Blooming online flower delivery startup shows subscription-based model’s a sweet solution

Just two weeks after coming up with the idea behind her startup Fig and Bloom, Kellie Brown already has her first customer.

Melbourne-based Fig and Bloom is a subscription-based flower delivery service. Users can sign up for weekly, fortnightly or monthly deliveries of fresh flowers.

After becoming redundant quite suddenly, Brown found herself with time on her hands. It was one night while at a party with some friends that she came up with the idea for Fig and Bloom.

“It’s something that’s happened quite easily and really quickly. That’s why I’m a little surprised by it all myself,” she says.

“My partner and some friends were just kind of chatting about great business ideas and someone mentioned this whole new business strategy based around subscription businesses. We were throwing around ideas for what might work on a weekly basis. I know myself and a lot of my friends buy flowers weekly to enjoy them at home. And a subscription service for that doesn’t exist.”

Brown sources the flowers from her local market which are then delivered to subscribers. She used contacts in the logistics industry, made during her time working in the fashion industry, to piggy-back on other deliveries, cutting down on costs. Currently, the service is available in Sydney and Melbourne.

Here are five tools that Brown used, with the help of her technically minded partner Dan Groch, to get her startup up and running:

1. Squarespace

The site was built using Squarespace because of the platform’s powerful visual content management system. It also comes with Stripe payments integration, making it easy to set up payments, Groch says. Email marketing solution Mailchimp is also built in, making email capture and lead generation simple too.

2. Asana + 3 Asana plugin Instagantt

Cloud-based project management tool Asana was used to keep track of everything that needed to be done to launch the platform. Asana plugin Instagantt enabled the duo to monitor due dates and set clear timelines for the most important tasks.

“We focused on the highest value and most important activities and prioritised those first,” Groch says.

3. Instagram and 4. Unfollow (now Crowdfire)

In its short lifespan Fig and Bloom has gathered almost 1000 followers on Instagram. Crowdfire helps startups grow followers by finding similar companies and engaging with their followers. Copy Followers shows which users are more active and therefore more likely to follow back if they find the service interesting and genuine.

5. Iconosquare

A tool that helps users understand key metrics on their Instagram accounts. Provides insights like most liked photos, average number of likes and comments, and growth follower charts.

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