Dutch flower industry girds for busy St Valentine's Day

By Thomas P Spieker Feb 6, 2007, 4:08 GMT

Naaldwijk, Netherlands - St Valentine's Day is drawing closer, and the staff at FloraHolland, one of the largest flower auctions in the world, are getting ready for their busiest time of the year.

Every year around 6 billion cut flowers pass through their hands. But February 14, the day that lovers all over the world mark by sending flowers to their loved ones, is also the most important day in the Naaldwijk calendar.

This small town between Rotterdam and The Hague is home to the largest branch of FloraHolland, the world market leader in flowers, with an annual turnover of more than 2 billion euros (2.6 billion dollars).

The noise level begins to rise in the huge halls in the early hours of the morning. Horticulturalists bring in their produce, trucks make the trip from the airport, where the flowers imported from Kenya, Israel and many other countries, have arrived overnight.

At 6 a.m. selling the flower sale starts in a reverse - or 'Dutch' - auction. The auctioneer begins with a high price, which is allowed to fall.

This is shown on a large counter much like a clock face. There is also information on the goods on offer, which are carried through the hall on automatically driven carts.

Buyers stop the auction by means of pressing a button. The first to push their button is offering the highest price and wins the auction.

The sale proceeds at great speed. 'Every day some 7,500 carts of flowers and 3,500 of pot plants change hands,' says Arnold Hordijk, FloraHolland's business director.

'On average there is a transaction every three seconds on our 10 auction clocks.'

St Valentine's Day drives the prices up, by as much as 60 per cent more than the average.

Traditionally red roses are in high demand, and their colour fills the distribution hall where the carts roll after the auction.

The activity is brisk. Electrically driven tractors pull the carts around at high speed. A control slip tells the driver precisely where to go.

'Only 0.5 per cent of the deliveries end up at the wrong place,' Hordijk says.

Within a few hours of being auctioned, the flowers are on their way to the consumer. More than a quarter of the exports go to neighbouring Germany - FloraHolland alone despatched more than 1.5 billion cut flowers and pot plants there last year.

Flower transporters also leave Naaldwijk for destinations as far away as Russia, which Hordijk describes as 'a rapidly growing market.'

FloraHolland is a cooperative combining around 4,000 individual businesses that hand over to the cooperative up to 2.5 per cent of their turnover and an amount depending on the number of auctions they are involved in.

In exchange they do not have to worry about marketing their produce.

The cooperative guarantees its members rapid payment. There is an office for conducting long-term contracts and other transactions for which an auction is not suitable.

Globalization has also had its impact here. Flower producers are increasingly finding their customers directly.

Powerful buyers are able to depress the prices, and costs have come under pressure.

For this reason, FloraHolland and its main Dutch competitor, Aalsmeer, have agreed to merge, in the expectation that their joint turnover of almost 4 billion euros will ensure they maintain their position.

The two are set to wed before St Valentine's Day comes round again.