#039 Building a Successful Wedding Business: Interview with Maria of Dereves Floral + Wedding Design

Building a Successful Wedding Planning Business with Maria from Dereves

In this podcast episode, host Melissa interviews Maria, the founder of Dereves, a full-service wedding planning and floral design company based in Toronto, Canada. 

They discuss Maria's journey from studying landscape architecture to founding her business, the importance of SEO and blogging, and the evolution of her services to include full event design and planning. 

Maria emphasizes the value of genuine relationships, resilience, and adaptability in business. She also talks about future goals, including destination weddings and community building, while sharing practical advice for other small business owners on sustainability and resource management.

00:00 Introduction and Guest Overview

01:21 Maria's Journey into Floral Design

03:15 Building a Business Foundation

05:47 Adapting and Growing Through Challenges

18:46 Expanding Services and Future Plans

25:00 The Importance of SEO and Blogging

27:20 Marketing Strategies and Relationships

29:18 Building Genuine Relationships in Business

30:11 The Importance of Offering Value

30:57 Navigating Client Interactions and Expectations

32:35 The Role of Social Media in Modern Business

35:12 Finding and Attracting Your Ideal Client

37:31 Learning from Mentors and Industry Peers

39:11 The Power of Sharing Knowledge

41:28 Managing Wedding Logistics and Expanding Horizons

47:57 Sustainability in the Floral Industry

54:27 Final Thoughts and Future Goals

Maria, Dereves Instagram + Website

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Transcript

Welcome back to the podcast. I'm your host, Melissa. And today we have a fantastic episode lined up for you. I had the pleasure of speaking with Maria, the founder of DeRevs, a full service wedding planning and floral design company based in Toronto, Canada. Today we'll dive into some key marketing insights that can help you grow your business, whether you're in the wedding industry or any other creative fields.

Maria came on my radar when I did an SEO search for wedding vendors for a podcast episode I was doing about wedding creatives that get it right, that not only build a solid foundation for a business, but also check all the marketing boxes, knowing who their ideal client is, what their messages and how that resonates with their ideal client.

She checks so many boxes so well that I felt she would be a great guest so that those of you starting your creative business. Or trying to grow a business could benefit from how she built hers. So let's get started. Welcome Maria.

Thank you so much, Maria, for being here. I'm so excited to have you. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome. And I guess the best place to start is please introduce yourself. Let us know who you are, what you do. And thank you again for being here. Thank you so much for having us, Melissa. I appreciate it. Um, I'm Maria. I run a full service wedding planning and floral design, uh, company.

So we started flowers in 2016, 2017, and we extended into full event design and now planning in 2025. So it's, it's fresh. That's new 2025. I mean, we're doing it a little bit last year, but now we're full planning. So it's, it's exciting. It goes hand in hand, not to digress, but what inspired you in the beginning?

Like, can you catch us up to where you are? Like, how are we sitting here now? And you're talking about all of this and where did it all start? Absolutely. I'll, I'll keep it to the point, but we started with flowers in 2016, 2017. Um, it began, I mean, I'll go way back. Um, I started with environmental degree in school and I wanted to do landscape architecture.

I, you know, I was really set on it. So I was supplementing my degree with a college diploma. And. Across from the classroom in this landscape design classroom at Humber was the floral and design classroom. And that's what captured my attention. And I was, I was just enthralled. I was like, Oh, my God, anything I can do to get into this.

This is what I want. This is so much fun. And I just, I had just graduated university. I was working in mortgages. I wasn't, I didn't really have a career. I was just floating around. So it caught my heart. And I guess it's in the same, um, Kind of, um, you know, I'd say in the same realm, we're working with plant materials, there's design, right?

So we went from landscape architecture to shifting focus a little bit into floral. Um, long story short, I promise I'll keep it short. No, no, I love it. I find this is fascinating. I love how people come to their, this moment. Like you said, your heart, your heart felt it. So I love that. Keep going. I'm on the edge of my seat.

Thank you. And we weren't, um, thinking of weddings yet. And when I say we, is I met my, uh, Ava's dad. So foreshadowing, I met my husband at the time and he owned a marketing company. And he was like, let me help you. Like, let's, let's put a website together. I'll help you with your sales. And he was just a brilliant, brilliant man.

Like he put together. Um, our websites and help me with like Excel sheets and the sales funnel and processing and everything I kind of needed to know starting off because he had owned multiple companies. So he helped me, um, with a foundation, which I love to talk about because I think without a solid foundation, it's really hard to grow a business.

So I'm glad you brought that up. Yeah, it's, it, it really, I mean, I didn't go to business school, so I didn't have any background or training in business. I never even thought about. Yeah. Uh, what it would take to open my own business. I was just doing it out of the love of, you know, the love of flowers. I didn't really have a plan.

I wasn't going to do, you know, just weddings. I was just happy to create at the time. So, um, that's kind of how that that's the, the path in. So, so jumping back in a little bit. So that is like a really like brief. So you got started, you find this thing that you absolutely love. Across the hall in college, your heart knows that this is the direction you want to head in.

You start, your, your husband helps you set up this. Foundation for this business. And then what, what's the next step? Well, where are we then? Exactly. Now we're like right around COVID time. I was doing it for fun. It was honestly, it was just, I loved it. I started doing weddings. Um, and not necessarily back then it was really easy to put, you know, like 5 towards Facebook ads and you had leads the morning, the next morning.

So. It was so easy to get out there now. I mean, we're all struggling with showing up and SEO and content and what we're doing in order to get those leads and help the, the clients and couples see, you know, what we. Uh, and trust like interest confidence and you know, it's it's a very different different game.

So back then it was really easy to um to get into weddings because we just got leads, you know, you posted a photo and you're on instagram and Um, it just happens and I was doing it again. It was more of a easy hobby I mean, I had the brand the name stayed the same over the years um You know, fast forward to 2022, something like that, 2021, I, something happens.

I, you know, I came face to face with the reality that I was getting separated. So foreshadowing once again, it was time to do something. I looked at my life and I thought, Hey, this is something I'm doing for fun. You know, I'm not all in and what would it look like if I, you know, as a single mom, you know, were to do that and my husband over time, I mean, we're still, you know, we have a great relationship and he reminds me like you had no identity as a mom.

And I think a lot of women struggle with this. A lot of any, any new moms to begin with. I mean, I was young. A lot of my friends weren't married yet. They didn't have kids. They didn't have businesses. I mean, we're all just out of university was very. Um, it's kind of like sprung upon us and it was all, you know, very new to me and I didn't really have a direction, a path to go on.

I looked at myself, I looked at myself and I thought, I have to do something. I have to make a decision and no, nobody's going to save me. I have to do this for myself, for my daughter, my, my career, my path. And I invested my time and I started from the ground up, like just completely, I was Um, overtaking the whole business in a, like almost in a different direction.

Like I needed to see what worked, what didn't work. And I needed to make updates quickly. And I needed to make them now, like I needed to post blogs and, you know, put up the store, things like that. So I made a new website. Um, Squarespace, a little bit different than the WordPress than they had built me with the marketing agency, um, years ago.

So now it all looks different. We were offering more services. Uh, we even had a store at a point like an online store and we're doing deliveries now. So it's transitioned a lot, but it's a lot of also figuring out works, figuring out what doesn't, um, making quick changes and being able to adapt a lot of adapting and resilience, um, that it took to get here.

I think resilience is one of the words that I think small business owners like us cannot keep going in a business like this without resilience, or not for the long term anyway. Both people quit, that's right. Yeah, you have to show up every day. But so bring me back just a little bit because you, you say, you know, you found that passion and you're saying it's more of a hobby.

But then how did you, how did you really take that leap? Oh, it's a lot. Okay. So I feel like I was doing this before I learned about it years later, but it must have been a really like a pivotal time when I, it was just when I decided and I looked at my life and I, and I thought nobody's going to save me.

I didn't have a backup plan. So this was the burn the boats analogy was a book written. Yes. Yes. That's it. That's it. Yeah. And it just said, you know, you can't have a backup plan. And this is why a lot of people who have nine to fives and they're trying to grow like a side career, a side gig. This is why they fail because they know that there's a backup plan because the safety net, right?

So you're not, you're one foot in one foot out. It's not, it's not a full commitment. Um, but I, I had those pressures and I didn't really have a choice, but to wake up and to do it. So I didn't really. Have another choice and it's the same with, um, starting a business, you know, from scratch, or even now when, you know, we're faced with all these uncertainties in our industry.

I mean, Canada on our end, um, there's a lot of like the, the tariffs that are about to be imposed that we think and all these things, right? Like, and everybody's so worried, but it's just showing up the same way that you had in the beginning. Like, I'm going back to square one. I'm doing introductions with venues.

I'm working on the SEO. I'm doing blog posts like never before. I'm showing up, you know, my face. I'm, I'm adapting to what the consumer needs to see, right? Which is like a face and to express and to share and to, Build a community. So it's, and to have people fall in love with you and, and to, to understand what you do.

And that brings me to, well, a, exactly how I found you. And B, did you mention something about almost envisioning how your business is going to be or how you had to show up in your business to get it? Exactly. So showing up the way like envisioning, it's almost, you know, what people call manifesting shirt, right?

Whatever. From the beginning, showing up as if you're. Um, already there, you know, things like, okay, you know, you are a team actually, because you are hiring freelancers. So it is we, it is an entity, you know, not making yourself look small in front of people showing up from the beginning in the way that you want to be seen.

So doing a lot of that from the beginning, you know, and carrying it out consistently throughout. Uh, even years later, just having the same focusing on a brand image as well and finding your message, the, the issue that you're trying to solve in the industry, things like that, finding out what the world needs and how you need to convey yourself to, to, to fit in and to, and to, you know, bring your brand out there and bring your and serve people in the way that, you know, for what they need.

Yeah, exactly. And so how you came on my radar is I was doing, I don't even remember. I think this is podcast number say 39 or something like that. This may have been 18. I don't remember. I'm going to look it up exactly the episode. But I just did a quick Google search before I started the podcast. I want to find people that have really done their SEO well, and they, they're showing up and they have a clear message and, and just everything you did on your website would be, if someone told you what to do for SEO, it's like, check, check, check, but in such a great way.

And clearly it's working for you, but it was just something that I feel it's a great. Demonstration of how, when you do things right and you, um, and I think you just kind of cover that, like where you put yourself out there, you talk about what it is you do. And there's no, there's no gray area. People understand this is exactly what you do.

And because sometimes whether it's floral or wet, you know, wedding photographers, people try to be everything to everyone. And then that means like really nobody understands like who you're for and there's that confusion. And I think when, when you land on your website, A, people are finding it because you've done a great job, but B, when they do find it, they can, they, they understand what you're there for.

And I think that's really important. Yeah. No, thank you so much. I didn't mean to cut over you either. Oh, no, no, no. And I think that's just something I really want people to understand that when you do things right. And then, like you said, this is your second website. So you've adapted it, you've changed, you've evolved as a business.

So now you're just, Changing along with it, right? It's like what your needs are today exact adapting, but also having that clear image. And I guess I did have, you know, a little bit of, I'd say training because Jordan, it was that my husband, he did own this marketing company. So I got to see a lot of the back end, a lot of what they did.

So it was, you know, it wasn't like new knowledge for me had grown up with this, just being with him and seeing this and how much effort goes into the SEO and finding your brand and your voice, finding your voice and having a consistent, a clear message that you're. Conveying throughout, for example, we do really big on sustainability.

So having that message pulled through socials to your website, making sure little silly things like from design, everything is cohesive throughout your Instagram is the same as your website and all of your material, your resources that you're sharing with clients, everything is consistent. Another word for a small business owners like us is integrity.

Like really, literally doing what you say you're going to do. So if you're talking about sustainability over here, you're not, you know, then I don't know, whatever the opposite of that would be demonstrating that. So when you're true to your message, no matter where you are, who you're talking to, what socialists are looking at, it's a consistent brand message.

And that, that definitely helps you stand out from. The, the pack of others that I'm sure you're, I'm sure you're in Toronto. I mean, you have to have a stack of competitors. It's obviously a testament to, you know, your, your knowledge and then putting it into practice and, and living it up to it every single day, but where did imposter syndrome sink, you know, sneak in anywhere when you were doing this?

Like, how did you, cause you can do all the things that you said, but was there a point where you're like, Hmm, am I ready for this? Is this, Melissa, I didn't have time. I almost didn't. I love it. Sitting around. That gets to you. It's now when we're faced with challenges later into the years, you know, when you've, when you've seen what it's looked like, what the industry looked like before and what it's looking like now.

Um, now it's very evident, but it's. It's the same message that I had, um, you know, back then and now you have to do it. You have to get up and do it. Uh, nobody else is going to do it for you. So there's no waiting for the right time. Oh, I'm going to wait until, you know, like tomorrow to post this, I'm just going to write a list.

I'm going to plan. You have to just, you have to put it out there. It's a, it's like anything, a creative thoughts. It exists until somebody else does it before you, you just have to get it out there and you have to action. Um, and, and try because you're, you're never going to know otherwise as silly as it is.

Yeah, I think that when you, when you, um, are as focused, like you're describing focused and resilient, that it's amazing what can happen when those, those 2 forces come together when you want something bad enough. I get maybe it's another way of saying it. Yes, exactly. Exactly. This is something. That I wish I had figured out before to not to say, you know, it was all part of the learning journey.

And I'm so glad that, you know, took the time that I needed to take. But if I had just figured this out before, uh, would I say, and it would save a lot of women, a lot of time, right? Just sitting and pondering. Hey, I could start this business. Oh, you know, but I have 2 small children. Oh, but I don't know if I could put all this time into it.

But you are, you are the creator. You can decide how much time you want to put into it. If you want to put 90 percent of your free time into it. Go ahead. Let's do it. The other beauty of owning your own business, right? You get to pick and choose your hours generally. So even though they can be long, um, so anyway, right now, like what is something that see the trajectory looks like it's been pretty good for you and looking at everything on your website, it looks fantastic.

And your, your business looks outstanding. What is something that if you could think of something that you didn't see that you didn't see coming or, or some sort of obstacle. That was in your way or or is in your way now, maybe to the next level. Especially with floral, I feel like there are a lot of moving parts.

Um, planning you have more, can I say like a bird's eye view of everything, but being the thick of it with the studio, um, is, is challenging. And it sounds like we've had to do installations on like 24 foot ceilings and like where I had to source my own scaffolding team, like had to call a painter and be like, Hey, could you hang this up?

Like little small things like that. You have to know where to look and nobody's there to tell you that's, that is the hard part. There is nobody there to help you unless you reach out and you ask. But I think that, you know, if we can do our part and Help people and spread a message and create a community.

I mean, that would have 100 percent of helped me back then. But, um, in challenges every day, there's something new thrown at you. Like every day there's a, a vendor you didn't see coming or some, or, you know, like a new, for example, I ran into like insurance. Now everybody has to have insurance floral under a mandatory.

Uh, category for insurance in Canada, like little things like that, that you find out as you go and again, adapt. Exactly. And again, it's that again, the same word resilience, but of all the vendors that I work with and the wedding industry, Flora seemed to be the most. Resilient resourceful of any that they, they, oh my God, if a bride's wedding dress or zipper falls apart, I've had the, you know, the floral designer come in with some sort of like jacks of all trades.

Like, when you said you need to find a call a painter, it's like, you guys just figure things out. Like, you have so many obstacles thrown at you that. We're just there to document it. You're there to create it. And it just seems sometimes the mountains are pretty high that it seems like you have to climb to get your job executed.

I've had to learn how to use a drill. Let's just get at it too, because you have to. Yeah, that's good. You're building things like you're doing it probably started. You love the idea of flowers. And now, like you said, you're you've you've now you're fine. Exactly. So anyway, that trajectory. So, okay, just again, I keep having us go back a few steps, but so you start with flowers and then obviously people probably ask you for more things.

And then how does everything else get added in and to where you are now? Like, what? Give us an overview of what you were talking about in the beginning of what you're doing now in 2025. It's so exciting, um, to talk about it because, so we've noticed the gaps in the industry or, you know, um, challenges that couples bring forward.

So part of a big part of my consultation process. Is learning, you know, like, what are your challenges? Like, what are you dealing with right now? How is planning going? I always ask this question. I don't know why, but this is kind of how it brings out. So good. Wow. Unbelievable. Sorry to interrupt. Keep going.

It really, I think that's what started everything because I genuinely wanted to know. I just, I, I genuinely, I didn't, again, I didn't plan on, you know, doing full event design and all of that, but there are just so many gaps in couples in the industry, finding vendors who do everything under one umbrella as being one of them.

So when companies are able to provide, like, Video photo booth planning, amazing. Like any couple would love to take that. Yeah, the less, the less, the less, like it seems like couples are overwhelmed with choice. And I think when you make it, when you make it a little bit easier for them, I'm sure they're greatly appreciate that.

Exactly. It's, uh, it's the killer of all things choice. So it's the same on the, on the design, uh, aspect. So if you are having to match your flowers now with your linen and your furniture and everything, it's just, it's, it's confusing and overwhelming, right? You want one person, your designer to be able to bring forward a cohesive vision and you don't know where to start.

You don't know who to. Message you to email, you know, you have, you can look it up on Google and find furniture, then you got to give them color specs. And it's just so much easier to do it under one person. So that's why we've expanded that way. Um, and then planning is just a personal favorite of mine. To be honest, I didn't love it at the beginning, but I realized I was bringing together so many vendors that I was like, Oh, I'm really good at this.

Like, okay. And I really like, You know what? That's great. You discover new strengths you didn't even know you had. That's fantastic. And something I could tell my younger self, so, um, find something that you, I think it's a Japanese proverb. Oh, ikigai, right? Is that? Yes. Yes, I love that. Oh, please explain it though, because sometimes I forget the true definition, but it's, it's um.

Absolutely fact check me, but it's um, finding something you're good at, finding what the world needs, and something you love, and then something you get paid for. So it's like the circles coming together and I think the, you know, the overlap that is, yeah, it's, it's the conjunction of all those points and that should bring you joy and fulfillment in life.

And is that how you feel like when you're working every week? Or is that, I love that. I love it. I still love it. And I think it's because I've been able to look at something and be like, this is not working. Like our online shop. It's not working. We're going to shut it down. That's, that's enough of that.

You know, just changing course, adjusting the sales full Proverbs today, but yeah, no, that's good because I think a lot of people think of what is it called? Like the sunk cost fallacy or something where you think you've invested time in creating this online. Um, you know, floral, I forget how you exactly describe it, but this online business and to scrap it, that's very courageous versus some people would double down and put more time when they know that it's not exactly the right fit for your business.

So again, another example of why your business is moving forward is because you take quick action and you recognize, you know, what's not working and keep moving. So that's, I hope everyone's listening closely because you're, you're just like a perfect example of like how a business should be operating. I will divulge anything.

This is the whole part of, you know, bringing a community together and offering because it's not easy to come by and I, it wasn't always offered to me. So I, that's the least I can do. Yeah. I agree. Sometimes, like you said, you have to figure so much out on your own. It's nice. If those have already been there, they can just lend, which is sort of the point of me doing this podcast because.

We've been doing this for 25 years. So if we can't shed some light on photography, obviously we've been in the wedding industry just as long. So it's nice to see that everyone kind of, I don't want to say suffers, but everyone has gone through that and it never ends no matter how old, how many years you've been doing something, there's always something new to learn.

And if people share. It's just, there's enough for everybody, you know, it's just a matter of carving out your niche and, and, um, you know, how you want to approach it. You mentioned your younger self a minute ago. So what do you wish your, your younger self knew that you now know, but I think you touched on this, but if you want to elaborate, if not.

It's, you know, you could throw things at somebody who's 18 and say, find what you love and find what makes money and find what you could say that to them, but they might not know where to start. Um, I think something that would have helped me altogether is knowing, um, that there are going to be challenges and it's how I behave during these challenges that really.

That set me ahead or they set me back. So, you know, establishing routines working on yourself, right? Um, finding patterns. Hey, you know, when the seasons turn and it's very slow for weddings, you know, I noticed that, you know, there's more time for you to sit around and ponder. Why am I doing this? Like, negative self talk, you know, like figuring out What triggers you during what time and how to combat it.

So, you know, routines again, uh, waking up, uh, working out, eating, but you know, think silly things that you think are silly, but they actually make a huge difference in the long term and then not planning, but planning. But preparing, so when things are slow, go and, you know, add more blogs, work on your websites, um, perfect your sales process, uh, look at your funnel, you know, organize, uh, make some, you know, update your resources, your booklets that you give clients, meet with venues.

So these are all things that I wish I had figured out a little bit earlier. And so, Started, started doing so it, you know, moments of heaviness didn't weigh so, so hard on me. Yeah. So talk about that a little bit more. The important, I know some people think blogging is dead and I would argue with that because I think it's the number one driver of business, especially to our photography business that even something I wrote 10 years ago or something, well, I saw this, you know, blah, blah, blah.

Cause I don't, I do go back and kind of weed through and get rid of things that aren't appropriate or whatever. I mean, that don't matter anymore. But there's some things like certain venues or, or certain things that, that live on. I mean, they really still bring people in. And I think the fact that you're talking about that, I think blogging is so important.

And I don't think people recognize how important SEO in general. I don't think not every wedding vendor understands the importance. Um, but blogging specifically has such a place, I think. I think. Yeah. Oh my gosh. So much to say about this. Blogging is not dead. Um, and Jordan, my ex husband who runs this marketing company, this was like, he would die on this hill.

He's like, you're not, you're not writing enough blogs. You should put out like three, four a week, even more. And I was like, this is not going to make a difference. Leave me alone. But it does. And I started doing it and it makes a huge difference because now you're indexing on Google for all these keywords that you put in your blog.

I mean, it's a no brainer. I even started doing landing pages for like Toronto best florist, or I started taking venues in Toronto and making landing pages on our website for like weddings at Casa Loma in Toronto. And now when people look up Casa Loma weddings, guess who pops up? These are all. You do.

It's so loud. Sustainable. That's how you found me. It was a blog. Sustainable floristry. It was like, if you look up sustainable florist anywhere in the world, we pop up. We're like number 2 or something because of a blog. That's all that was. That's all that was. Thank you. That is so important for everybody listening to hear that because.

A blogging's not dead, but be the power of it. And especially if you're picking, like you just said, a long tail keyword or a keyword that that's going to rank, especially now where sustainable obviously seems to be, uh, very prevalent in the industry, that it's very important. So a lot of people are typing in those words and good for you that you were out ahead of that.

And that's why you're popping up for the world to see. So that's fantastic. It's a battle, but you know, you have to do it. You have to, it's all the pieces, right? I mean, this is just one. So obviously we're talking about blogging. We're talking about SEO. You mentioned vendor relationships. So if you, I don't want to put you on the spot, but if you could rank like, okay, um, SEO is number three for driving traffic to me or meeting vendor referrals or client referrals, like what would you say is your number one marketing tool, right?

Um, top three. Yeah, I've had to look into this because I, because again, this is a very slow time in Canada because people don't get married in the winter as much. I've had to look at our market. I want to see marketing strategy. You got to figure out what your marketing strategy is as a business owner.

It's okay if you don't work with an actual marketing team, like sit down and figure it out. Um, we get a lot of leads from Google. So, uh, perfecting our SEO, it was like number one. Um, then it's social media. So a lot of leads from social media, but believe it or not, it is much easier to close. I mean, I mean, this is a no brainer when I think about it.

It's much easier to close a lead. Who comes from a trusted source, like a trustworthy source, like another venue or, you know, a past bride, they've already kind of made the decision that they're coming with you. They're like, oh, this person already, they were singing your praises and I'm calling you too. So you can put a quote together, but I kind of know what to expect because I've already heard about you.

So, you know, um, I feel like. There should be a lot of time invested into relationships, um, genuine relationships, social, social proof, but, um, yeah, it's also being genuine. You're being, uh, integrity, like having, yes, yes. Working with integrity. Yeah, integrity, but also establishing relationships. So that same integrity, like, honest, truthful, and like, loving relationships.

Like, if there's somebody you really love working with, reach out to them, keep in touch, you know, um, The same with venues. I've had to email venues that I've really loved working at or, you know, I've had a lot of experience working. Um, at, and, you know, I'm going for lunch with somebody next week and they're going to, you know, things like that.

It's important, um, because to your point, it has to be genuine. And I think so many people, or at least I talked right over you. So I'm sorry about that. But at least amongst the wedding vendors that I've worked with over the years, there's a lot that do this in a self serving kind of way. And of course, the end result that you're having lunch with that person, because of course you want to work at that, that.

Venue more often, but you're not going there with that. That's not the sole intention. You actually want to build a relationship and this isn't one sided. This is reciprocal because you might refer them. They're going to refer you. And I think that you're approaching it from, uh, like you said, to build a genuine relationship when they're like, well, you know, I'm only doing this so that they'll.

Send people my way. And I think that's extremely important. And people don't recognize that. And that shows up for years, you know, that they know you're a real, like a real quality person, not just it's your, it's who you are as a person too. But I also, I found that actually this is mentioned a lot in sales books that when you ask somebody for a favor, you also have to offer them something first, you know, it's not just, Hey, do me this favor.

Thing it do me the, you know, please make all this effort for me and yeah, and stand over clients while you're at it, you know, so it's not like that you have to, Hey, we'd love to feature you as well. Or, you know, you have to have something that you're also bringing to the table or showing up with something to offer as well.

You can't just ask people to do you favors, right? So it's not, Hey, could you, could you do me the solid and you send some clients my way? Yes, sure. I mean, they must like your work, but also it's personality and As well, what you can offer people in return to not, not that it's transactional, but you're not just, you're not just asking to take something, right?

You're maybe something as easy as like, hey, we're going to make your process a little bit easier. I'm going to give you like a book with pictures from your venue that you can show clients so they can imagine these tables covered in flowers and candles, like, you know, maybe you have like some printed material that feature that venue and like.

You know, and and then if your client asks any questions, here's the process on the back. So you can, because couples show up and they want to know things. They were like, okay, how does this work? How much do you cover? Um, and a florist does what? And like, how will this look? And people have questions, right?

So, like, let me make this process easier for you or. Uh, let me, here's a link to the page that I featured on your venue, right? Just ways that you can help each other. Not that it's supposed to be transactional, but ways to help each other grow. Exactly. And they don't have to cost anything either. Just like you said, if I write a blog post about my favorite.

Flores, for example, and that's just to say thank you for doing such a great job at a wedding that I worked like, Oh, my goodness, you need to work with that. It cost me nothing, but my time. And I think some people think that marketing has to come with these big dollar signs next to it. And really, I think it's a lot of, of course, it's a lot of work, but it doesn't have to come with a high price tag.

It just so there's, I don't want to say there's no excuses, but everything you're talking about here are things that. You know, everyone could be doing, but a lot of people aren't doing them. They stay quiet and they wonder why business isn't coming their way. And they're not trying to interact with the community around them.

Some people would love to help, right? You just have to interact. You have to show enthusiasm and genuine, genuine connection. You just have to get out there. Yeah, I think, I mean, it's easy to say that, but I really, I really think goes a long way. So here we are 2025. We're doing event design planning and of course the flowers, of course, an integral part.

So what is fundamentally changed from, from the beginning? Like say when you were, I think you mentioned to me that you worked at a, at a florist, right. For, in the very beginning when you, when you. Recognize that this was a passion for you. So here you are there and now here you are here and you've spoken about a lot of things, but as if there's, is there one thing that stands out to you that has, that has changed or that has evolved?

Evolved. I would say our platform. The social media in general, it's a huge integral part of any business and even like personal, right? If I had worked at that flower store now, I wish that I took some videos. Well, I didn't, I didn't think of that. So imagine showing that before and after 2025, we document everything.

Like I take videos of my coffee. I probably would have making a spiral bouquet for the first time and imagine the Storytelling that could come from that, but it's it's social media and it's just documenting everything that people want to see. They want to see who the faces behind a business have the businesses run.

Um, what it looks like behind all of it, they want to see they want to have a personal connection. There are creators. We don't even talk about their business. They're on tick tock and people just follow them for the pure enjoyment of, you know, Hearing this person talk, but they know they run this business on the side.

Like there are just so many different ways to see this and so many different ways that people connect. Yeah, exactly. And that's true too, because I think a lot of personality types might say, Oh my God, I don't want to be on Tik TOK. I'm not funny. I can't dance. I can't do it. But there's people who are demonstrating something or showing something that is absolutely within their wheelhouse of what they're comfortable with.

So you don't have to be doing something outlandish. You can do something true to your personality. Or I always felt that you kind of don't mean to talk so much about me, but some of what we do is being, I hate to say an act, an actor, but not, not in some, some terrible way, if you're a shy person or an introvert.

Pretend that it's a role like you're playing the role of vendor and you need to be out there talking to people and and being on your socials and doing the things to to market your business very helpful yeah i get camera shy sometimes i wish you told me in the beginning that would have been great but that is a great advice i think i think we're.

Nailing it, but that is some great advice that just play the role play. Yeah, whatever it needs, whatever you need to do to help you get out there. But it's also finding your this is important. I think finding your ideal client and everything that you say, because, for example, and that's big for everything.

Like. You know, finding your brand voice and image and the message you're trying to convey, but like finding your ideal client because people on, you know, tick tock, making tick tocks and not talking about their business. Yeah, but they're talking to their ideal clients. So they're, for example, there's this influencer who owns a bikini line and she, she never, I mean, rarely she'll show what they're making.

But sometimes she'll just talk about things that. A girl, her age could relate to, you know, talk about boys and she's just attracting and it's a very simple example. She's attracting her ideal clients. That's all it is. And we have to do the same within our industry. I'm trying to figure that out. So. To the outside person looking in, it seems like you're, you're doing it.

And I think that, of course, I'm enjoying talking to you. I probably should have had a more linear line with this conversation, but having an ideal client or knowing who your ideal client is, is it's like right at the top of the list. And then there's so many, you know, obviously a one, one, a one B one C, but knowing who you're talking to, like, if not, then you're talking to no one, if you're trying to talk to everybody.

So when did you know that that was important? How soon in your, in your. Trajectory. Did you recognize that as soon as I started looking at this as a viable business, I sat down and I took everything that I learned over the years and marketing and sales. I was just reading books. I was just, you know, absorbing information, but the top of that list was finding your ideal client.

And then it was like finding, you know, a problem and finding the solution, like things like that. But the top one is like, who are you attracting? Um, you know, and it could be different for everyone. So it could be brides who love classic timeless weddings, or there are some florists that do a really colorful weddings.

And so they attract like the pop fun, like splash of pink and like bright, bold, you know, we're not really like that. So finding your, and it comes with finding your style, but also who you're speaking to. Like, are you, are you trying to book a lot of business and you're saying, Hey, I'm an affordable florist, or are you luxury and you're.

You know, you're positioning yourself that way, just things like that to keep in mind. Yeah, that's a good point. Excellent point. So what was the most influential resource for you in your career so far? It was other florists and looking at what they were doing. So a big, I think, like a pivotal part in anyone's life is like who your mentor is.

And it's supposed to like, take you, you know, um, mentorship is very important if you can find that right person. And I'm still searching. So it's, it doesn't have to be a one person. You could take inspirational from a multitude of sources. It could be writers. It could be people, you know, not in your industry at all, or, but for me, I was looking up to, it was some florists that I loved in the industry.

And I was just taking inspiration and looking at what they were doing and how they were talking and positioning themselves and like what they were making, like what. You know, our style evolved over time because of Pinterest. But also it was me who's like, look at how I really love this, like Ikebana style.

I just have, I really love Japanese style. I, I just loved it. I don't know why I was looking at the Korean, um, florists as well. So just grabbing inspiration from a multitude of sources. But I really, I wish that people were a bit more open about their process and. You know, you know, less gatekeeping, less gatekeeping because we're all going through the same struggles.

And people have come to me and been like, Hey, Maria, like, do you know how to do this? Like a flower show? Hey, do you know how to put flowers and make us make a skirt of flowers? I'm like, yeah, this is how I did it. But I mean, nobody showed me. It's not like people volunteer this information, but I really feel like we should be more open about it because.

We're all struggling. We're all looking for ways to do things. And I agree with you a thousand percent. And actually other people that we've worked with over the years, as far as other photographers specifically, and we've always been an open book because we always said there's a million people getting married.

There's a million people that need flowers and need wedding photographers. And There's really enough to go around. I think it's when people have that scarcity mindset, and they feel that they can't share because someone else is going to take something of theirs. And that's really not true at all. I feel like the more that we gave over the years, the more we got back.

And I think, and I don't mean doing, you know, a million free shoots or whatever. I mean, literally gave information. Told people like what we did to get to where we were and some people passed us right on by too. And that's fantastic to see, you know, someone 10 years younger, just get, you know, get their business off the ground and take it, taking advice like you're talking about from different sources and channeling that into a business that works for themselves.

I think if everyone shared, but all just rise faster and like, instead of keeping things close to the vest and it just never made sense to me. Yeah, Melissa, you're, you're completely right about the scarcity mindset. And it just, some people just operate that way, but you, you just have to put on your blinders and keep going and be open and, and just share.

I want to say that people have left a long lasting, um, impressions on me when they have done that, when they have shared their secrets or, you know, or just offered help, right. And. That's the one thing in the floral industry. There's a lot of labor involved. There's, there's a lot of actual, you know, it's laborious, like lifting of buckets and hanging things up.

And, and then there's right ways of doing a hanging installation. And then there's much harder ways. And if you had just known, you The easier, you know, the right way with the, with the rigging and the like. It would've saved you time, effort, pain. We're all, we're working, we're putting our, uh, blood, sweat, and tears into something, so that could be done much easier.

Then why not help? Yeah, exactly. So those of you that are newer to any industry, , just recognize the importance of sharing information because. We're all going to be in the position where we need help. And I think it's just very, I don't know, powerful or just helpful or whatever the right adjective is to just help each other, just good community.

And I think that you'll find a lot of people who do, and then you'll find, you know, the group that doesn't. And unfortunately, so what does your year look like? So we do anywhere between 30 to 40 weddings on a slower year and now going upwards, aiming for 40 to 50. Um, That's again dependent on how the year is going minimums if they're within Toronto, things like that.

We've had some very successful years, like we were featured in People's Toronto Life, things like that. So that's really helped the trajectory of the business kind of take off. Um, it can, it can get really busy. Like we can do like two weddings a day if they're within the city of Toronto, because we can dispatch more than one team and, or we can have the same team, like hit several spots, but when they're outside of, um, the Toronto, the greater Toronto area, that's when we have to be a little bit more careful with minimums and things like that, because your team is like.

Out there till like the afternoon, you know, with travel time coming back. So your whole day is booked. So it depends on, um, depends on, uh, location a lot, but I'm also aiming for destination weddings in the coming years. So, so, you know, that's a whole week then that you're off in somewhere, somewhere else.

Yeah, sounds fun. Anytime we've had to shoot them. I loved it, but I can imagine from the, again, we just show up. So it's not, we're not the ones planning. So for us, like, wow, look at this, where did this magic happen? Like on an Island somewhere. And you're the one who has to make that magic happen. So that, that's, that's, uh, that's crazy when it's a destination wedding, but I'm sure the strategizing and the challenge, it's a lot of fun.

So I'm sure it'll work out. You, you, you put it out there. It seems everything you put out there, it seems to happen. Thank you. Thank you. But it's so, but if it wouldn't happen, if you didn't put it out there, right. And I think people don't recognize that if you don't start talking about what you want, the chance of it happening is like zero.

So start talking. Festing, right? Even though manifesting is an overused word, it's what you're doing. If you don't talk about it, if you don't have a financial goal or a number of weddings goal, very hard to happen. If you don't, if you don't start putting it out there. It's not capping yourself on, you know, maybe you'll do 30 weddings, but you're, you'll be more profitable than a 50 wedding year.

Right. Just not limiting yourself and having this, you know, stay within that boundary. Maybe it's destination weddings, but, you know, maybe it's somewhere you never thought of. Like, we're doing a destination wedding in Canada, like Nova Scotia on the east of beautiful. I mean, I would have never thought of that.

It's an island. I like, I am incredibly grateful. I get to, I would have never thought of that. That that is a destination wedding. You still have to fly in all these vendors. And so, yeah, exactly. That isn't going to have its challenges if you're on an island. So I imagine. Which is not yourself and and not limiting in your SEO and your wording and you're just in your mindset, not limiting yourself to a certain, you know, ideal vision because it could be so much more and I think that's how a business grows.

Right? I mean, if you don't have these, these ideas and these. Challenges like to give yourself to get to that next level. So you're talking about when I say self educate you, it sounds like you read a lot of books that you read books about business, probably self help, philosophy, things like that. How has that helped your business?

Do you think? I wish I had more time. I definitely put a lot of time into it when I started. So there's. There's just, there's so many resources out there, like this podcast to, um, like the community that you're building there. It doesn't have to be books that could be even, you know, instead of doing scrolling on Instagram, you know, look up business accounts or.

It follow accounts that bring value to your life. So it doesn't have to be read a book anymore. It doesn't have to be like that. That was a very old school way of doing it. Like I have a whole library of like how to get to the yes. Like, you know, those books that were, you know, the sales books of back in the day.

You can, you can find that anywhere and just have to find the right platform that you enjoy, uh, consuming. Like I like to listen to podcasts while I'm cooking dinner and I can learn a whole, a lot more than sitting and reading a book that might, I don't have that precious time, maybe that particular day, but there's always time to listen to podcasts.

I don't listen to books, but I'm sure that's a great option as well. So speaking of the future, like where do you see yourself? I mean, it sounds like you're off with obviously a huge trajectory for 2025. Where do you see yourself in like, say five years, if that's too much to ask. No, thank you. Thank you for your interest.

I, I hope again, I hope that, you know, I'm not limiting myself by choosing something. It could be flowers, but, um, it could be continuing on with the studio if it makes sense, but it looks like most of our, my efforts specifically.

So kind of making that shift a little bit into like destination weddings, because it's hard to fly in a florist. If you're doing a wedding in Paris, for example, you're, you're probably going to want to choose the vendors, their, um, local, like local town, local people, local product, local, everything sustainability.

So I think the way that my, um, my goals are aligning and my own values, it's probably going to be towards that. Planning. Yeah. Okay. So what, what's coming up in, let's say in the next few months, like, what is something you're excited about? Is there a particular wedding or like a planning component, something big?

You know what? It's exactly what we're doing right now. So it's, um, showing up. More with, you know, ourselves and sharing with the community. Um, I'm just seeing, I'm seeing a lot of struggle in that field, especially on our end. So it's something that I want to kind of add more value to are forming a community, helping other florists, helping, uh, moms and young women kind of find their niche or whether it's floristry or, um, Um, I would say I'm an expert in flowers, so I'm going to keep it there.

Not, you know, not the, not all the vendors. So this podcast is an incredible resource. I think for people to tap into where experts in different fields can come and speak like confidently on what they're, uh, what they're succeeding in. And. I plan on doing a little bit more of that. So I want to share like our flower calculator that we use that have perfected me.

Please talk. Would you mind talking a little bit more? Love to. Okay. So there's a lot of waste in the industry and I know we mentioned sustainability quite a few times. It is very challenging, especially when you're dealing with people's weddings, right? So they don't really care. I mean, some wonderful couples do care, but overall, if it's your wedding day, Does it really matter where it comes from?

This is your one day to shine. If you want that rose, you should get that rose. I am with you. I completely, I wholeheartedly agree. So it's hard to be sustainable 99 percent of the time, especially with floral, especially knowing that most of these flowers are imported. They come from Ecuador and Colombia.

Carbon footprint. Um, it's, it's horrible. If you think about it, if you really like track like the entire journey of like a box of flowers to get here in front of you at a studio, it's anyway, um, it's heartbreaking. So I'm trying to do as much as I can to, um, to be sustainable and to also to meet the requirements of.

These beautiful brides weddings, right? So I want them to look how they want it to look, but I also I'm trying to do things on the back end that I know that we could do better, like floral foam, even though the biodegradable one is more expensive, things like that to try to kind of offset the. Import the cost of importing, which is a cardboard print.

So a lot of that has to do with how much you're ordering small things like that. That make a huge difference. Like if you're bringing in, um, you know, a 5, 000 roses and you only use 4, 000, that's about that's waste, right? So anything from actual ways to waste flowers, things like that. And not to mention that you're wasting money.

So that's your, that's your margin, but that's also environmentally destructive. Yeah. So, um, that being said, it's helped me a lot, having a way to calculate flower counts for weddings. So I type it into this Excel sheet, um, and it spits out exactly how many boxes you're ordering and how many stems would be left over if you were to order this much.

So it looks at your flower recipe for everything from centerpieces to bouquets, adds it all up together and says, Hey, this is your order. And guess what? If you put five roses in every centerpiece, you're going to have 20 left over. Yeah. It's genius. And I don't know how other flowers do this. I think they just count it out.

There is one software that's online, but I don't think a lot of people have it. Um, you know, at their fingertips in an Excel sheet, able to modify it and put in, you know, this is the cost of a rose. This is the Cost of a ranunculus, you're not able to like, maybe change things around however they want to change the, the fields of the, of the sheet.

So I just find it. I think it's genius and we've been using it. Your bottom line must be. Yeah, thanking you for having this and like you said, less waste, which helps the environment, but also helps your bottom line as well as theirs. You're passing, I'm sure, savings onto the, the, the couples too, by being a good, a good order, you know, being steward of your inventory.

If you're only ordering, uh, like, okay, let's say roses come in bunches of 25. If you're using only 10 of those roses, The other 15, theoretically, the cost of those centerpieces should be relative to how many you're ordering. So the price of stem theoretically goes up. Price per stem goes up. And I don't think a lot of florists take this in consideration.

If you're only using half, that price is going to double because that's waste. If you're a wedding florist, it's waste. If you have a shop and you're able to sell the remaining roses, sure, no problem. But if you are predominantly a wedding florist and you operate per weekend, you have like one wedding a weekend.

Those flowers are going to the garbage. That's a tragedy already. I'm sure this just, it must make, does it make you sad when you bring the, the arrangements? This is just a personal question, but it's the end of an event and you have all these stuff coming back into your truck or van. Like, yeah. And then what happens?

Like, well, why didn't you just give them away? Like, this is, this is garbage. We've had, actually we had a bride who had attached the charm to her bridal bouquet and it was like her grandmother's charm from when she had. It was a keepsake and she lost the bouquet. So she just threw it out at the end. I don't know something, but we, we took the garbage because we have to do tear it out.

So we're like looking through bags and bags of garbage. At least we had it at the studio and I found it for you did find. Oh my God. What a wow. What an above and beyond service must have been so grateful. She was, I sent her the whole bouquet the next day. I'm like, why did you take, but I'm crying. It was going to the garbage.

Oh my God. Thank goodness. Thank you. Yeah. Another one of those examples of going above and beyond for your clients. That's something she's not soon going to forget. And she'll tell all her friends how wonderful. Yeah. If you did, it's incredible. It did. Sure. Yeah. It went somewhere. I'm so glad. Yeah. Um, more, some more online resources for the community, being able to share more with other florists, um, not and not putting people out.

So, like, I see all these, like, flower courses and it's 1 thing to teach and I understand, but to share resources and it's like an arm and a leg. I mean, how, how is anybody ever going to get ahead? Right? Like, these outrageous prices and, uh, it's, it's stressful. So trying to do that, but in like, a more, um, like, a liberal way, you know, it's.

Creating community and yeah, so more focused on that and the weddings that are, that are ahead again, that Nova Scotia wedding. That's exciting. It's a summer wedding, but they say like that, I asked this question. I guess I asked this question to every guest and I'm going to read it sort of. So, I mean, as we've said a few times here, we're focused on demonstrating to other industry professionals.

That, you know, with this podcast that you can have a successful business, that you can build a long term sustainable business. And when I say sustainable, I mean it in a different way, sustainable for the long term that you're putting, you've laid a foundation, you're building on it and your business is, is growing and it's evolving.

And that's what I mean. I think that's powerful for other people to see, because I think there's a lot of people who feel that they're stuck or can't grow. You know, break free of whatever, whatever is holding them back. Can you give our listeners one piece of advice that helped you get from where you started to where you are now?

And I know we may have covered this, but one final, one final, just in case, being consistent and adjusting the stails if something isn't working. So like you said, what was that mindset that you mentioned, you know, people put too much effort. And they feel like they can't let go of something because they've invested so much.

Yeah. Like, Oh yeah. I think it's sunk cost fallacy. Like the more you put into something, you can't pull away from it because you've put time or money into it. Yeah. So, so not falling a victim to that and, and the negative self talk and all of that, the imposter syndrome and. And waiting, there's a lot of advice, right?

That I would give, but a lot of it, a lot of it is knowing. And actually I got this piece of advice from somebody who was much more experienced than me, but it was looking at, uh, looking at it from a least emotional standpoint, the least emotional standpoint that you can. And from a business standpoint, it's working or not pull out.

And then when you get older and, you know, more experienced, I think you'll be able to assess something before you even do it, right? So is this going to be profitable? Is this going to be worth my time? It's going to be a no, you know, not being the no person, but knowing when to say no sometimes. Yeah. Great advice.

Excellent. Is that good? Yeah. Yeah. That's excellent. That's great. That's really good. So, again, thank you so much for being here over time. Where can you tell people where to find you? Please go ahead. Yeah. We're online. Our website is the reef studio. com, but all our socials are at the Reeves co. So very simple, the Reeves code D E R E V E S.

co. So that's it. We'll be on Instagram a little bit more and sharing more throughout the year. Um, and I'm working on tech talk and it's getting there, but slowly. That's my goal too. Well, we'll TikTok following. I wanted to ask you where your name came from. How did you decide on your name? Oh, it's it came.

It was actually it's funny because it was French as flowers. Yeah, it goes. It really, um, goes hand in hand with, uh, you being in Paris, but it was supposed to be flowers of dreams of duh. And then I've have of dreams. So we combined it to make it an English name because people felt bad for butchering it.

So, but yeah, that's what it was. So that was just perfect. Thank you. Sorry, I didn't mean to talk over you, but I've been meaning to ask you that. So thank you so much for the, um, for the answer. Thank you so much for being here. It was so much fun and you're inspiring, truly inspiring. I know a lot of people are going to find huge inspiration from everything you said, and I so appreciate you being here.

Thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me. Appreciate it, Melissa. Thank you. And I'll put all the links in the show notes and link to all your stuff. And anyway, thank you so, so much. Thank you so much for joining us today. I hope you found these marketing insights from Maria as inspiring as I did.

If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate, and share it with others who might benefit. Until next time, keep striving for success in your business.