The Yorkshire florist whose designs have appeared on the cover of a OK! Magazine
Jess is a self-taught florist who was looking for a new venture after the birth of her two sons, now aged two and four.
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Hide Ad“When I was 13, I had a little cafe with my dad and so sort of fell into hospitality – my family were in hospitality all their lives. Silvertini came around then as I created this cocktail, the Silvertini, and it went crazy in the local area where everybody knows everybody and likes a good time and so when we were thinking of names for the floristry business I thought let’s call it the Silvertini Florist.”
After being a full-time mum for a few years after the birth of sons Theodore and Boden, she felt she needed to go back to work.
“We’d bought a house near Wakefield, in Waterton – the world’s first nature reserve – which really got me into nature and gave me the idea for the florists. It’s also next to a big wedding venue. I’ve always been quite creative but I didn’t have the confidence to put a bouquet together.”
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Hide AdBut encouraged by her husband Dom, she decided to give it a try. “My husband pushed me he said ‘Just try it’ and so I tried it and it went really well.” At first, Jess thought she’d name her fledging business after their home “but I didn’t love it so I decided it should just be Silvertini as it was a name everyone in the area knew,” she says.
“I launched on a Tuesday night in June last year and I haven’t stopped working yet. It just went crazy. My husband works in digital so he helped me build the website and it has really helped me get my mojo back. I love it. It’s crazy and stressful but I just love working with flowers.”
Even though Jess says the use of social media – Instagram and Facebook in particular – has helped her business, it is old-fashioned word of mouth and the support of her local area that has really seem her business grow so quickly in the first year.
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Hide Ad“I cannot thank people enough for all their support. We don’t have a shopfront so we have really become an online florist. I’m going in the more modern approach.”
Jess specialises in ‘hat box’ bouquet deliveries which have proved successful with orders every day of the week.
“I’m only 26 so I wanted to make it young and modern. When you get a normal box of flowers, you end up chucking the packaging away straight after you’ve put the flowers in a vase and probably take the tag and put it in the bin. I wanted something that was a bit more sustainable that people could reuse and struck on the hatbox idea.
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Hide Ad“The bouquets are already arranged so people can just put them in their home or business and reuse them for storage afterward. They also have my logo on so are a constant reminder of where the flowers came from and I do believe that has helped us get repeat orders. I’ve also started to personalise them for businesses and I’d like to expand that corporate side more.
“I get up at 5am and do all the orders I’ve got but I also get a lots of last minute bookings up until 11am and we deliver them all that day.
“I am passionate about getting the flowers in and out as quickly as possible. That’s my bread and butter and has almost worked as its own marketing for the weddings as often when they are delivered a customer says they love them, and they are getting married later in the year and would I do their wedding.”
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Hide AdWhen she first started, on her husband’s suggestions, Jess made up a lot of bouquets and delivered them to local businesses.
“So off I went and I’ve kept doing that and it really helps to remind people that I’m doing flowers now especially as we don’t have an actual shop. My stepson also does leaflet drops at weekends for pocket money around the local area.” Jess does all her floristry from the family home once the boys have gone to school and nursery, although there are plans next year for a new venture which she hopes will combine her love of flowers and hospitality.
“Once the boys have gone to school, I take over the entire house. We have a big garage where I keep all the flowers, but we have really outgrown it and we are hoping we might be able to move after Christmas.”
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Hide AdAt the moment Jess sources most of her flowers through a wholesaler, who she says has been a massive support for all her “weird and wonderful ideas”, but she is keen to pursue a more sustainable method n the future.
“It’s been so busy so quickly I really haven’t had time to research that route, but it is something I am really keen on. For a recent wedding I did I tried to go down a more sustainable route, and I’ve started working with Silver Grey Foliage, a flower farm in Headingley. Rebecca, who runs it, rents an acre of land in Leeds and grows all this beautiful greenery that smells so nice and is so much more sustainable.”
Jess is very conscious of sustainability but recognises being a sustainable florist is challenging when people want flowers that aren’t in season the UK for their weddings and other events.
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Hide Ad“We’ve started with the packaging and hope to make the flower side more sustainable as we move forward but one way I try to give back is being doing a lot of work for charity.”
Jess says that at the moment the trend with wedding flowers has returned to being very classic. “It’s the romantic Gypsophila look that’s really popular at the moment. Gypsophila with white roses – the more classic and traditional look.” An example of this trend was the celebrity wedding she did for her friend, the model and singer Chanelle Hayes who appeared on Big Brother, which was featured on the cover of OK! Magazine.
At the busiest times of the year – Mother’s Day and Valentine’s – Jess works round the clock to fulfill her order with husband Dom helping with the’ mechanical’ side of things
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Hide Ad“I’m quite good at pulling all-nighters and have been since I was a teenager but next year is already filling up with weddings so I am hoping if the new project does come off it will allow me to take someone on to help me with the orders.”
She also runs wreath-making workshops.
"I live in a place where the outdoors really comes to life at Christmas,” says Jess.
“Our house looks like something from the hobbit so it gave me the idea of hosting some wreath workshops in our garden. When I realised it might be a bit cold we turned our cottage into a winter wonderland and hosted around 60 people here.
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Hide Ad“The word got out so we began doing them at all of the local pubs and restaurants. It’s felt really special to be able to work with lots of wonderful venues which are all local so I know them well.”
There are also plans for a Silvertini Florist app to make it easier for people to place their orders.
"I want men and women to be able to have the app on their phone, so they can quickly order collect in the next hour or so. It’s a way to stop flowers gong to waste. Also its the best way for them to stay fresh - we don’t want to send out flowers that die within a few days," says Jess. “Also my husband says that when he used to go into a flower shop he some times felt intimidation – he often didn’t know what he wanted to buy or how much he wanted to spend. This way they can just pick what they want to spend and I will sort it.
www.silvertini.com or on the Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/silvertini_florist/