Local business: Capri By Fleur E Scent in Balgownie

Lauren Basi was running a successful wedding and events floristry business, Fleur E Scent, when COVID hit. With a decrease in events, it prompted her to open up Capri By Fleur E Scent, a Balgownie gift shop.

Now, the founder and creative director has never been busier.

How did the two businesses start?

We originally started with weddings and events about four years ago, so that's always been our main business. We've always focused on the

• weddings,
• events,
• christenings,
• baptisms,
• birthdays

- all the celebratory types. Because I had little ones, I wanted the business to work with family life. Over the years, it got busier and busier.

Last year in lockdown we had to adjust, because the weddings and events just stopped. So we were starting to send out bouquets to people and started our website, and were seeing success with that. People were wanting to send flowers and gifts, so I said “OK, I think it's time we open the shop. The kids are all older now. They're all at school.”

We looked for a space and we found one, and that's why we decided to open in Balgownie.

It was a natural progression. I always wanted to open the shop, but it was going to tie me down too much with the little ones. Now that they're all at school, it's so much easier.

When did the shop Capri By Fleur E Scent open?

We opened the shop on the weekend of Mother's Day. Of course, we weren’t open for very long because of lockdowns. But that’s been another good thing. It's given me the time to spend on the website and pushing social media. That has been really important for us to survive.

If weddings and events were on in full force, I wouldn't have had that time to invest. It's really good that I've been able to have the time to push social media and that people are going online to buy. So when the shop does reopen, we’ll still manage orders coming through online and over the phone.

What’s your background and has that involved floristry? Where did your passion stem from?

I was working in financial services for 14 years. So I was in superannuation and the corporate world. I've always wanted to do it. Before my oldest son, now 13, was born, I said to my husband, “I want to really do this floristry course”, but it was a bit of an investment to do it. And with the little ones, I just couldn't. But the corporate world just wasn’t flexible enough for me with the little ones.

One day I’d just had enough and I said, “no, I'm going to go and pursue the course up in Sydney at Pearsons School of Floristry” and never looked back. It's sort of just boomed from there.

I left where I was working. I did overlap a little bit, doing my studying and working. But when I was ready, I left and just went straight into the floristry and it’s boomed since, so I’ve been pretty lucky.

What attracted you to Balgownie? What do you like about working in Balgownie?

Our warehouse for Fleur E Scent is in Fairy Meadow. We need the space to store all our sundries, vases and wedding and event items, so I needed somewhere that was close enough to Fairy Meadow and I did want that village vibe as well. Balgownie has that. It’s a beautiful community, there’s a lot of foot traffic there and the people are beautiful and welcoming. That’s what really attracted me to Balgownie for Capri By Fleur E Scent.

Where do you source your products from and how did that develop for you?

When I started floristry, I was going to the Flemington Markets every single week to build my relationships with all different growers. I've got my specific flower suppliers that I deal with on the weekly. I send him my orders every week and obviously due to COVID I can’t go up there, so now I have a flower courier who goes up there and picks up for me from all my different growers. He then delivers them straight to my door at the warehouse. We refresh everything, we cut all the stems and then put them in fresh water and straight into the cool room.

Look, if it wasn't for COVID, we’d be doing the trips two to three times a week getting fresh flowers in the early hours of the morning. So it's actually been nice not to have to get up early! But, you know, we're still on the phone and on email, messaging all our growers at all hours of the night to source our flowers. It’s a bit harder, but I don’t miss the early mornings.

What are the most popular items you sell?

Especially during COVID, people are wanting the bright, beautiful bunches. Obviously because we can’t go out and buy gifts, a lot of people are wanting to add on. So candles have been popular and lots of body products, which were always popular in the Capri By Fleur E Scent shop. Another thing that’s been popular in lockdown has been the cocktail mixes. They’ve been a sellout pretty much every week so far. People are going crazy for them.

It's just a pre-mix cocktail, but you need to add in your own alcohol. That's been great with the younger ones who want to send a gift to their girlfriends or just a bunch of flowers and a cocktail mix. It's a perfect gift.

If there’s anything that’s most popular at the moment, it’s the cocktail mixes and the flowers as a combo. That's something we created for the lockdown. We’ve also been doing balloon packages, which is another thing that's been really popular. We teamed up with Balloon Expressions, which we deal with a lot with our events, and we thought it was a great idea to do something different and support each other during the lockdown and try and spread the love in other ways.

Usually we buy gifts for anniversaries and birthdays, but have you noticed that people are buying gifts just because they want to brighten someone's day?

Yes. A lot of the card messages we're seeing - some of which are quite sad - say “I’m thinking of you” and “we’ll get through this” and “just wanting to brighten up your day”. We're getting lots and lots of that. Other than the standard birthdays, that's seen a huge increase in those kinds of gifts being sent out, for sure.

We always love to spend time with our customers on the phone anyway, but every phone call with people now is that little bit longer because people want to talk to each other. We’ve lost that interaction. So even the customer service side of things has changed as well. We're creating different conversations now, we’re more understanding of each other and we’re all asking each other how the other is. So there is definitely that shift from a customer service perspective.

Anything else you’d like to share with us?

Capri By Fleur E Scent is closed up in Balgownie, but all my girls have been continuing to work in our warehouse. We closed the doors because we want to keep our staff safe, but the community as well. The good thing is we’ve been very lucky that we’ve still been able to employ the girls and keep jobs. It’s not full time capacity - it's not the same as it was before - but just that interaction with my staff and having them come to work and having that relationship, it really lifts our spirits a lot.

It's hard because we've got the two businesses and one of them has just completely come to a holt. But the fact that we've got the shop, it was a blessing, really. Because otherwise it would have been as easy to survive.

To learn more about  visit Capri By Fleur E Scent.

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