and get a payroll company and all the things. Just start start small. And it it is going to take a lot of years of learning also. i i didn't really realize what an art management is. um i could have easily gone back to college and spent four years learning that. I probably should have.
00:29:40
Jenny Rae
But Each year, I just absorb a little bit more. I accept the fact that I'm not perfect. I have a lot to learn, but to just try not to be super hard on myself to the point of giving up um and just be like, you know what, we're we're all growing. And that has really resulted in allowing the business to flourish, um being willing to like face these kind of scary things like employing people. But You can do it Anyone who's listening, i would say you can do it. Try, find your sanity back ah because like we we don't need to be working 70 hours a week. um I mean, I say that and probably still in the peak of the season, I might be working 60 hours a week, but I don't want that every week of my life. I do fully believe that we work to live, even if we're doing something that we really love um because at the end of the day,
00:30:35
Jenny Rae
You know, you're not going to get those hours back and you want to be able to enjoy some of the fruits of your labor.
Inspiration and Mentorship in Floral Design
00:30:40
Jenny Rae
In the evenings, it's always funny. i will, I might be farming during the day or designing. And then um my pleasure is to then garden.
00:30:50
Jenny Rae
i i I have a garden that I've been cultivating.
00:30:51
Jennifer Gulizia
Oh.
00:30:54
Jenny Rae
a friend helped me work up a garden plan for it. And it's not that big, but man, it's a lot of work. And gardening is so different from farming. And I get so much pleasure out of just being able to garden without it riding on a business aspect.
00:31:11
Jenny Rae
um And the only way I have that time is because I have a team that can make sure we can get our work done during the work hours.
00:31:20
Jennifer Gulizia
That's amazing. Thank you for sharing that. That was super helpful. I'd love to shift gears and talk about the floral side of your business. Flower Well is known for its use of color and texture and heirloom varieties in your bouquet work. And when I look online, your social media pictures, they're always beautiful.
00:31:40
Jennifer Gulizia
Color is perfect. There's balance. It's just, it's beautiful. Yeah. how do you think about design when you are building these bouquets and doing your floral work?
00:31:55
Jenny Rae
I think about gardens and I think about meadows and i'm I'm a very visual person. So whenever we're out and about, my eye is just trained to kind of look at the landscape.
00:32:06
Jenny Rae
I'm always looking at the different heights. You know, in a garden, i think it's so important that you see clustering and the way that you see different plants kind of interacting with each other.
00:32:17
Jenny Rae
the way that texture plays a really big role um and just how visually appealing a garden can be. And I love the fact that gardens are moving in the direction of more of a perennial, natural kind of English take.
00:32:31
Jenny Rae
At least that's that's the type of garden that I really appreciate.
00:32:32
Jennifer Gulizia
Mm-hmm.
00:32:35
Jenny Rae
And i think about what I'm drawn to visually there, and then I try to incorporate it in our design work. And I i do always kind of lean into like what a bride might want, because i at the end of the day, it is, you know, the bride or the groom or whomever, it is their wedding day and it is their vision.
00:32:55
Jenny Rae
But I am often trying to convince them to trust me and like, you know, think about what you're attracted to visually in our work. And it usually is texture. It's the way things move. It's color um when we're growing and when I'm selecting what we're going to grow each year. you know I'm not trying to pick out of the crayon box. i'm I'm trying to go with those in-between colors, all of those incredible varieties that we now have access to, many thanks to floret and other breeders in the dahlia world as well. so By taking all of those in-between tones, just visually, my eye kind of marries them and
00:33:33
Jenny Rae
Again, we're trying to think about like the way an arrangement moves. We talk about in my design studio, we have tiny dancers or what we call when things kind of float up high and move.
00:33:45
Jenny Rae
And whenever I make a bouquet, I'll kind of shake it to see how it like how it physically moves in my hand, just because like no garden is stiff. No garden is perfectly round or mounded.
00:33:55
Jennifer Gulizia
Oh yeah. yeah
00:33:57
Jenny Rae
no garden is all one variety. So I think visually for it to be really enticing to the eye, it needs to make sense. And like gardens make sense when you kind of think about all those aspects.
00:34:11
Jenny Rae
So I'm just trying to translate that in my design work and connect both myself and our designers and our clients to to all those like aspects. um Just so that I think that that's what will give you the best like visual impression is when it feels like a garden.
00:34:29
Jenny Rae
Does that make any sense?
00:34:31
Jennifer Gulizia
Absolutely. I love that way of looking at it. I've never thought of it that way. um i always do the shake test and I love how you called it tiny dancer. um So that's, that's such great advice.
00:34:44
Jennifer Gulizia
You've trained with some incredible designers and growers over the last decade. What have those experiences taught you?
00:34:53
Jenny Rae
Oh, they have taught me a lot. They've taught me some great things. They've taught me, well I should say they've taught me what I want and what I don't want. They've taught me how to treat people and how to not treat people. um But I really, i think training under whether you're just a farmer, training under another farmer, training under another designer,
00:35:17
Jenny Rae
I've kind of dabbled in different ranges to understand like, what do i what do I really want out of this business? How do I want to scale it? Do I want to become a giant wedding florist? Do I want to become a giant farm? And it helped me to find my direction in where I was most happy.
00:35:36
Jenny Rae
and I think too, i would I would work under some incredible, like incredibly talented people, but I couldn't always sense like what made them happy.
00:35:47
Jenny Rae
and Like if they were really loving what they were doing or were they doing it for the fame or were they doing it for the money? And like, did I want that? Like, I think I was capable. I like, I do believe in myself um that I could do it, but do I want it And so kind of finding that sweet spot, feeling confident in the fact that um I had a style that I loved and that I could convince other people to love and i could share that with the world, but that maybe I didn't want to be
00:36:20
Jenny Rae
a mega, a mega name or a mega farm um that I could find kind of a happy sense of balance that I could still, again, we're, we're, we're working to live and that that living aspect was really important to not let the work and the career take over my entire life.
00:36:39
Jenny Rae
It's kind of a random thing to say that I learned. i of course, learned some incredible design work. Visually, i learned that it was okay to lean into this garden side.
00:36:50
Jenny Rae
i kind of needed permission to do that because no florist around me was was designing that way. It felt foreign. it kind of felt scary.
00:37:00
Jenny Rae
i remember one time I handed off just like a paper bouquet and somebody said that there was weeds in it. um And like, i I know there was like Queen Anne's lace, but it just um to to feel confident enough to say that like, nope, that's a choice.
00:37:08
Jennifer Gulizia
Oh no.
00:37:17
Jenny Rae
And like visually, this is why and to own it. um Designing under all of all of the phenomenal designers I've worked with and farmers I've trained with.
00:37:27
Jenny Rae
That's it really gave me a lot of confidence to just own it and to be OK with it. And to any naysayers, just to be like, be gone with them.
00:37:37
Jennifer Gulizia
Oh, I love it. i love that it gave you the confidence because I could also see some people training with others or attending conferences or summits or seminars and then feeling overwhelmed or comparing themselves and maybe feeling like I just saw this amazing work and my work feels like it's just not there yet.
00:37:59
Jennifer Gulizia
And I think it's so easy in the floral industry for all of us to fall under that comparison trap. What advice do you have for people that struggle with that?
00:38:09
Jenny Rae
I mean, I do think learning from workshops, because sometimes it's just some really small technical things that can transform your design work or even your farm, if it's farming. To to some degree, I think farming can be an art. ah As technical as it is, it's still an art to kind of learn what to grow visually, to learn how to grow things that kind of make sense together for selling purposes or for bouquet making. So some of those technique items, that's really what helped to grow my confidence to what do we call the drip and droop of design work to understand that like having flowers and grasses kind of coming out of arrangements and flowing
00:38:53
Jenny Rae
in your installs to have movement and to have asymmetry, that that is all really acceptable and exceptional, even though you don't see it all the time, but there is there is some like skill to it and there is some technique and there is a way to make it look really bad too. Because even though it's like this organic thing in nature, there's still principles. And I think some of that is tied back to like learning art history and to learning painting because even the most abstract painter still probably has a lot of those principles kind of ingrained in them.
00:39:29
Jenny Rae
Um, and so i do think that there's a great value to that. And that's kind of what I took away the most of along with gaining some confidence.
00:39:41
Jennifer Gulizia
Thank you. I love that. You talk a lot about how flowers bring you joy and um just bring life to you. I mean, i see you so energized talking about them.
00:39:53
Jennifer Gulizia
How do you feel that flowers help you on the hardest days?
00:39:57
Jenny Rae
Oh, I will sometimes, even when I have like ah a rough farming week or maybe we're having a difficult month due to rain or drought or whatever the case is, I sometimes will just take an evening walk by myself during golden hour and I'll just take a moment to kind of like smell a flower, to watch watch some bees drumming on a blossom, to maybe look at some of like the dahlia colors that I haven't been paying attention to enough. And it it just brings me back. It kind of humbles you a little bit. It brings you down to earth. it reminds you that
00:40:33
Jenny Rae
What is this all about? um Because we can all get really wrapped up in the business aspect of it. We can get ripped wrapped up in the comparison. But just at the end of the day, when you you find that peace and you find that satisfaction, you kind of know, like, I always know we'll be okay even if, you know, even if we're eating Cheerios or whatever the case is or my designs become horrible. whatever I don't know. Whatever it's going to be. I'm like, I...
00:41:00
Jenny Rae
I still know like I'll be able to go out, look at the flowers and feel so much joy from them or be in my garden and be digging in dirt. and I think by knowing that and instills the confidence in me to like always make this business succeed and to keep trying new things and to not be afraid to fail.
Future Plans and Industry Reflections
00:41:19
Jenny Rae
I've tried so many different avenues in this business. I feel like I've kind of done it all. um And it's evolved and it's grown. And I'm really appreciative of that. And I just try to keep an open mind that the flowers will lead me to our next our next destination.
00:41:36
Jennifer Gulizia
Isn't that so true? i love that. You have such a positive mindset. It's so fun hearing your take on all of this. I would love to know because right now it's the end of February as we're recording this. You're probably covered in snow right now. Is that right?
00:41:51
Jenny Rae
We certainly are. Mm-hmm.
00:41:53
Jennifer Gulizia
What does 2026 have in store for Flowerwell?
00:41:57
Jenny Rae
Oh, it's an exciting year. um We're still diving really hard into dahlias. We have an amazing curated selection, new varieties like that I'm trialing and that I'm hoping to build up stock for to share with the world. that's It's become a really large part of our business and it's so fun. It's just it's just so exciting. um We have some great weddings in store. I mean, I love designing for couples and being able to be a part of just such a special day. So that takes up a lot of time working with them, working with planners.
00:42:30
Jenny Rae
We're diving a little bit harder into sweet pea seed production, which has been fun. Just something different to try. We've really enjoyed it this past year. And we have a bunch of new varieties that we're trialing, a bunch of Japanese varieties. So I'm very excited about that.
00:42:45
Jenny Rae
And for our florists, we survey our florists every year to ask, what do they want us to grow? What are they excited about from us? like What can't they wait to get their hands on?
00:42:58
Jenny Rae
um so we're growing quite a bit more Lysanthus this year. you know I'm so grateful for Farmer Bailey and all of his like new varieties that he's getting us. It's just great because the world of flowers is growing and evolving rapidly.
00:43:13
Jenny Rae
And it's just keeping it fresh. and So every year is a little different. ah Yeah. i who There might even be something new that I'm like not thinking of, but I do, I did just welcome um my second son in December.
00:43:30
Jenny Rae
So thank you.
00:43:30
Jennifer Gulizia
Oh my goodness, congratulations.
00:43:32
Jenny Rae
ze yeah, I have a, have a toddler and a baby. So there's, there is that to kind of balance me out that um I recognize I can only do so much and I want to be able to enjoy these younger years um and, you know, maybe spend more time in my garden than that I should be just spending on my business because I can be with my kiddo in the garden in the sandbox, but we are still doing new things.
00:43:58
Jenny Rae
And yeah, it's, it's, it's good stuff. Even if it's like at a slower growth pace than it hasn't been in past years.
00:44:07
Jennifer Gulizia
I love that. and I love that you're building a business that allows you to do that. You have a team so you can step aside. You can spend some time with your family. And it seems like you are so clear on your priorities that you know what's important to you and you're able to make those decisions.
00:44:15
Jenny Rae
Oh.
00:44:25
Jennifer Gulizia
Jenny Rae, this has been so fun chatting with you. I have been asking all of my guests a series of quick fire questions this year. And so um I'm going to ask you a few questions here before we wrap up. And my first one is, what is your favorite flower to grow or design with?
00:44:44
Jenny Rae
Cosmo. I couldn't, I couldn't, I could not live without a Cosmo.
00:44:45
Jennifer Gulizia
Wow.
00:44:48
Jennifer Gulizia
Wow.
00:44:49
Jenny Rae
Yeah. I, I just love the way they move. I love their airiness. I love how they surprise people and that, uh, people think that they're not going to be tough enough to like withstand, but I probably use a Cosmo in every single wedding that I design when humanly possible. I just love them. And I don't think I could live without the way they move in the wind.
00:45:12
Jennifer Gulizia
I guess I could see that based on how you've been talking about the movement and the mimicking gardens. So that makes a lot of sense. Next question. Why do local flowers matter to you?
00:45:22
Jenny Rae
ah I think that they can really inspire people. i think that they can bring people together. and in our region, um, i don't think it's just been me but we've seen a great presence like a great growth in folks gardening and uh you know we just had our dahlia sale and i saw so many orders come from western new york and i it's possible that we've impacted some of that and i i just love the idea that maybe i've inspired somebody to grow their own flowers and um just kind of see the happiness that comes from that.
00:45:58
Jenny Rae
Our wedding couples, you know, sometimes they'll come back and ask what flowers that were in their bridal bouquet so that they could add them to their garden. That just, ah that like thrills me so much and it brings joy and it feels like a simple thing. Like it's something that doesn't cost a lot of money, but can bring such enormous happiness. Yeah.
00:46:21
Jenny Rae
yeah And that's, that's like where it hits me hard.
00:46:24
Jennifer Gulizia
I love it. What's one thing you wish more people understood either about flower farming or floral design?
00:46:32
Jenny Rae
Well, I think if you like kind of marry both together and think about it as a business, um I wish they understood how expensive it is. That operating a business, growing a business, starting a farm from scratch, even if it's a small farm or a backyard farm, it is so expensive. Yeah.
00:46:54
Jenny Rae
A lot of money. I've spent a lot of money. um And I wouldn't change it. i wouldn't I wouldn't go back on it. But I do think that there's a stigma that it isn't expensive and you don't you don't need capital.
00:47:08
Jenny Rae
ah But I have taken out a lot of loans to grow this business. I've paid off a lot of loans. I mean, when we think about delivery vehicles and tractors and mowers and equipment and attachments, it's It's just far beyond what I could have ever imagined. And to some degree, I'm glad I didn't know because I might not have done it had I known how much money it would take.
00:47:32
Jennifer Gulizia
Totally. Well, I think it goes back to the grocery store flowers that you talked about early on. And you see that loss leader in the grocery store that's a $5 bouquet or a $7.99 bouquet. And I mean, we're tackling 20-acre new farm right now that was fallow for 20-something years. And talk about being expensive. i had I mean, we knew it was going to be expensive, but like I feel like multiply that by 10 and then maybe we're somewhere in a ballpark. Yeah.
00:47:57
Jenny Rae
I know. I know. And we've we've cleared land, like to to get land to a place where you can grow on. i think that that aspect people just don't, can't really wrap their head around.
00:48:04
Jennifer Gulizia
Mm-hmm.
00:48:08
Jenny Rae
And so i think that there's such a good sweet spot of like growing for pleasure and maybe doing a couple of raised beds. Cause like you can do that without breaking the bank. You can make that happen.
00:48:18
Jenny Rae
But when you go to make this a business and you take the next leap, Yeah. whole Holy cow. um i did I did not know what I was in for. And I have had some incredible farming mentors who have helped me incredibly. And I've gotten lucky to some degree. I think that that was part of it. And I'm so grateful For Erin of Florette sharing so much of her knowledge, I also don't think I would have succeeded without that. I mean, I think I read her blogs over and over and over again until it was riddled in my head because for so many of us, I think she saved us years of making mistakes. just by like giving us the foundation of how to do it, because it is really hard and the mistakes do get you down and will make you defeated. And I have still um i have still made some incredibly dumb mistakes to end that have cost me a lot of money. And you know we have her knowledge. So yeah, yeah.
00:49:20
Jennifer Gulizia
I think anytime we can learn from those who have gone before us is so impactful because it can get you to the next level so much faster. and we have a community that's so willing to share their knowledge, which is exactly why i'm hosting the Profitable Dahlia Summit coming up in March, because we have 13 growers who are all willing to share what they have learned the hard way and how to simplify so that others can get to that next level faster.
00:49:28
Jenny Rae
Yes.
00:49:45
Jenny Rae
Yeah. I mean, that is instrumental. Like that is what folks that want, if they want to go in this direction, like that is well worth your money to spend that, to learn from others, to save yourself the years of mistakes and just the years of money down the drain.
00:50:00
Jenny Rae
i mean, especially for dahlias, you know, you, if you put them in the ground and you don't know what you're doing, you have just lost a lot of money. Um,
00:50:08
Jennifer Gulizia
Absolutely. And you can still lose a lot of money on them, even if you know what you're doing.
00:50:12
Jenny Rae
ah Yeah. And and again, i I hate to like go, it's not all about the money, um but the because I've done this for so long it and it is a business and I i am pretty business minded about it We do have to take into that into account, just like, okay, well, how much money have we invested in X, y Z? And, you know, if it's a retirement and a hobby and that doesn't matter, like, I love that for you. But if it does matter, you need to educate yourself and things like that summit that can be so worth your while.
00:50:46
Jennifer Gulizia
Absolutely. Okay, what are you most grateful for that flowers have given you beyond the blooms?
00:50:53
Jenny Rae
It really is joy. it's It's filling my cup. um It's feeling that peace, feeling that happiness. Yeah, nothing nothing has ever compared to that. And it I feel so lucky to get to feel that because I don't think everyone Yeah.
00:51:12
Jenny Rae
It's truly a peace within myself and a sense of joy that like I can say I've done it and flowers will always be with me no matter what. Even if this business fails tomorrow, i will always be growing flowers because they just I need them. My soul needs them.
00:51:31
Jennifer Gulizia
Flowers feed the soul.
00:51:32
Jenny Rae
They do.
00:51:34
Jennifer Gulizia
Well, this has been so fun chatting with you. Before we say goodbye, is there anything I haven't asked you that you want to leave our listeners with today?
00:51:43
Jenny Rae
I think it's just so important to stay encouraged and to remember that like we all will have a great growing year and then we'll all all have a bad growing year and to not to try to not give up if that's the case. I mentor a lot of folks that are just beginning gardening. And, you know, I tell them you're going to have failures. Things are going to die and it's probably not going to be your fault. You know, some of those really expensive dahlias that you just bought,
00:52:13
Jenny Rae
who they could thrive couple might die it's part of the deal mother nature is a really difficult boss she is incredible she is giving she is also the hardest boss you will ever have in your life so just don't get down on yourself don't give up and just remember that like this is all about learning this is part of the deal and That does make you stronger. That helps you to kind of keep going, find confidence, but just know that like you're going to have failures and that's, it's okay.
00:52:51
Jennifer Gulizia
Oh, I love that advice. Okay. This is my last question for you. Where can our listeners find you so they can connect with you after today's show?
00:52:59
Jenny Rae
Yeah, I do try to be really present on our Instagram. So that's that's where I'll share the most. Sometimes my team will even post on there on our stories, like what we're harvesting, what we're doing. That's probably the best. On our website, we do try to upload our like most recent wedding work. And that's kind of fun to just browse through. But Instagram is where we're the most present and kind of where I stay the most up to date with what we've got going on.
00:53:28
Jennifer Gulizia
Perfect. Well, we will have show links to both of those in today's episode. Jenny Rae, thank you so much for joining us today. And I wish you a season filled with lots of joy. Thank you for joining me.
00:53:39
Jenny Rae
You are so welcome. It was a pleasure.
00:53:42
Jennifer Gulizia
Thank you. Bye-bye.