Closed lilies, not-so-fresh blooms, and two flower arrangements that never showed up, leaving disappointed girlfriends in their wake. Delivering the flowers a day late is better than not at all…but not when you paid extra to make sure your significant other knows that you didn’t forget to wow her on the 14th. Welcome to the third and final installment of this year’s Valentine’s Day Garden of Discontent.

Joe’s Teleflora delivery arrived just fine, but the vase was a different shape, there was more greenery than the photo showed, and the arrangement’s closed lilies didn’t create the impression he was looking for.

I had a disappointing experience with Teleflora as well. Check out the pictures below. After sending an email to support they called and gave me a 50% refund, and a coupon code for 30% off my next order, which I can deal with. But I’m still not very happy because all I wanted was to send someone a nice bouquet of flowers that looked assembled by a professional, and what she got was pretty awful compared to the website. Sure, they’re still prettier than no flowers at all and she was happy to receive them, but it looks like it’s a bouquet I threw together myself hastily and I’m no florist.

I do have to admit that I sent emails to their customer support and received a phone call promptly the next day from a support rep who was extremely nice.

My email to Teleflora:

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Hi,

I spent quite a bit of money on these flowers (about $120 after taxes, handling fees, and a small discount) and I had high hopes for them. I know Teleflora is dealing with local florists and it’s a hectic time of the year for them, so I didn’t expect them to be absolutely perfect, nor look like a mirror image of the picture. I just expected a beautiful bouquet which looked much like what I ordered. I was disappointed with what was received. None of the lilies were blooming at all. OK, I can deal with that; they will bloom this week. But it just didn’t bring the wow factor that I expected. I think some of the lilies chosen should have been blooming. Also, the picture has no filler greenery in it whatsoever. I don’t understand why the bouquet received had so much greenery filler in it. One of the reasons I chose the “Timeless Romance” bouquet was because I thought it looked so elegant and classy without the filler. What really upset me the most though was the vase. I think the vase pictured on the Teleflora website is beautiful. What was received is a vase that looks nothing like what I saw on the website, and actually looks quite cheap to me. It looks almost like a beer pitcher from my local pub, honestly. Please see the pictures below.

My order number was [redacted]. I was offered a 30% refund off the $120 I charged to my credit card, but honestly I wouldn’t have paid $85 for the flowers which were delivered, which look much more like a cheap bouquet to me than something I would have dropped over $80 on. I know that this lackluster bouquet is not indicative of Teleflora as a whole which deals with local florists to deliver its bouquets, which in turn makes it tougher to enforce quality control. I look forward to your response.

This really wasn’t Teleflora’s year. (Did they put out a Groupon or something?) Josh designed his own diptych of what he ordered versus what he got when he, too, laid down more than a hundred bucks to impress his girlfriend.

I ordered my girlfriend a bouquet of flowers from Teleflora a good 6 days in advance. I wanted to make sure they would have plenty of time. To guarantee delivery, I payed extra for Valentine’s Day. My total outage was almost $113. For that, I got nothing. I WISH they had sent the wrong arrangement, or at least an ugly version of what I ordered. Instead, my GF got nothing.

I’ve been on hold with their “customer service” for 70 minutes and counting as we speak. The first customer service agent I spoke with (after 30 minutes on hold) could not tell me anything specific about my refund. All she could tell me is that “I will make sure your concerns are handled appropriately.” Something like that. But an actual refund? She couldn’t tell me. So now I sit on hold for an additional 35 minutes…make that 37 minutes for a supervisor.

Avoid Teleflora at all costs. They are as worthless of a company as you will be able to find in this day and age.

(And no, I didn’t really need the Kleenex. My GF was very understanding.)

TJ writes:

I placed an order on the 13th to be delivered on Valentine’s Day and paid a fee of $21.99 just to ensure that the delivery would take place. Valentine’s Day comes, no delivery, no email, no phone call! I call their 24/7 customer service line to find out that they are CLOSED!

I call today [February 15th], get a rep and she seems oblivious to the fact that they ruined Valentine’s Day and just wanted to deliver the flowers today. I suggested that they upgrade my order to the deluxe flowers to take care of the $21.99 that I paid for delivery yesterday which did not take place. She refused and couldn’t only offer me 25% off a future order which is pointless as I will never order from Teleflora again!

Meanwhile, a different Josh’s ProFlowers delivery went smoothly, but the flowers weren’t looking so great the next day. He expected the company to fight when he complained about the short lifespan of the flowers he sent to his girlfriend. Nope: they sent a new, fresher shipment of roses.

I had a great experience with ProFlowers for Valentine’s Day. I ordered my girlfriend a dozen roses with chocolate and a teddy bear to surprise her at her office on Valentine’s Day. It showed up on time but the flowers began to wilt less than 24 hours after arriving.

Even though they advertise everywhere “7 day freshness guarantee”, I called customer service expecting to have to put up a little fight to get a replacement. After explaining what happened the lady was very apologetic and immediately went to work resolving the problem. Without any input from me as to what a fair compensation would be, she offered to send new flowers in an ungraded vase, plus more chocolate and another teddy bear. She also included a spa trio package as an extra way of saying sorry. The second shipment arrived the next day at no cost to me and the flowers look great. My girlfriend got a second, better Valentines’ Day gift, and I was floored by how great the service was. I will definitely order from them again.

See? It’s nice to end on an even happier ending.

That’s the end of this holiday’s Garden of Discontent. We’ll surely be back for Mother’s Day.

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