Last-minute Valentine's Day flower delivery

February 13, 2006 8:13 PM

Valentine's crisis: I need to have flowers delivered to either Half Moon Bay (CA) between 9 and noon, or an apartment in the Castro after 11pm. I admit poor advance planning.

Obviously I'll call every florist within 25 miles of Half Moon Bay, but I'm wondering if anyone has any bright ideas in case they all laugh at me and hang up. Offer to pay them more? (I should probably try to keep the desperation out of my voice.) I've also considered a ridiculous (and expensive) plan involving a courier service, a friend in SF, and after-hours delivery to her apartment.

Any advice would be welcome, preferably before I panic and book a flight to SF to deliver them myself. Thanks.

posted by lbergstr to Shopping (7 answers total)

Best answer: Try finding someone in the area on Craigslist... one of those "personal errand" people. They could possibly buy flowers at the florist, and then deliver them. But skip the roses... they'll be hard to get and/or quadruple the price. Maybe risky, though.

Or try places like plant stores instead of traditional florists... there's a place in my hood that doesn't carry cut flowers, but they do have beautiful orchids, daffodils, tulips, etc in pots. And they deliver.
posted by kimdog at 8:23 PM on February 13, 2006

I doubt any florist is going to laugh and hang up; they will gladly quote you a price and take your money.
posted by reverendX at 8:23 PM on February 13, 2006

This is what florists do. They aren't paid to deliver flowers only when they feel like it!

Relax; if you can find a florist in either area you'll probably accomplish your goal.
posted by ikkyu2 at 9:07 PM on February 13, 2006

there are some excellent greenhouses right in half moon bay, sorry but I can't think of names offhand.

I did exactly this some few years back and it turned out just fine.
posted by dorian at 9:12 PM on February 13, 2006

Best answer: Just find a person in that area and have them go buy flowers and deliver them. Shouldn't be that hard.

Worst case scenario: hire someone from a cleaning service or something, pay their hourly fee for an hour or two and have them pickup and deliver some flowers.
posted by kdern at 9:15 PM on February 13, 2006

Response by poster: thanks all. now i get to stress out about writing the message! heh...
posted by lbergstr at 11:16 PM on February 13, 2006

[ex-post facto filter]

Dorian--one of the huge operations right there in HMB is Bay City/Hana Bay flowers. I'd say lbergstr is in one of the best places in the country to have this issue.
posted by Emperor SnooKloze at 3:32 AM on February 14, 2006