Media Release Announcing Publication (11/1/08)

For Release 11/1/08

Editor’s Contact: Peggi Ridgway, Wordpix Solutions, 800 200-1101 -- peg@wordpix.com

Los Angeles Flower Market – American Florists' Exchange
Introduces Sending Flowers to America Book
 

Pictorial coffee table book depicts the history
and influence of Southern California flowers
upon the floriculture industry throughout America

(LOS ANGELES, Calif., November 1, 2008) The American Florists’ Exchange, Ltd. dba Los Angeles Flower Market announces the publication of a hardbound, 288-page full color, hardbound pictorial history portraying in stories and pictures the growth of the Los Angeles Flower Market and flower industry.

Sending Flowers to America: History of the Los Angeles Flower Market and the People Who Built an American Floral Industry features a chronological history of how Southern California evolved into a patchwork of flower farms and citrus groves, covering its changing landscape from 1850 to the present day. A Profiles section complements it with more than 60 stories based on interviews with descendents of the European immigrant families who formed the nucleus of the early Los Angeles flower market, who operated the flower farms, trucked their blooms nightly to the Los Angeles Flower Market, and sold and shipped flowers and supplies across the United States.

Complemented with more than 350 photos, Sending Flowers is unique in recording the contributions made specifically by European immigrants and transplants from "the states" to California's agricultural economy. Their stories and anecdotes of years gone by are told in this book, along with photos.  The book showcases the role they played in supplying flowers to florists and consumers nationally during the years before imports, when fresh flowers could only be obtained domestically and California was the state that supplied them year 'round. Crucial to the book is the role played by the Los Angeles Flower Market, the “grand central” of the Southern California flower industry since its inception in the early 1900s.

“We are very pleased to present this archival quality record of the milestones in our history,” says Johnny Mellano, manager of the Los Angeles Flower Market and a flower grower whose family story is one of those featured in the book. “These stories have been passed down to us through generations. It’s time we record them for those who follow in our footsteps and those across America who trade with California farmers and wholesalers and the Los Angeles Flower Market.”

* * *

About the American Florists’ Exchange, Ltd./Los Angeles Flower Market

The Los Angeles Flower Market of the American Florists’ Exchange, at 754 Wall Street in the Los Angeles Flower and Fashion District, was incorporated in January, 1921. Primarily a wholesale venue bringing together floral wholesalers, flower growers, shippers, distributors, floral suppliers, floral designers, event planners and retail florists, the Market is open also to the public and is part of the Los Angeles Flower District, the largest wholesale flower district in the United States. For more information, visit www.laflowerdistrict.com. For details about the Flower Market History Book Project, visit www.flowermarkethistory.com.

About the Authors

The Sending Flowers to America book project was managed and the book co-authored by Peggi Ridgway, editor of The Bloomin’ News, the newsmagazine of the Los Angeles Flower Market, and author of business books and articles. Jan Works, a Fullerton, California-based business writer, wrote most of the 66 profiles of growers, wholesalers and florists that appear in the book’s Profiles sections, while Ridgway wrote the book’s chronological history.


Book Distribution & More Information:

Flower Market History
American Florists' Exchange
754 Wall Street
Los Angeles, CA 90014
(800) 200-1101 c/o Wordpix Solutions
(888) 635-5266 Jim Mellano
Email: peg@wordpix.com - (FLOWER BOOK in subject line please)
www.FlowerMarketHistory.com

Media Materials Available at the Website:

• This news release

• Social media news release

• Author profiles

• Images - both high and low resolution downloads available

• Book contents and fact sheet

• Story angles

• More

The Los Angeles Flower Market is also commonly referred to as the Los Angeles Flower Mart, LA Flower Mart, LA Flower Market. This Los Angeles history book is significant in its portrayal of the early development of Los Angeles with an emphasis on the growth of the flower industry.