I knew from the beginning that I wouldn’t be spending a lot of time or money on flowers. Most wedding planners recommend spending between 10-15% of your budget on flowers, but my fiancé and I had rationalized the price of our location by including our flower budget in it! It was, after all, a giant garden so we knew we wouldn’t need much. Still, just flowers for bridesmaids, groomsmen, moms, dads, grandmas, centerpieces etc. adds up.

In addition to the sheer number of bouquets we realized we needed, another problem I soon realized was as soon as you mention the word “wedding” to a florist your estimate doubles. Flowers for an anniversary $30, the same bouquet for a wedding $60! It was ridiculous. Especially since I live near an amazing and incredibly cheap flower market, I found this very frustrating. I didn’t need more than those simply beautiful farmers’ bouquets for the tables and couldn’t the bridesmaids carry small posies of whatever flower is in season? I didn’t need roses flown in from Ecuador, stephanotis from Hawaii, or baby’s breath filler. I called florist after florist in vain asking for bids for what I needed. Unfortunately, I found most florists weren’t willing to give me what I needed, they would only estimate for what they generally created – large, extravagant centerpieces $100 or more and exquisitely detailed bridal bouquets around $150-$200 (and this was from so called “budget florists”).

At this point I could have revisited my budget, perhaps moved some things around and created a more realistic flower budget. However, I decided to stick to finding what I wanted, not only in price but in simplicity. It was then that I read an article about how beautiful the flowers are in an average Southern Californian supermarket. Of course, Southern California ships out cut flowers to the rest of the United States, it makes sense that their supermarkets would also be stocked with better than average flowers. And it just so happened I was having a wedding in LA, although planning from Seattle. I soon wrote a list of exactly what I needed; 15 centerpieces, bagful of loose petals for cake and aisle, 6 posies, 8 boutonnieres, 1 bridal bouquet, 2 flower girl baskets, 3 corsages for the moms and grandma, and 6 bud vases for the cocktail tables. On a planning trip down to LA I scoped out Ralph’s, Whole Foods and Von’s.

The report card for the three stores was scored by my fiancé . A+ for Whole Foods, B for Ralph’s and D for Von’s. Von’s flowers were exactly what I had previously stereotyped supermarket flowers as – boring, cheap looking and half dead. Ralph’s fared a little better, fresher flowers with more creativity but still a little “supermarket”. Whole Foods had beautiful arrangements and healthy looking flowers. They also had a knowledgeable staff that had put together wedding flowers before. I later placed the order from Seattle generally describing what I wanted, adjusting as I got feedback on what was possible and in season. It was a positive experience and in the end added up to the exact budget we had set aside for flowers. I received a call two weeks before the wedding as the florist was putting in our order with the wholesaler and confirmed the order again with me. Then they were ready to go on time the day of the wedding. I was satisfied. It’s definitely a great route to go if you’re not picky about the exact flowers and look that you want. In the end, I did end up squeezing a little stephanotis into my bouquet as well!