Over three days at SAF Amelia Island, conversations could move surprisingly quickly from tariffs to tattoo-inspired color palettes, from artificial intelligence to family-business succession, and from new varieties on the show floor to a question nearly every segment of our industry seems to be asking in one form or another:
What will customers value next?
That is what made this year’s Society of American Florists Convention particularly worthwhile for us at Choice Farms. The education was strong, but some of the most valuable insights emerged when what we heard from the stage began connecting with conversations happening between sessions, around tables and throughout the Supplier Expo. Together, they painted an encouraging, but increasingly nuanced, picture of floral right now.
The Numbers and the Mood Tell a More Interesting Story Together
SAF CEO Kate Penn opened the State of the Floral Industry with plenty of reasons for optimism. U.S. household floral spending reached $78.1 billion in 2025, while Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day 2026 both produced historically strong consumer participation.
Then SAF Chief Economist Dr. Charlie Hall added an important layer. Consumer sentiment has been remarkably weak, even while floral usage remains strong. His advice was essentially to pay attention to what consumers do, not only to what they say they feel.
One line particularly stuck with us: “Units are the canary in the coal mine.”
Sales dollars alone can disguise what is happening underneath. If revenue rises because prices rise while units decline, businesses need to understand whether customers are beginning to pull back.
That point echoed what we heard in conversations throughout the convention. The mood among retailers was optimistic, but not blindly so. People want to grow. They are looking for new ideas and ways to differentiate themselves. At the same time, margin, pricing and customer value are very much part of the conversation.
The opportunity, then, is not simply to offer the lowest price. It is to give customers a compelling reason to choose one product, one design or one business over another.
SAF’s Marketer of the Year award offered a tangible example of that idea in action. Arizona Flower Market was recognized for Tempe Blooms, an immersive floral event that brought flowers into the community through installations, bouquet building, education and interactive experiences, ultimately drawing nearly 100,000 attendees. What stood out was not simply the scale of the event, but the way it turned flowers from a product into an experience. It was a strong reminder that value can also come from creating reasons for people to participate, discover and connect with flowers in new ways.
As Technology Gets Smarter, the Human Hand May Matter More
One of the most fascinating parts of SAF was seeing two movements happening side by side.
Technology was everywhere. Sessions explored AI-powered buying tools, employee training, business data, traditional search and the emerging worlds of Answer Engine Optimization and Generative Engine Optimization. One SAF session even demonstrated how a florist took knowledge that had traditionally lived inside an owner’s head and turned it into a tool the broader team could use.
Yet Talmage McLaurin’s 2027 Flower Trends Forecast pointed strongly toward something much more human.
His six trends moved from expressive, hand-painted creativity to raw natural textures, vintage influence, heritage craftsmanship and deliberately imperfect design. At one point we were discussing dark botanicals, gothic influences and tattoo culture. Not long after, the conversation had shifted to restrained coastal environments, traditional textiles and the revival of older craft techniques.
The individual trends were interesting.The broader message may be even more important.
There may not be one dominant aesthetic defining what comes next.
Consumers increasingly have access to endless visual inspiration, which allows smaller aesthetics and highly personal tastes to flourish simultaneously. For floral professionals, that makes variety, color, texture and access to something unexpected increasingly valuable.
And there is an interesting parallel with AI.
The more technology can make certain parts of business faster and more standardized, the more consumers may notice the elements that still feel unmistakably human: creativity, imperfection, craftsmanship, personal taste and story.
For an industry built around a natural product transformed by human hands, that is an exciting place to be.
Change Is Becoming Part of the Job, Not an Occasional Event
Some of the most candid conversations at SAF were not really about flowers.
They were about introducing new technology to longtime employees. Developing the next generation of a family business. Training teams on new systems. Integrating companies after ownership changes. And figuring out how quickly a business can evolve without losing the people, relationships or culture that made it successful.
SAF addressed those realities directly.
Mike Lee’s Lead Through the Noise focused on leading with clarity and purpose amid constant change. Later, the Managing Ownership Transition session examined a particularly relevant issue as consolidation continues across retail, wholesale and growing operations. SAF framed the challenge not simply around completing a transaction, but around preserving employees, customer relationships, trust and continuity afterward.
One comment from that discussion captured the challenge particularly well: “Change is emotional before it’s operational.”
That extends far beyond acquisitions.
Technology changes. Leadership changes. Customer behavior changes. The way people discover businesses changes. Even the varieties and aesthetics customers ask for continually change.
What does not change as quickly is the need for trust.
Why Being in the Room Matters
For us, that may be the biggest value of SAF Convention.
As an importer, it would be easy to view our role primarily through the lens of product: what is growing, what is available and what customers are buying.
But our place in the supply chain gives us a much broader responsibility.
We need to understand what growers are developing. What wholesalers are navigating. What retailers are hearing from consumers. Where floral design is moving. How economic pressures are affecting buying decisions. And how technology and consolidation may change the way our industry operates.
SAF puts those perspectives in the same room.
We left Amelia Island optimistic, not because the floral industry is without challenges, but because there was a clear willingness to talk about them, learn from one another and keep evolving.
Consumers are still choosing flowers.
Our job as an industry is to keep giving them reasons to do so.
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