Learn how to price your products and services with advice from four small business owners - Erin Shackelford, Jesalyn Pettigrew, Quynh Nguyen, and Jessie Chui, in the paper flower, floral arranging, and flower farming industries. 

Does your stomach tie up in knots at the thought of pricing your products or services? A quick search will show that paper flowers come with all sorts of price tags attached. How do other paper florists come up with those price points? Are you charging too much or too little?

^{Camas Design}

“I looked back on what I had done that summer, thinking I had done great for that first year…But when I looked at my profit margin, I realized it was not a sustainable business model.” - Erin Shackelford

Paper florists aren’t the only ones to struggle with this problem. Small business owners of all kinds lose sleep over the pricing question. That’s why on our Season 3 premier of Papertalk we took on this important topic and...

Hey Paper Florists - Do you want to spend more time on your craft and less time chasing down clients? Or are you a vendor who needs to reach more paper florists?  

Well, look no further. Quynh and Jessie talked about this project in Episode 57, and now it's live. The Paper Florists Member Directory is finally here!  When you sign up as a Member, you’ll be listed in our worldwide directory, the first of its kind for paper florists and vendors. With just a few clicks, potential clients can connect with you like never before. We’re talking commercial businesses, photographers, fresh florists, event planners, and more. 

We’ll do the heavy lifting with advertising, spreading the word on influential podcasts and blogs like Botanical Brouhaha! 

All you have to do is sign up at thepaperflorists.org and pay a small annual fee —only $4.08 a month! The same as that fancy latte you love. And it goes to maintaining the tech-related stuff for the...

Listen to mixed-medium artist Ann Wood talk about her international exhibit and how she keeps herself inspired and challenged with her art.

Have you ever found yourself in a creative rut? Found yourself no longer joyful with your work, but simply slogging through? Maybe you’re having difficulty even imagining a different way to do things. Maybe you have a dream to chase, but the risks seem too big.

If that sounds familiar, we have perfect inspiration for you! 

In this episode of Paper Talk, we chatted with Ann Wood of Woodlucker studio. She is the amazing mixed-medium artist behind a plethora of hyperreal insects, feathers, vegetables, fruit, and flowers. These incredible creations have been featured in many publications including Martha Stewart Living, as well as NPR’s Cultivating Place podcast. Her dream to create a massive botanical wall led to her current exhibition at the Kunstmuseum Den Haag in the Netherlands.

Here’s what you’ll learn...

Learn from a marketing expert, Tonneli Gruetter, how to reach across industry lines to grow your paper floral business and gain exposure in print and digital publications.

Let’s face it: our paper floral industry is strong, but still has lots of room to grow. To get our work out there and to help our community flourish, we need to collaborate with other industries. Getting featured in the magazines or blogs of other groups is a fabulous way to grow your business. An obvious one is the fresh florist market. We can create pansies with long stems or an iris for a dried bouquet. The possibilities for collaborating with florists are endless!

You may wonder if a fresh floral magazine or blog will feature your paper flowers, and the answer is yes! On our latest episode of Paper Talk, Tonneli Gruetter— a marketing expert and writer at the Florists’ Review magazine—spoke eloquently about the amazing collaboration that can happen when we choose to look outside of our...

Although South Korea did not formally implement a lockdown, South Koreans were encouraged to practice physical distancing and to wear masks in public spaces. Most of their economy is back to "normal" and we thought it would be interesting to speak to Jasmine Sing of Merremade about how she went about re-commencing her in-person workshops in South Korea, as it would be equally relevant in other countries once the physical distancing policies start to loosen up.

If you want to know more about Jasmine, be sure to check out Episode 15 where we first spoke to her about the paper flower industry in Asia.

First, let's learn a bit about Jasmine:

1. Tell us about yourself Jasmine!

The Asian with big dreams, and the brain & hands behind Merremade. I am born and raised in Singapore but moved to South Korea 7 years ago. Still trying to learn & adjust to this not-so-new environment. Everyday is an adventure and I have so much I want to achieve. I am usually...

This week on our Paper Talk Podcast, we want to talk about when it's ok to work for free with our friend, Kate Alarcon.

As much as we hate to admit it, we've all made paper flowers for "free" in one way or the other. Often, it's in the early stages of our paper flower journey, when we're desperate for exposure, when we don't have the guts to ask for the right kind of compensation (or any compensation at all), when we're not all that confident about work. If we're lucky, we come out of it a better artist or entrepreneur with opportunities that we never dreamed of. On the other hand, if those opportunities aren't fruitful, we might feel slightly disappointed, even resentful perhaps. 

^{Above: Quynh's Cherry Blossom exhibit at Fran's Chocolate}

When would you work for free? In this episode, each of us explain when we've worked for free and why those opportunities were or were not ones that we would ever do again.

 ^{Above: Jessie's...}

Last week on our podcast, Paper Talk, we dove into the world of branding with Kalisa Jenne-Fraser and Missy Palacol of Kalyx Group. We loved and learned so much from our conversation that we extended into this week’s episode. Our focus shifted from finding the heart of your business (in short, the brand) to the ins and outs of marketing your business.

If you haven't listened to "How and Why Branding and Marketing Go Hand in Hand (Part 1)" be sure to listen to that Episode!

Let's learn a bit about Kalisa and Missy:

1. Introduce yourself to us (again)!

Kalisa Jenne-Fraser is co-founder of Kalyx Group, a brand and marketing consulting firm headquartered in Seattle. Kalisa is a brand marketing consultant who specializes in strategic brand planning, content marketing and digital media strategy. She has spent almost her entire professional life delivering marketing strategies and insights to global brands, non-profits and startups alike. In 2016, after...