Before you order flowers, you first want to estimate how many you need. Sketch out your arrangements or your various bouquets, and get a good estimate of how many flowers you’ll need. Guessing will be easier when you are dealing with flowers like roses and carnations, which have only one bud per stem. If you’re dealing with daisies or other multiple-bud flowers, be sure that you estimate a little high. Whatever type of flower you use, though, order a few more than you need in case some of them break or bruise.

When you’re ordering, be sure that you’re going with a reputable service, since you won’t be able to actually see the flowers until you get them in. If you want, you can check around at a few third-party review sites to see which companies get good reviews for the flowers that they send.

Your flowers should be properly packaged by the shipping company. Most companies that deal in wholesale flowers will send your flowers in bud form because they’ll be less easily damaged this way. When you get the flowers, you’ll have to let them sit in water and open up for about twenty-four hours, so you want to have your flowers delivered about two days before your big event.

Although the wholesale company won’t tell you exactly how to create your flower arrangements, a good company will be able to give you ideas about how to keep the flowers fresh for as much time as possible.