Key Takeaways
- The Bouqs is an online flower startup that was rejected by Shark Tank investors in 2014.
- Since then, the startup has expanded to over $100 million in annual revenue.
- The Bouqs’ primary growth strategies are a flexible subscription engine and a selective shift into brick-and-mortar stores.
When The Bouqs Company walked off Shark Tank without a deal in 2014, the online flower startup looked like another reality TV disappointment. Instead, the business quietly kept building, ultimately crossing $100 million in annual revenue last year by reinventing how flowers are sourced, sold and subscribed to.
The Bouqs story starts long before the company appeared on Shark Tank. Co‑founders John Tabis and Juan Pablo “JP” Montúfar met at Notre Dame, connecting around a shared frustration with the traditional floral industry. The two founded The Bouqs in 2012 and designed the company to ship bouquets directly from farms to customers’ doors. The choice cut out middlemen and pushed against legacy models, where orders bounce from website to wholesalers to local florists.
“Selling flowers online is not a brand-new concept, but the challenge with some of the other players in this space has always been that they are more of a wire service, so you can order on the site, but they don’t know what the inventory is of any local florist at any time,” The Bouqs CEO Kim Tobman explains in a new interview with Entrepreneur. “So what you order online might not be what you get from the local florist.”
The Bouqs set out to address that concern and make sure that what you order is what you get. If a customer loves lilies, that’s what shows up. If they want orange roses, that’s what they get.
By the time Tabis appeared on Shark Tank in 2014, The Bouqs had already logged $700,000 in sales in its first year. The Sharks balked at his ask of $285,000 for 3% and questioned everything from margins to the name. Every Shark passed, and Tabis left without a deal.
The exposure was ultimately good for the brand — and one Shark, Robert Herjavec, later invested in the company after recognizing its value. Herjavec reached out to The Bouqs to do his wedding flowers in 2016 and later made an undisclosed investment in the company based on his positive experience. A year later, Mark Cuban called The Bouqs the one deal he regretted not making. By 2019, The Bouqs had secured $55 million in funding and expanded to 80 employees. Today, the company has scaled to over $100 million in revenue.
Subscription model
Tobman, 44, became the company’s CEO in September 2022, and says that one of its primary growth tactics is its subscription service. About 40% of the company’s revenue now comes from its subscription offering, which the brand deliberately designed around real customer behavior. “Subscription has been a huge part of our growth journey,” Tobman says.
Tobman described two core audiences: Customers who want to gift a subscription to flowers starting on occasions like Mother’s Day or Valentine’s Day, and “power gifters” who send flowers constantly to different recipients for birthdays, promotions and life events. To serve both audiences, The Bouqs has made its subscription flexible. Subscribers can change the delivery date each month, they can change the recipient monthly and they can choose the specific bouquet each time.
Subscriptions are priced at $48, $59 and $74 per month, with each price point corresponding to one bunch, two bunches and three bunches of flowers, respectively. The prices include year-round free shipping and do not increase over the life of the plan, allowing heavy flower buyers to lock in value while The Bouqs gains predictable, recurring revenue.
The floral calendar is otherwise spiky: Valentine’s Day is the company’s Super Bowl. Orders surge in a compressed window, and flowers must land exactly on the promised day. “We don’t get credit when it’s early, and we definitely don’t get credit when it’s late,” Tobman says.
The Bouqs uses that pressure as a growth moment. Marketing encourages customers to start with a holiday gift, then extend it into a monthly subscription, so someone who discovers The Bouqs in early February may still be receiving and sending bouquets in November. Tobman says the subscription service has grown “exponentially” over the past few years, becoming a central driver of the company’s overall performance.
Brick-and-mortar stores
The next phase of The Bouqs’ growth is happening offline. In the past two years, the company has opened five brick-and-mortar stores, including locations in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Orange County, San Diego County and New York. The Bouqs has also begun rolling out in-store flower shops with Whole Foods Market. The goal is not just to have the brand more visible to shoppers, but also offer same-day delivery in those areas.
Early tests show that the standalone stores have reached profitability within their first year, which “is pretty unheard of in retail,” Tobman says.
“That’s number one,” she says. “Can we make sure that this pays for itself? The answer is yes.”
The stores also allow The Bouqs to capture demand and service more markets. “People do like to shop in person, that’s clear,” Tobman explains. “It’s a great brand-building opportunity that is also really important for us.”
Advice for CEOs
Tobman’s advice for CEOs is to lead with transparency and authenticity. She says it is easy to be an inspiring leader when things are going well, but that is not how business works.
“A business doesn’t grow without hitting bumps in the road,” Tobman says. “And so as the CEO, I always try to make sure that I balance transparency with optimism and enthusiasm for what we do.”
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Key Takeaways
- The Bouqs is an online flower startup that was rejected by Shark Tank investors in 2014.
- Since then, the startup has expanded to over $100 million in annual revenue.
- The Bouqs’ primary growth strategies are a flexible subscription engine and a selective shift into brick-and-mortar stores.
When The Bouqs Company walked off Shark Tank without a deal in 2014, the online flower startup looked like another reality TV disappointment. Instead, the business quietly kept building, ultimately crossing $100 million in annual revenue last year by reinventing how flowers are sourced, sold and subscribed to.
The Bouqs story starts long before the company appeared on Shark Tank. Co‑founders John Tabis and Juan Pablo “JP” Montúfar met at Notre Dame, connecting around a shared frustration with the traditional floral industry. The two founded The Bouqs in 2012 and designed the company to ship bouquets directly from farms to customers’ doors. The choice cut out middlemen and pushed against legacy models, where orders bounce from website to wholesalers to local florists.
