Flower Express

Source: Danisa Flowers

I love fresh flowers. LOVE. They make me incredibly happy, and they also make spaces incredibly happy, because like plants they bring energy into every room. The downside is that fresh flowers are expensive, but I'm totally in favor of getting a $7 bouquet from Trader Joe's and divvying up the flowers into smaller jars to dot around the apartment.

One of the joys of flowers is also the processing of giving and receiving them. I know they're not gifts that last, but maybe precisely because of that fact, they seem more precious and sentimental. Yeah, it would be great to gift everyone iPads or vintage china, but unless your pockets are deep, flowers are a fantastic alternative.

Source: Gardenista

Which brings me to a cool startup in San Francisco called Bloom That. The basic premise is that you can have handcrafted bouquets of locally-grown flowers delivered within the same day (within 90 minutes of ordering!). The flower selection is based on what's in season, and they typically only have ~7 options, but the prices are pretty great for what you get:

 Source: Bloom That

Plus! Delivery is built into that cost! So it's just the price + tax, versus that typical $15 delivery charge that most services pack onto your order. And in typical SF style, they have an app for mobile ordering; use bike messengers vs. vans; and wrap the bouquets in fair trade-produced coffee sack burlap. So you know your bouquet was made with a conscience. :)

Finally, one of my favorite things is that they also have a plant option--typically a set of succulents in a small rock garden. Plants are as good company at a dinner party as flowers.

Source: Bloom That

My only nitpick is that their product names are suuuuuuper yuppie: (The) Clarence, Beaumont, Finley, Corwin. People, these are the names of bespoke clothing lines and/or my high school classmates from Greenwich, CT. :) Happily, I've gotten over that hiccup and plan to start sending myself surprise bouquets more often.