“Our mission is to connect Maine cut flower growers, florists and designers through an online marketplace and build a community of abundance to strengthen all our businesses, and to do it in ways that are mindful of our impact on our environment and our wider world,” said Sofia Oliver, the operations manager of the Maine Flower Collective (MFC).
MFC’s hub is located in Brunswick, Maine, about 30 minutes north of Portland, Maine’s largest city. The collective is organized as a multi-stakeholder cooperative. Flower growers and buyers can either be member-owners or annual users.
Member-owners pay a onetime equity investment providing them voting rights, eligibility to sit on the Board of Directors, potential profit sharing and early ordering access. Annual users pay a yearly fee to be part of the collective and have access to its services but are not entitled to the benefits of member-owners.
To become a grower, individuals must have at least one full season of wholesale floral selling experience which includes selling to florists, local stores, event designers or other wholesale outlets. They must also have had at least $2,000 of annual wholesale floral sales the previous year.
Once admitted to MFC, growers and buyers are required to subscribe to the Rooted Farmers platform, a proprietary all-in-one flower sales software and online marketplace. On this platform, growers can create listings in various categories: cut flower bunches, bulk flowers sold in buckets, bouquets, dried flowers and wreaths. Rooted Farmers allows growers to set their own pricing and choose from preset parameters for color, stem length and quantity of stems per bunch.
“Growers upload their weekly flower availability lists to the collective’s Rooted Farmers virtual marketplace each week. Buyers can log on and shop all of the collective growers’ flowers, sorting by color or variety. They can purchase flowers from multiple farms at once through one point of sale,” Oliver said.
Growers have the option to meet the collective’s van at convenient locations throughout the state (for a fee) or bring the pre-ordered flowers to the hub in Brunswick. Before being placed in the van, each order must be tagged with the grower’s identification code and placed into MFC plastic buckets. If there is space in the van, growers can bring extra products to be sold at the in-person wholesale flower market at the hub.
Since 2023, the Maine Flower Collective has made wholesaling local flowers easier for those growing and harvesting blooms. Photo courtesy of Sofia Oliver
To ensure quality and uniformity, MFC created a quality standards guide. The guide is a spreadsheet listing each flower in alphabetical order. It contains recommendations for stem length, number of stems per bunch, appropriate harvest stage and special handling considerations. If there are issues or the products don’t meet MFC standards, Oliver will contact the grower directly.
All buyers are required to have a Maine resale certificate since MFC is not open to retail sales and does not charge sales tax. Buyers can pick up their pre-orders at the hub on Wednesdays or Thursdays. On these two days, buyers also have the option to shop for extra inventory on the market floor. If an order is $200 or greater, buyers have the option to have their flowers delivered by MFC with the delivery prices varying by location.
A wholesale buyer who doesn’t want to join the collective as an annual user can shop at the in-person market on Thursdays for four hours by purchasing a Market-Only Buyer Pass for $25 a year. These buyers don’t have access to the pre-order system or any other services provided by MFC.
Growers receive 75% of the sales. MFC retains 17% for operating costs (including one full-time employee), and 8% goes to the Rooted Farmers platform and credit card fees.
Farmer Melissa Law, who grows flowers at Bumbleroot Organic Farm in Windham, Maine, helped develop MFC and also sells flowers through the collective. Although the collective is taking a percentage of each sale, she thinks it’s worth it.
“The fact that Sofia does all of the communication with buyers has been really helpful because that is not my strong suit and something I really don’t have time to do. There’s just so much back and forth communication, especially with floral designers who have very specific needs,” Law said.
Law also appreciates that MFC has given her access to buyers across the state. “We don’t have the capacity to make long drives to other parts of the state. The collective has opened up sales to a whole new batch of customers that I never would’ve interacted with,” she said.
In 2023, MFC’s first year, they sold 93,100 stems from 27 growers. In 2024, MFC sold over 150,000 stems from 39 growers. A grower survey at the end of 2024 showed that the majority of growers reported an increase in sales between 10% and 20% with 83% reporting sales increases overall.
“So, some really nice numbers to see and lots of connections being made,” Oliver said.
Growers are benefiting, as are buyers who gain access to delicate and unique Maine-grown flower varieties that aren’t conducive to commercial shipping like anemone, ranunculus, delphinium, cosmos and lisianthus.
MFC is no longer accepting grower applications for the 2025 season, but growers can follow MFC on social media or subscribe to their newsletter for information about the 2026 season. See maineflowercollective.org to learn more.
by Sonja Heyck-Merlin
