What to do with CP flowers after the wedding???

drdifabio

What did you do or are planning to do with your CP flowers at the end of the night?

We are using vases from my DOC so we cant really give them away with the vase, but I would hate to just throw away all the flowers.

Are there any good ideas out there on how to give them to our guests if we have to take them out of the vase first? I was trying to think if I could get a bunch of floral bags (from somewhere)...but would that get too messy? Or collect something else to put them in?

Has anyone heard of donating them in the twin cities somewhere? A girl on my club board mentioned that there is a service in her area that will come and pick up the flowers and the end of the night and transport them to a hospital or nursing home. Do you know if we have anything like that here?

TIA!

Steph0871

I've heard of friends donating them to hospice centers or hospital patients before.  We're just doing a single gerbera daisy, so it's not worth it to keep them.  If you're doing boquets though, I'd definitely find somewhere!  Maybe your florist has ideas?

hkiesling

I've heard of people doing things like an anniversary dance and then giving one centerpieces to the couple who was married the longest.  Or maybe you could put a note on the table that says the couple that's been together the longest at the table gets to keep the flowers.  You could fold a little flowerbag up and wrap the note around it so they know to use the bag.

laura_fett

I've been wondering this myself, I haven't been to a wedding where they gave away the centerpieces, but I think it's better than wasting them! Let's see if there are any other ideas, I haven't come up with anything good yet...

shan87

I've heard of people donating them and they simply called their local hospital and asked if they would like them. I asked the hospital in St. Cloud and they actually said no which thought was odd. (Personally I think because they want ppl to buy from the gift shop- I was like well sell mine in the gift shop then LoL - No Go)
I am keeping mine until the next morning for the Gift Opening and allowing guests to take them home then. Otherwise my mother's house will smell very nice for the next week  haha

kclepire

For our low centerpieces, we got to keep the vases they were in so we took one for our house, one for my sister's, one for DH's parents, and then one of my good friends took.  For our tall centerpieces, the florist put them in the vase (her vases) in such a way we just had to lift them out at the end of the night.  We then gave those to DH's aunts who live in town. 

The low centerpieces lasted a long time...we just got back from our HM yesterday so 1.5 weeks after the wedding and it was still looking somewhat decent.

leggwilliams

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/local-wedding-boards_minnesota-minneapolis-st-paul_cp-flowers-after-wedding?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Local Wedding BoardsForum:81Discussion:67ee35d2-0601-4d50-b85a-d19c384f096cPost:b60379a7-87f6-4550-84b4-c9e12532576c">Re: What to do with CP flowers after the wedding???</a>:
[QUOTE]I've heard of people donating them and they simply called their local hospital and asked if they would like them. I asked the hospital in St. Cloud and they actually said no which thought was odd. (Personally I think because they want ppl to buy from the gift shop- I was like well sell mine in the gift shop then LoL - No Go) I am keeping mine until the next morning for the Gift Opening and allowing guests to take them home then. Otherwise my mother's house will smell very nice for the next week  haha
Posted by shan87[/QUOTE]

You should call St. Ben's Senior Community Center. FI's mom works there and I bet they'd love to take them off your hands!

wittyschaffy

We brought a bunch from my sister's wedding to Little Sisters of the Poor.  They were thrilled - but we also had vases for them.  Do you know anyone who has a zillion old flower store vases that you could somehow get to your guests?    I guess I just think that if you don't provide them some vessel for holding them, people won't hassle with it and you'll have a ton of flowers to find containers and homes for!

shan87

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/local-wedding-boards_minnesota-minneapolis-st-paul_cp-flowers-after-wedding?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Local Wedding BoardsForum:81Discussion:67ee35d2-0601-4d50-b85a-d19c384f096cPost:bc9ae4cf-ee9a-4d00-ac20-4a5e9bec9aca">Re: What to do with CP flowers after the wedding???</a>:
[QUOTE]In Response to Re: What to do with CP flowers after the wedding??? : <strong>You should call St. Ben's Senior Community Center. FI's mom works there and I bet they'd love to take them off your hands!</strong>
Posted by leggwilliams[/QUOTE]

Will do!! :)

drdifabio

I asked my DOC to see what she had to say and here is the response I got...

This is a good question and we get this a lot! 

First of all, I wish I could say that there was an organization to take the flowers to nursing homes and hospitals. I have lookined itno it before and I wish that we had one like NY., but we do not. It is actually VERY hard to get to bring in items to nursing homes I found out??? I just called a few to see. 

I would say 90% of people end up throwing flowers out I know that is so sad to see all of the money go into the garbage, but most people need to return vases and it is just how it works. I am not sure the kind sof arrangements you are doing.. but if they are just simple in the vases we can always bring baggies and rubberbands and make little To-go bouquets. We do that if the flowers work for that!

dc*prep

Yeah, our florist said the same thing about donating flowers -- it's not as easy as you'd think. What you don't always realize is that in some flower arrangements (like ours), the flowers are all stuck in that floral foam stuff, so it's not easy to just take them out of a clear vase and give them to a hospice or something. I was bummed when she told me this