In the 80s, there was a huge flower Mart down in downtown LA. Along with the jewelry Mart and the garment district. As a fraternity we were able to go down there because it was so close and buy tons of flowers really cheap. I don’t remember the exact numbers, but let’s just say that back then carnations were a dollar apiece at your local florist? We would be able to go down there and buy them for a dime.
That made a difference because when we were having a party with a sorority, we would go spend a couple of hundred dollars on flowers. And the flower of our fraternity I think was the white carnation. Or white rose. But we gave carnations lol. Anyway, when girls came over to our house, we literally would have hundreds. Even a thousand flowers. And every girl got one coming in and by the time they left, they picked a few more for themselves, and several of the girls went home with little bouquets. It was a personal touch that other fraternities didn’t know about or didn’t do or didn’t care about and as we were growing and trying to establish a name for ourselves, that was a Huge point of difference between us and other houses. And the girls all talked about it and loved it.
But I wonder now if there’s no more California flower industry is there no more flower Mart in downtown LA?
In the 80s, there was a huge flower Mart down in downtown LA. Along with the jewelry Mart and the garment district. As a fraternity we were able to go down there because it was so close and buy tons of flowers really cheap. I don’t remember the exact numbers, but let’s just say that back then carnations were a dollar apiece at your local florist? We would be able to go down there and buy them for a dime.
That made a difference because when we were having a party with a sorority, we would go spend a couple of hundred dollars on flowers. And the flower of our fraternity I think was the white carnation. Or white rose. But we gave carnations lol. Anyway, when girls came over to our house, we literally would have hundreds. Even a thousand flowers. And every girl got one coming in and by the time they left, they picked a few more for themselves, and several of the girls went home with little bouquets. It was a personal touch that other fraternities didn’t know about or didn’t do or didn’t care about and as we were growing and trying to establish a name for ourselves, that was a Huge point of difference between us and other houses. And the girls all talked about it and loved it.
But I wonder now if there’s no more California flower industry is there no more flower Mart in downtown LA?
Encinitas was once the Flower Capital of the World
from carnations to poinsettias