Why Adland Sends Itself Flowers (& More Creepy Florist Stories)!

We know there are a lot of egos in media but former adland peeps Chris Berents and Sarah Regan claim many of our advertising peers secretly send flowers to themselves to make their colleagues jealous.

The duo, who turned their back on advertising in 2013 to set up online florist company, Little Flowers, told B&T they have a giggle when writing the messages on the tags, especially when they’re to people they know from their former agency lives.

“Since day one the messages are far more creative than we’ll ever be,” laughed former Droga5 and Clemenger BBDO creative Berents. “We’re often writing messages from ‘celebrities’, and we were surprised to discover people regularly send flowers them to themselves to make people in the office jealous, and other times to get everyone talking.

“We also get dogs sending them to cats and all sorts of bizarre requests, including wives who have rumbled their husbands. They ring up and they’re like, ‘my husband has a credit card that purchased little flowers and they didn’t go to me, you tell me where they went to,’ and I’m like, ‘I’m sorry ma’am I can’t, he might have sent them to someone else,’ and she’s like, ‘I knew it, I knew he was having an affair. Tell me who it is?’ It can get very awkward.”

Berents and Regan founded the business with fellow marketers Ben Sampson and John Kane to “spread happiness one little bunch at a time,” said Regan.

The company now employs 20 people and turns over approximately $1.5million a year, delivers around 170 bunches of flowers a day at a set rate of $30.

Recent amusing messages to people in media and marketing include:

– Congratulations! One week asshole-free (sending to self)

– F*ck ’em. You’re better than those c*nts!

– Call me! (from George Clooney)

– Just some flowers to help cover up the smell of poo

– Please don’t be embarrassed that you farted during sex (from Ryan Gosling)

Regan also revealed that when it comes to advertising agencies, it’s often the group account directors sending flowers to say thank you for the hard work.

“They get a lot of ‘gee-up’ flowers,” she added, “which is nice.”

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