Industry overview
What is shaping floral
Flowers are bought for occasions, gifting and decoration, through florists, gifting platforms and street vendors. Freshness and delivery reliability are everything.
- Gifting occasions drive demand peaks
- Online gifting platforms are growing
- Growers need better access to markets
Client background
An online flower and gifting platform, working in India & UAE. Client identity is withheld to protect confidentiality.
- Organisation
- An online flower and gifting platform
- Sector
- Floral
- Team engaged
- Market Research
- Services
- Consumer panel, Quantitative research, Performance marketing
Client challenge
The platform’s sales spiked around Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day and festivals, then fell sharply for the rest of the year. Marketing spend was concentrated on a few peak weeks when advertising costs were highest. The company wanted to find everyday occasions that could smooth demand.
Research objectives
- Deliver on the brief: understanding why and when people send flowers online.
- Understand the views, needs and behaviour of gift senders.
- Produce results that can be compared across groups and locations.
- Give the client evidence it can act on within 7 weeks.
Target audience
The work focused on 2,200 gift senders.
- gift senders2,200
Audiences we typically reach in floral
Gift buyersFloristsFlower growersEvent plannersCorporate gifting buyers
Geographic coverage
Coverage: India & UAE. Markets: India and United Arab Emirates.
- India
- United Arab Emirates
Research methodology
A structured quantitative design, so results could be compared across groups, locations and time.
- 1Brief
- 2Gifting occasions survey
- 3Order data analysis
- 4Insight
We surveyed people who had sent gifts in the past year, asking about occasions, recipients, budgets, delivery expectations and what made them choose flowers over other gifts. In the UAE, the sample included both nationals and expatriates sending gifts to family abroad. Results were combined with the platform’s order data to see which occasions were under-served.
Consumer panelQuantitative researchPerformance marketing
Sampling strategy
- gift senders
- 2,200
- Online respondents were drawn from verified panel members who matched the screening criteria, with quotas on key profile attributes.
Data collection
- The online survey was mobile-friendly and offered in respondents' languages.
Data quality & validation
- Digital fingerprinting and duplicate checks
- Attention, speed and straight-lining checks
- Review of open-ended answers
- Logic and range checks on the final data
- Work carried out under our ISO 20252 quality procedures
Data analysis
- Cross-tabulation by key groups and locations
- Significance testing on the differences that mattered
Key findings
- Birthdays, work anniversaries, get-well wishes and gifts to family in other cities were frequent but rarely targeted.
- Expatriates in the UAE often sent gifts home to India for birthdays.
The steadiest demand came from everyday occasions that marketing had ignored.
Recommendations
- Build on the core insight: the steadiest demand came from everyday occasions that marketing had ignored.
- Focus effort where the evidence was strongest: birthdays, work anniversaries, get-well wishes and gifts to family in other cities were frequent but rarely targeted.
- Re-measure after the changes to confirm the effect.
Business impact
- The platform introduced reminder services, corporate gifting and cross-border delivery bundles, and shifted part of its budget to year-round campaigns.
What changed in the business as a result of the work. Impact is described qualitatively.
Deliverables & next steps
- Insight report and management presentation
- Cleaned data file and data tables
- Repeat the measure after changes are in place to track progress.
- A natural follow-on question: how reliable is delivery?
Client identity is withheld to protect confidentiality.