Florist nurtures 'Can do' attitude

Sparks Florist on Wednesday expects to give away about 35,000 roses in its ninth annual Good Neighbor Day, and the number is filled with meaning for the company.

By coincidence, the company's revenues were that same number $35,000 in 1960, its first year in business.

Yes, that's the gross rather than the net.

And owner Tony Fiannaca had a partner at the time.

"Even back then, that wasn't very much," Fiannaca recalled the other day.

That was a long time ago.

Among some 25,000 FTD florists around the world, Sparks Florist last year ranked 22nd in order volume.

It's the largest florist in the state.

Surveys find that more than 80 percent of Truckee Meadows residents say "Sparks Florist" when they're asked to name a florist.

The company's 48 employees run two thriving retail locations one in

Sparks, one in the Meadowood area of south Reno along with a 10,000-square-foot design center in Sparks.

Pretty good? Not good enough, say Fiannaca and Suzanne Shepherd, director of internal operations.

They're on an unceasing campaign to improve customer service, and they're now in the 10th year of a program they call "Can Do." The message to the company's employees and management team is simple, Shepherd said: "No matter what, you can do it." Fiannaca and Shepherd recognize that mere slogans, however, don't do the job.

They invest heavily in regular sessions with a consultant who is provided an appraisal of employees' strengths and weaknesses in customer service before the consultant arrives.

He teaches customerservice skills, then follows up with calls from a "mystery shopper" to provide more feedback to employees.

The company has invested, too, in technology.

Place an on-line order with Sparks Florist, and you'll get an e-mail letting you know the status of the order.Wondering if a dozen roses will arrive before your hot date tonight? Drivers from Sparks Florist update delivery status in real time.

The investment in technology goes deeper.

The company, for instance, relies on software to map out delivery routes for its drivers.

That replaces a time-consuming task of hand-mapping a route.

More important, Fiannaca said, it frees time to be devoted to the care of customers.

Here's the kind of care they get: A customer walks in with an arrangement and says the flowers are wilting.

A Sparks Florist employee replaces the arrangement even thought it was purchased from a competitor.

This week's Good Neighbor Day reflects the same spirit.

By 6 a.m.

or so on Wednesday, folks will be lining up outside the Sparks Florist locations to receive a free dozen roses.

The only caveat: Recipients need to give away 11 of the roses during the day.

The program, which is co-sponsored by U.S.

Bank and local governments, has grown from distribution of 10,000 roses in its first year to this year's 35,000.

"This allows people to reach out to someone," said Fiannaca.

"It's a little easier when you have something to give."

To be sure, the company gains invaluable exposure from the program, but Fiannaca said the greater value is creation of a stronger community.

"We're serious in believing in the value of a good neighbor," Fiannaca said.

"We low-key the commercial side."

The continued emphasis on improving customer service comes as Sparks Florist, along with other traditional floral shops, increasingly feels competitive pressure from grocers and mass merchandisers.

Fiannaca doesn't begrudge the entry of the big boys a decade ago into the business dominated by small shopkeepers.

"They did us a favor," he said.

"The mass merchandisers have created an awareness in the marketplace that we never could do."

The big competitors also caused Sparks Florist to redouble its focus on customer service.

The way Fiannaca sees things, customers will stop by the grocery store for a small bouquet when they want to brighten a room.When they're serious about quality and service an arrangement for a friend's special occasion, for instance they'll turn to a specialty florist.

And that, in turns, matches the way that Fiannaca wants to run his business.

Back in the early 1960s, when Sparks Florist barely survived for five long years, the store's owners did anything they could to stay afloat.

They gathered manzanita branches and shipped them East to meet the needs of a decorating craze at the time.

Another craze came along and Spark Florist made a few dollars gathering and selling the ming moss that's used in bonsai arrangements.

But even while he was scraping to stay in business, Fiannaca said, "We had a passion and a commitment that we were going to be the best flower shop in the area, if not the nation." As the Truckee Meadows began booming, so did Sparks Florist.

Through the 1990s, the company regularly posted annual growth rates of 10 percent or more.

The two retail shops got so busy that the company in early 1997 launched its design center in Sparks, a centralized facility that handles all the floral design and deliveries for the company.

And it, too, is plenty busy.

On Valentines Day, Sparks Florist will handle 1,200 deliveries.

(Some longtime customers, who remember when Fiannaca himself was the company's prize-winning floral designer, still call to offer their compliments to Tony after they receive an arrangement for Sparks Florist.) Next up for the company is remodeling of the Sparks location in coming months.

Although he still comes to work often, the 70-year-old Fiannaca is turning over the reins of the company to his son, Michael, the company's vice president; his daughter, Lori Ramirez, who works in the company's business office; and Shepherd.

"We're a team," he said.

"We do it together.

The team enjoys the rewards of making it together."

Despite the generational change, Shepherd said the focus on unrelenting improvement isn't going to disappear.

"How can we do it better?" she asked.

"That's the question that's on the table."