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Business Blooms at Flower Show: The Bucks County Courier Times reports on the Philadelphia Flower Show
March 6, 2006
Mary Jo Barbi and Barbara Sullivan waited two years before they were allowed to be a part of the Philadelphia Flower Show.
They said it was well worth the wait.
The Lower Makefield friends said they'll spend a lot of time in Booth 528 at the Pennsylvania Convention Center. It's their third flower show, but the 177th annual show.
Their company, Clearly Pretty, is an Internet-based business run out of Sullivan's home. They sell clear, acrylic plant stakes that they say are practically invisible when put next to plants. The stakes are used to prop up large plants.
Over the next 10 days, Barbi and Sullivan hope to sell enough of their product to pay for the booth. But even more important, they say, are the customers they're certain to get after the show.
"This is our marketing," Barbi said Saturday, the first day of the show. "We have a Web site, but people still need to find us. This show is the best show in the U.S. for gardeners and for our product."
Clearly Pretty is just one of more than 140 businesses from around the world showcasing their flowers, gardening tools, furniture, jewelry and gifts in the Flower Show Marketplace.
Vendors came from as nearby as Willow Grove, New Hope, Bensalem, Quakertown and Warrington, and from as far away as Florida, Arizona, Wisconsin, Vermont, Maine and Washington state.
"Philadelphia supports this show like no other trade show in the country," said Dana Lyons of Lyons Ltd. in Palo Alto, Calif. "We see so many different types of people."
Lyons Ltd. sells prints of antique paintings and has a large clientele on the East Coast, Dana Lyons said. The company, started by her mother-in-law, Leila, in 1968, has been exhibiting at the flower show for 10 years.
"It's a great show for us," Dana Lyons said. "Philadelphia is one of our biggest clientele bases. This show has to be one of the major reasons for that."
Getting into the flower show as a vendor isn't an easy task, exhibitors and flower show officials say. There's a waiting list. Companies must have established themselves in the industry before they'll even be considered for a booth. Then they have to shell out hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars for their space during the 10-day event.
Vendors, however, said it's money well spent.
"We get leads, we show our stuff off," said Brian Paul, who owns BenchSmith, a company in Warrington that makes teakwood furniture. "Any advertising we do helps out somewhere down the line."
-Crissa Shoemaker Debree
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