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Not to burst your bubble, but I would rather fill you in now than to have you end up disappointed on your wedding day! We have had very bad experiences with FTD. Once, I sent a bouquet to my mom for Mother's Day....with all different types of purple flowers...her favorite color. When she got it, they were all red and yellow...definitely not what I orderd....at all! On another occasion, my FI ordered me flowers for Valentine's Day. He ordered a bouquet of gerbera daisies (my favorite), and I ended up with tulips. Both of the bouquets were really pretty, but were not at all what we had ordered. We have stopped ordering through FTD. They take liberties with substituting flowers without consulting with the person who placed the order. Not cool! Maybe other people have had better luck, but I just wanted to fill you in on my experience. Sorry! :(
I saw these also: http://www.flowers.pacificcallas.com/yelloworangecallalilyflowers.htm. They are more than FTD, but less than your florist charges. In my limited experience with FTD, the flowers were smaller and less full than pictured--mostly it was that the stems were smaller than I expected. But I did get the flowers I asked for. Just make sure that the variety of lily is specified in the description.
@MayBee - I appreciate your honest review. It sounds like they used the subsitution policy on you every time! The Substitution Policy is scary - it basically gives them carte blanche to make the arrangement as they please. Here's what I'm afraid of: "the colors shown online will be used if at all possible, even if this means substituting other kinds of flowers of equal or greater value." So this means that I could end up with any kind of orange flowers. "For one-of-a-kind flower arrangements, such as all roses or all lilies, we will make every attempt to match the flower type, but may substitute with another color" means I may end up with pink, purple or black lilies. On the other hand, the 7 day satisfaction policy only guarantees that you will receive fresh flowers that will last 7 days!
ohhh I hate to even tell you this BUT we also had a terrible experience with FTD, my fiance ordered me some flowers and they NEVER showed but made sure they charged us, and one other time he ordered what he thought to be a beautiful bouquet and when it arrived it was SO tiny!! we were very upset with them and wont use them ever again. Just be careful, maybe theres something that will say exactly what size they are?
I'm actually doing the flowers for my brothers wedding in October (FSIL wanted farao orange which is a little darker than mango) and we ordered them from WholeBlossoms.com. They also have mango and several other orange colors. You can also call and order less than what is listed. I am also considering doing this for my wedding (we'll see how it goes) and am looking at this site as well as FiftyFlowers.com which was just featured in Brides. These two sites has the best prices I could find and offer free shipping.
I am using Calla Lilies also and my florist has told me that the mini's to come in two sizes a very small one and a medium size one (which is probably the one you are going for) my florist always uses the bigger mini but I have a feeling with the online site they may send you the mini mini! I would be cautious!
However, I do go to a big box store florist and they only charge $10 a pop for a mini calla!
www.bloomsbythebox.com offers those mini calla lilies for $4.28 a stem ($42.88 per bunch of 10 stems).
http://www.bloomsbythebox.com/pub/orderflowers.cfm?categoryid=129&productid=386
I didn't order calla lilies from them, but I got all my wedding flowers from them and was REALLY pleased. (and they have free delivery!). I reviewed my experience with them on this thread:
http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/diy-flower-vendor-recommendations
I have no experience with FTD but the other reviews are a bit disturbing. Are there other reviews on FTD's site that would ease your worries, or do they all mention having a problem with substitutions? Based on the few reviews I have read here, I would be cautious ordering from them.
If you insist I would make sure you call them to tell them that you are a bride and it is imperative that you receive what you order; if they cannot fulfill it they should give you a call back (or probably you will have to call them back) a few days/week/whatever in advance and maybe you would be able to pick out something else? If you do this, you should plan on a back-up, worst case scenario plan.
Are you set on the mango/reddish-orange color or are you flexible? If not, FiftyFlowers has mini calla lillies for as low as $80 for most colors (20 stems). The color you showed above happens to be the highest priced color, unfortunately, but if you love calla lillies and are okay with a darker pink/purple/yellow/white you may want to try them?
I think it depends on the local florist. It's not like all FTD flowers come from the same place. They just contract out to local florists, I think. You could probably find out from which store your flowers would come and go look.
check out Pro Flowers.com My fiance orders flowers for me every time he's out of town and they are always pretty. The roses lasted two weeks last time!
Yeah, FTD is just, like, a florists' association that helps individual shops market their stuff. So you should ask your local florist (FTD member), if they're able to produce that specific bouquet, and if so, can they guarantee the color and the stem-count! This could work out great, if you have a nice, honest local florist (FTD member).
@sleepy - I was totally thinking I could figure out who the local florist would be and intercept the order so the stems wouldn't get cut and they wouldn't have to deliver the vase but it's just about impossible to find out who they are. In fact, somewhere on their website I was able to look up affiliates and the local shop I called was listed. I had mentioned the FTD deal to her and she seemed to think that was a crazy price and didn't mention that she filled orders for them.
In the end, I called FTD and asked the customer service rep how large the arrangement was and how many stems were in it. She then proceeded to pull up the website and make the same guesses I did. Although nice, she didn't have any additional information that couldn't be found on the website. I decided there was pretty much no chance that I was going to receive the boquet in the picture!
WholeBlossoms.com had great customer service and contacted their suppliers to see if I could purchase a smaller quantity (the minimum listed on their website is 80). They were able to go down to 50 but that was still way more than I needed.
I ended up going with 20 from flowerbud.com. After a discount code, the final price was $72! They're flame colored but it's very similar to the mango that I wanted.
Thanks to everyone for your help! I would not have found these flowers without the help of WeddingBee!
we did our own flowers and ordered them wholesale. combined the mango with white callas, sunflowers, hydrangeas and some other stuff. I loved the mango callas.
flowers.JPG (31 KB, 79 downloads) 2 years old 
@bvig
Where did you order your flowers wholesale? Your bouquet is amazing!
Thanks! I found blooms-by-the-box online and MIL was very concerned about them being shipped so I thought it was a good choice because it was located in NJ and that's where the wedding was, but then she tracked down whoever sells to them, so I'm not sure who it ended up being, but whoever sells to blooms-by-the-box.
Definitely don't use FTD. They just send your order to a local florist & you aren't guaranteed the same product.
Hi Lily Dsm-
I too am going with Mango Calla Lillies-i think they're gorgeous. Just an fyi-i told this girl at work i'm going with calla lillies and she did too-a year prior. She did let me know that she told her florist she wanted calla lillies and her florist recommended Latex Calla Lilies being that real ones bruise very easy. She brought one of her latex lillies for me to see and it looks and feels so real. She told me if she woul've got real ones by the end of the evening they would've been bruised. Hope this helps
I had white and mango callas, I made the bouquet the day before the wedding, and no bruising even though I carried it with me a lot at the reception, even the next day I could have used it.
Right before it was go time, my mom cut the stems to the right length and put some clear nail polish on the bottom to help seal in the water, maybe that helped.
We've had a couple of bad experiences with using FTD, and now we don't use them at all.
Hmm, I hadn't heard anything about callas bruising. I ended up with 19 usable flowers out of my 20. I picked them up on Thursday for my Saturday wedding and they held up in the boquet all evening. I put them back in water and they were just about perfect several days later. I would post a picture but I don't have them back yet! Like @bvig, I cut the stems shortly before the ceremony.
I used FTD to send my mom flowers for her birthday and mothers day one year, both failures. They were late for 1, paid extra so the flowers would actually get to her (weekend delivery charge). I thought maybe they were just flukes, but then it happened again when i sent them for a surgery she had the following year. So i have now been sending her flowers successfully through a local florist by her. 3 times was definately the charm for me to stop using those people.
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I have my heart set on a boquet of mango calla lilies. I've decided to DIY to save a little money but I'm not sure that I can even work the cost of the flowers in my budget. I talked to a local florist who charges $15 per mini calla lily stem so a dozen is going to set me back $180. Here's the thing, FTD offers a gift boquet of mango callas for $59.99! By my count, it looks like there are 15 stems in there and that includes the vase and delivery. Is this TOO good to be true? I'm afraid the flowers are going to be tiny or it's going to be delivered with just a few. Does anyone have experience with FTD? Can I count on receiving what the picture shows?