The giving and receiving of flowers has been a tradition for many generations.  It used to be that your local florist knew your name, your wife’s name, and her favorite flower – so YOU didn’t have to worry about remembering!  But as time has progressed, local brick-and-mortar flower shops have become more and more scarce.  People are turning, instead, to 1-800 and online “warehouse” ordering to send flowers to their loved ones.

The lure of what seems to be a larger selection is what sucks people in to these call centers.  They think they are calling a HUGE floral warehouse with dozens of people standing around, just waiting for their order to come in so they can build it and send it immediately!

The reality, of course, is much different.  When you call these “warehouse” florists, you are getting a call center.  ONLY a call center.  There is no flower warehouse.  Just lines of cubicles filled with people answering the phone all day.  Most of them probably couldn’t tell you the difference between a daffodil and a daisy.  Once they get your order and your money, whoever you spoke with has nothing to do with you or your order again.

What happens when that order doesn’t get to the right place or at the right time?  What if that order gets lost in the shuffle and doesn’t end up anywhere?  Who carries the responsibility to make it right?

When you call your local florist, you KNOW you are talking to a knowledgeable person who knows plants and flowers and values YOU, the customer!  If you aren’t sure what type to send or what colors to use or what’s in season, you can rest assured that the person on the other end of the line will have the perfect suggestion!  Your local florist is just that – a florist who cares about your satisfaction!  A florist who recirculates your dollar in your community 8 times as opposed to only a possible 4 times with a call center.  YOUR money goes back to work in YOUR community to help keep other local businesses – run by your friends, family, and neighbors – in business!

Next time you need to send flowers, call your local Boesen the Florist!  Local florists work and live in your community and CARE about the reason you’re sending the flowers in the first place!  You can rest assured that if anything goes wrong and you aren’t completely satisfied with the quality of your order, Tom Boesen will stand behind his work and will do everything in his power to make it right for you!

We recently received this wonderful comment on our Facebook Page from a satisfied customer!  We’re so pleased to have been a part of this great occasion!

Flowers I ordered for Mary for our 50th anniversary were beyond what we expected and made our celebration very special. I visited the Beaver store to place the order and the personnel there are very professional in their guidance to what I ordered!

Happy 50th Anniversary, Ted and Mary!  We wish you many more happy years together and hope you will consider Boesen the Florist for your future celebrations, as well!

Boesen the Florist wants to extend a great big THANK YOU for voting us “BEST LOCAL FLOWER SHOP” by Cityview readers once again!  Tom and Frank Boesen and the team at Boesen the Florist are very proud and humbled to have won this honor for 20 years running!  It means the most because it’s voted on by YOU, the people of Des Moines.

When words can’t say it, flowers often can, and our readers realize that.  When searching for the words, they continue to choose Boesen year after year.  This is a local shop with national accolades, as well as a wall full of Best Of awards.
~ Cityview

Boesen the Florist has been a family-owned and -operated flower shop in Beaverdale since 1923, with love of the business being passed down through FOUR Generations of Boesens.  The shops, expanded to include locations on Ingersoll and in the Downtown skywalk, are run by employees who are trusted as family and who care as much about the business and customer satisfaction as any one of the Boesens.

Throughout its operation, Boesen The Florist has always, and continues to invest in the most advanced technology available to the floral industry. Currently, a state-of-the-art floral online order entry and customer service system is in place to insure order accuracy. Boesen’s houses a 22-line call center, so customers can call and speak directly with a Boesen employee actually in the flower shop, rather than a faceless order-taker who isn’t even in our city.  Boesen’s stands behind its satisfaction guarantee – if you ever have a question, don’t hesitate to call the shop and speak directly with Tom Boesen himself and he will make it right for you.

In addition, Boesen’s is one of a handful of florists utilizing the most recent revelation in CO2 technology, the FloralKeeper™, to enhance respiration, refrigeration, bacteria control and ethylene displacement in all their floral coolers, increasing flower longevity and performance. As a result, Boesen the Florist is as well equipped as any florist in the nation to give customers the best possible product.

So thank you, Des Moines, for bestowing your trust in Boesen the Florist once again!  We hope to serve your flower and garden needs for generations to come!

From time-to-time, we like to post letters and images from those that we’ve helped. Whether it’s a beautiful bridal bouquet or a holiday floral centerpiece, we’re happy that Boesen the Florist can help you “Make the Moment Mean More.”

Tom Boesen

Dear Tom,

Thank you so very much for your generous support of the American Cancer Society’s Fifth Annual Coaches vs. Cancer Hoops for Hope Gala on October 6, 2011.

Tom, Boesen the Florist’s generous in-kind sponsorship was essential to making our Hoops for Hope Gala a great success and is invaluable to our continual fight against cancer.  Without supporters like you, we would not be able to host the Hoops for Hope Gala.  We had approximately 275 guests in attendance.  More importantly, approximately $75,000 was raised to fund the mission of American Cancer Society. Thank you for helping with the centerpieces at the event.  They really made the room complete!

Thank you again for your generosity and support of the American Cancer Society’s continual fight against cancer.  We hope you will continue your generous support to the American Cancer Society, in particular, our Coaches vs. Cancer Hoops for Hope Gala.

With deepest appreciation,
Krista Walsh
American Cancer Society
Coaches vs. Cancer Events

From time-to-time, we like to post letters and images from those that we’ve helped. Whether it’s a beautiful bridal bouquet or a holiday floral centerpiece, we’re happy that Boesen the Florist can help you “Make the Moment Mean More.”

Tom Boesen

P.S. Thank YOU, Mary, for your hard work and dedication to such a worthy cause!

Dear Tom,

On behalf of the Greater Iowa Chapter of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF), thank you for your donation to the 2011 Hope Gala held on September 24, 2011.  The Gala was a tremendous success, raising more than $350,000 for diabetes research!  You will be pleased to know that your donation of flowers for a year helped us reach this remarkable goal.

At JDRF, we are committed to improving the lives of people with type 1 diabetes and speeding research toward treatments and a cure for the disease and its complications.  The support you have given will help us pursue that goal – making a real difference for children and adults who live with the burden of type 1 diabetes every day.

Last year, donors like you allowed JDRF to increase our total funding of research to roughly $107 million.  Your recent gift will help ensure that we will fund even more in the coming year.  The projects and partnerships JDRF funds are uncovering the causes of type 1 diabetes, developing novel ways to improve management of the disease and pursuing new pathways to a cure.

Thank you for your generosity and your passion to find a cure.

Sincerely,

Mary Hunter
Executive Director
Greater Iowa JDRF

From time-to-time, we like to post letters and images from those that we’ve helped. Whether it’s a beautiful bridal bouquet or a holiday floral centerpiece, we’re happy that Boesen the Florist can help you “Make the Moment Mean More.”

Tom Boesen

p.s.  Thank you, Paula, for showing your artistic flair with the “muy bueno” color coding!

Hola Tom!

Thanks/Gracias for helping at the Des Moines Art Center’s 11th annual Day of the Dead celebration! Your generous contribution made our celebration very special. We had 2,730 visitors enjoying the LOVELY altar, INCREDIBLE music, FANTASTIC dance performance, AMAZING film, FUN studio activities and DELICIOUS food on Sunday!

We are very appreciative that you support the Art Center. Enjoy the rest of your week!

Cheers,
Paula

Beaverdale was listed in Forbes as one of America’s Prettiest Neighborhoods and we couldn’t agree more!

Forbes: America's Prettiest Neighborhoods

“Featuring bucolic parks, attractive historic churches and a small bunch of popular area restaurants, Beaverdale stands out among Des Moines’ neighborhoods and is a great place to while away a weekend day. “Most of the brick homes date to the 1930s, and nestle underneath towering shade trees and along streets with parkways running down the middle,” says Williams. There is a popular fall festival and plans are in the works to start a farmer’s market in the neighborhood next summer.” – Forbes

In 1923 Betty and Theodore Boesen opened Boesen The Florist’s main store and greenhouse on Beaver Avenue. Now as the third generation operating Boesens we have been delighted to see how Beaverdale has flourished through the years. Betty and Theodore could not have picked a more perfect location for the first Boesen The Florist location!

While touring the beautiful Beaverdale area be sure and stop by Boesen The Florist right on Beaver Avenue!

Boesen The Florist is honored to announce that we have been named Best Florist by the Des Moines Business Record‘s Best of Des Moines 2011!

“Boesen the Florist co-owner Tom Boesen likes to joke that the only thing that hasn’t changed since his grandfather started the business 89 years ago is that it sells flowers. More specifically, in the past couple of years, the company has focused on upping its social media presence on Twitter and Facebook to the point where “I think we’re a leader,” Boesen said. Still, word-of-mouth advertising is as important as it has ever been for the florist.” – Des Moines Business Record

Boesens is also thrilled to be named Best Flower Shop in Des Moines by CityView for the 19th year!
It appears we may even be a little late in tooting our own horn on this one. Here at Boesen The Florist we pride ourselves on offering the very best flowers and service to our customers throughout Iowa. A big thank you goes out to everyone who voted this year!

“When you’re named one of the top 25 florists in the country by major floral wire services, you’ve already built a pretty solid reputation with the clients from your community. Boesen the Florist competes with the finest designers, retail and service providers around the world to deliver the best quality product they can produce. It’s no wonder readers have selected them as the “Best Flower Shop” for 2011. Multiple locations.” – Cityview

These are such honors because the community votes each year and its because of you that myself and the staff at Boesens is able to continually do what we love!

From time-to-time, we like to post letters and images from those that we’ve helped. Whether it’s a beautiful bridal bouquet or a holiday floral centerpiece, we’re happy that Boesen the Florist can help you “Make the Moment Mean More.”

Tom Boesen

p.s. – we LOVE exclamation points, too… 

Jane and Tom-

The ballroom looked INCREDIBLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Thank you to you and your team for creating the most amazing room – our friends and family said it’s the most beautiful wedding they’ve ever seen.

- Kelsey and Steven

click to view a larger image

On behalf of the Hoover Baseball Association I would like to send out a heartfelt thank you for your support of the Hoover Husky Baseball program.  With your help we were able to purchase a pitching machine for the team at all levels, freshman through Varsity.  We are hopeful that it will help improve our batting averages up and down the roster.  The guys are already enjoying it and while some are still getting used to it, it seems to be working.  The coach is also utilizing it to help our catchers prepare as well.

This is our first year of the Association and our first year of parental fundraising.  Again, we do so appreciate your considerate donation.  Feel free to join us at any of our games – a schedule is enclosed.  Just mention the Association at the gate and we’ll see that you get a prime seat!

With much appreciation,

Mindy Markey