We all know that when the home life suffers, the work life suffers.  So it isn’t really a stretch for a Healthcare IT Careers blogger to offer love life advice, right?  Plus, I worked in a flower shop in my early years, and I’m female – so I know a bit about these matters, too.  So without further adieu, here are 3 secrets that every man should know about sending flowers on Valentine’s Day:
 

1.       Don’t order red roses.  Red roses are the #1 choice for Valentine’s Day flowers, and it’s a lousy one.  The reason is two-fold:  One, in every (successful) flower shop across America, thousands of red roses are on order, to make the hundreds of “I’ll take a dozen red roses” deliveries.  Flower shop employees will be up all night (literally) for one to two days before, shoving red roses into unimaginative green or clear vases.  By the time the morning of VD rolls around, all creativity is lost and all they want to do is get the blankity-blank flowers on the delivery truck so they can go home.  Quality suffers.  However, given the chance to make something (anything) other than another dozen red roses order, chances are good the poor sleep-deprived florist will perk up and create a beautiful arrangement.  And two, unless your gal’s very favorite flower of all time is a red rose, you will be showing zero personalization and imagination by throwing her the standard arrangement.  Don’t do it!
 

2.       Looking for something different? Consider sending flowers in a box, rather than a vase.  Blame Hollywood, or the fact that women respond to beautiful packaging, but there is nothing more romantic than receiving flowers in a long elegant box with a big bow, rather than in a run-of-the-mill cheap vase.  If you do go this route, make sure to double-check that the florist includes water tubes or some other kind of device for keeping the flowers fresh until they are able to be arranged and placed in water.  Note:  If the object of your affections is not the “flower-arranging type” or for whatever reason does not have a stash of empty vases (if this is true shame on you, slacker), then this may not be the choice for you.

3.       Don’t have flowers delivered on Valentine’s Day – send them the day before!  Here’s why:  As stated in #1, by the time the big day rolls around, the florist shop employees are exhausted, sleep-deprived, and generally quite bitter (you would be, too, if you had just spent the last 48 hours arranging thorny objects).  Additionally, chances are very good that the inventory will still be fresh and plentiful the day before, and the frantic emergency call for more flowers from whatever source that can provide them has not yet been made.  (When this happens, the only available flowers have generally been frozen at some point, leading to the dreaded rose that never opens and just flops over).  Finally, if you’ve sent the flowers to the workplace of your lady, she’ll be able to enjoy and show them off all week before the big toss on Friday afternoon. 

So there you have it!  And one last thing – all women love receiving flowers, and if they say, “Don’t bother,” they are lying.   It doesn’t have to be an extravagant arrangement – in this case the thought really does count, because we get a terrifically out-of-proportion thrill over the fact that the delivery person is there to hand US the goods.  The ROI on this gesture can be considerable.  Trust me.