Startup Story
Who doesn’t love flowers, either as gifts or in the home and office? They make us feel good, they cheer up our living and work spaces, they can help with our healing processes, and they make us feel closer to nature. In South Africa, entrepreneur Tshego Ratshidi, founder of Bleu Rose Flowers, knows the power of flowers to brighten lives and is delighting customers daily with her beautiful floral arrangements and floral gift boxes.
LoA spoke to the passion driven founder, Tshego Ratshidi, to find out more….
What does your company do?
We provide flower related services. These include flower and gift box deliveries. We also do reception as well as office flowers. We run an event side of the flower business too, which is for both corporate and private clients. We do flower consultations with the client to ensure the flowers complement their event themes and decor, and meet needs of the client. We do gifting for corporates as well.
“We do flower consultations with the client to ensure the flowers complement their event themes and decor, and meet the needs of the client.”
“I wanted to enjoy life. It all led me to start my business, especially when I saw how people yearn for happiness, and I believe flowers and plants in general allow us to feel happy and a lot less anxious.”
What inspired you to start your company?
I went through a rough time in corporate South Africa and as a coping mechanism, I would spend a lot of time in the garden and then started seeing plants and cut flowers provided a healing effect. It took me 10 years before I started my entrepreneurial journey, as I didn’t see how I could make this work, coupled with fear. As I went on my corporate journey, the whisper became a loud bang as I saw how many of us were suffering from depression. My home was my solace. I thought ‘hmmm, I'd like to have the feeling that I have at my house all the time.’ In the meantime life in corporate was not changing even after switching companies, but I had grown a thick skin to deal with it. I then got to a point that I didn’t want to go through life just surviving, I wanted to enjoy life. It all led me to start my business, especially when I saw how people yearn for happiness and I believe flowers and plants in general allow us to feel happy and a lot less anxious. Then I decided I'd like to share that feeling with others by opening a flower services business.
Why should anyone use your service or product?
Bleu Rose Flowers does not sell flowers. We sell a relationship service, using flowers. We respect that human beings do better when we have relationships with others. So the relationship between the sender and the receiver is important to us. From a corporate sending flowers to a colleague who is not well, or who lost a loved one, or is celebrating the birth of their first child or a birth because the corporate wants the employee to know they are valued; to a husband who wants his wife to know that she is still very very special to him. Our services are for everyone.
“Bleu Rose Flowers does not sell flowers. We sell a relationship service, using flowers.”
Tell us a little about your team
My name is Tshego Ratshidi and I am the founder of the business. I have over 15 years experience in the corporate world. I have a postgraduate diploma and I am a single woman who cares about women’s issues. Our florist is Tembeka Motsisi, she is a wife and mother and is new to the working world but is driven by providing for her family - she is also a cancer survivor who saw the work of flowers when she was sick. Our client service/administrator is Dikeledi Munguni, a young lady who is starting out in the world on her career journey. Nkele, as we love to call her is very client focused and is excited by being a part of a new and growing brand. She is a sister, a daughter, a friend, who is touched by the narrative of the young black woman in South Africa.
Share a little about your entrepreneurial journey. And, do you come from an entrepreneurial background?
I do not come from an entrepreneurial family, I always said I can't sell anything until I started Bleu Rose. I have been running the business as a side hustle for about 3/4 years, but I started running it full time in March 2018. I gave up a lot to start this business, including giving up a safe monthly salary. I had to rent out my house to move back home, stop my savings and start living on less than half of what I was used to. I ran the first 10 months of the business from my parents’ home. I then had to move since I couldn't operate from home anymore. I ran the first 11 months of the business alone. At the end of January 2019 I had to find an assistant. I took someone who wanted to work but knew nothing about flowers except that she loved receiving them when she was ill. I ran my first Valentine’s day a week after she joined and that was so hard. I was basically the only one arranging, etc. She was very supportive and stayed late but I was the one who did the buying, the planning, the admin, the arranging etc. I got a small business who is in the transport industry to deliver for us and they didn’t show up, so we used plan B. Then there was load shedding and it was raining- I wanted to cry but no tears were coming through. I came back to work the next day and she was there. I was shocked, but we are still on this journey together. She can now arrange flowers without supervision. I then got an administrator/client services assistant who has taken a load off my shoulders and takes care of most of the admin and communications with clients regarding orders deliveries etc. Today we are 1 year 6 months old. We have a few corporate clients, some private ones as well, and do deliveries of flowers and gift boxes nationally.
“We aspire to be as green as we can be in the future, with little 1-time-use plastic in our operations. We would like to grow some of our own flowers.”
What are your future plans and aspirations for your company?
I would like to get out of operations and do more planning. We would like to have more than one shop. We aspire to be as green as we can be in the future with little 1-time-use plastic in our operations. We would like to grow some of our own flowers. We would like to be involved with more artistic work which showcases flowers and educates people about flowers and plants and what they do for our wellbeing. We would like to be a known and trusted brand in South Africa.
What gives you the most satisfaction being an entrepreneur?
The lives we change from the person who receives our flowers, to entrepreneurs coming behind us, as well as the people we employ.
What's the biggest piece of advice you can give to other women looking to start-up?
Just do it. And we are not as horrible as society says we are.
Contact or follow Bleu Rose Flowers
WEBSITE | FACEBOOK | INSTAGRAM | PINTEREST | EMAIL tshego@bleuroseflowers.co.za
Why LoA loves it….
Flowers have always been known to create a sense of wellbeing and happiness during good times, and a sense of healing during difficult times. Someone who knows this from first-hand experience is the talented Tshego Ratshidi, a floral design entrepreneur who is creating feel-good for her customers, whether in the home or in the work place. She has found her calling in life, and her floral design company is providing her with the platform to contribute to enhancing the lives of others through her work - a real win-win. — Melanie Hawken, founder & ceo of Lionesses of Africa