For 1-800-Flowers, Valentine’s Day is a chance to flex.

People are expected to spend $23.9 billion on the holiday this year, with 37% of consumers planning to purchase flowers.

• 1-800-Flowers will get a nice piece of that: Valentine’s Day accounts for roughly 9% of its consolidated annual revenue, the company told us. (It owns several other brands, including Harry & David and The Popcorn Factory.) Total net revenues reached $2.12 billion in its most recent fiscal year.

So, to make sure that everything comes up roses, preparation typically starts a year in advance, and CEO Chris McCann said that’s how the company stays ahead—even during a pandemic.

“We start to work with our growers early on in the cycle so that they know what our marketing plans will be,” McCann told Retail Brew. “We know what their growing capacities will be, what plants they’re doing, what colors we’re looking at.”

But that’s not to say there aren’t challenges.

Roughly 70% of the company’s supply is sourced from South America, specifically Colombia and Ecuador. And labor shortages there have increased the cost of transporting products to the US, McCann explained.

• 1-800-Flowers budgeted for ocean freight to be 3x the price of what it was last year, he said. It actually came in at 5x.

Inflation, too, has “forced us to look at pricing on a very diligent basis,” McCann said. “It’s done in a very strategic, targeted manner to make sure that we’re still giving good value to the consumer and, at the same time, offering the consumer a breadth of products and a breadth of price points.” (Flower arrangements range from under $30 to upwards of $100.)

Grow with us

But McCann brings the company’s strategy back to its growers and relationships. Communication is important, he explained, which is why the company has “dozens” of “florist-relations consultants,” who make sure product and labor supply are in line with forecasted demand.

• 1-800-Flowers has a network of 5,000 florists that provide design and same-day delivery capabilities ahead of distribution to its 125,000+ retail locations.

“We do our forecasting down to the zip-code level, so that we can tell any given shop, ‘This is what we expect—how many of arrangement A, how many of arrangement B’…during the Valentine’s Day period in each of the zip codes we cover,” McCann said.

Field day: 1-800-Flowers also relies on the 10,000+ seasonal workers it hired during the winter holidays, asking some to stay on or move from another brand or team, depending on demand.

• For example, 150–200 seasonal employees were moved from the customer care team to the flowers team this Valentine’s Day.

“As much as we can do that, it works well for the employee. And it works well for us, the employer,” McCann said.—KM

Since nobody’s ever found “model is 5’10” and wearing a size XS” genuinely helpful, retailers are investing in virtual fit tech to improve their e-comm ops. And just last week, Shopify was granted a patent for body-measuring technology.

The company wrote in the filing that the service is meant to alleviate size consistency issues. Shopify’s patented tech will collect customers’ measurement data using an app that captures images, video clips, and sensor data.

• Shopify is all in on AR. The platform already works with MySizeID, and it even acquired the team from Primer, an AR home-design app, last year.

The big Q: Are consumers ready? A June 2021 Harris Poll-Retail Brew survey shows that only 10% of shoppers have used virtual fitting room technology. Global consumer research platform Piplsay found that 41% of Americans aren’t even aware it’s an option.

The reward: If all goes according to plan, fewer returns and more consumer confidence. After all, 70% of consumers said the No. 1 reason they return items is an improper fit, a 2021 PowerReviews survey found.

“When someone is looking at a product, a certain percentage of people will always bracket: They’ll buy three, four, five sizes of the same item in the same color because they know that they want to get the one that’s going to fit them,” Richard Berwick, cofounder of the Gap-acquired virtual try-on tech company Drapr, told Retail Brew for our Virtual Fitting Room Guide.

• “If we can add confidence to that user...to the point where they are going to buy one size, we just reduced a significant number of returns.”—JG

We’ve got the perfect gifts for that special HODLer in your life. With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, we’re offering FREE expedited shipping on all Valentine’s Day orders over $75. Be sure to order by 2/8 for delivery by 2/14.

Shop now.

If it feels like every company is raising their prices, it’s because they are. Just in 2022 so far…

• Pret a Manger is upping its coffee subscription from £20/month to £25/month. And Starbucks in the US will charge more for that caffeine rush after already raising prices twice since October.
• More everyday essentials will be hit, with P&G bumping up the price of its Tide detergent and Clorox planning increases across 85% of its products, to (grab a tissue) Kimberly-Clark noting hikes are coming.
• Hershey’s says it is raising prices across “all segments,” and Cadbury and Oreo-maker Mondelez International warned of upcoming “pricing waves.”
• Oh, and that Amazon Prime membership will now cost $139 a year instead of $119.

Zoom out: Most retailers have blamed rising inflation for the hikes (no surprise there), but it doesn’t mean consumers are happy. US consumer sentiment dropped ~5% this January—the lowest since November 2011—as Americans remained wary about omicron and skyrocketing prices.

“Companies are doing a great job rebranding corporate greed as ‘inflation,’” tweeted Dan Price, CEO of credit card processing company Gravity Payments.—JS

Today’s top retail reads.

Casual business: Who works from home in pajamas anymore? Brands are now selling jumpsuits, wearable keyboards, and more to consumers who want comfort and convenience. (Fast Company)

The U.P. and coming: Unisex streetwear brand Deviate has a message for the fashion industry: “Don’t sleep on Detroit.” (The New York Times)

Keep your customers hooked: In The State of CRM 2022 report from Tinyclues, you’ll get the scoop on top challenges and opportunities for CRM marketers this year, plus key strategies to attract and deliver big for customers. Get it here.*

^{*This is sponsored advertising content.}

At the mall, it’s where band tees are the only tees. In Retail Brew, it’s where we invite readers to weigh in on a trending retail topic.

Activist investors are advocating for retail employees as some companies move to reduce paid sick leave.

While retailers have expanded sick pay during the pandemic, CVS, for example, has asked the SEC to block a shareholder proposal from Trillium Asset Management that demands permanent paid sick leave for all of its employees.

• The TJX Companies and Kroger are also facing similar proposals from investors.

It’s still very much up in the air if the investors’ proposals will succeed, but it comes at a time when retailer workers have grown increasingly frustrated.

What should happen? We want to know how you think retailers should respond to the push for increased or permanent paid sick leave. Let us know here.

Checking in: Last week, we asked if going fur-free was enough for brands that want to be more ethical. A huge majority (81.8%) said a lot more needs to be done, while 17% believe that going fur-free isn’t worth it.

Catch up on the Retail Brew stories you may have missed.

• What’s “metail”? Joel Bines will explain.
• “An underlooked and underserved market”: How one startup is making online grocery more accessible for EBT recipients
• Secure delivery lockers are huge all over the world. Why not in the US?