Flower markup: how much to add and how to price in waste

Flower markup in retail is usually higher than on most goods, because part of the cut flowers never reach a sale. As a rough guide, shops sell cut flowers at two to three times the wholesale price and potted plants at 1.5 to 2 times. Your own figure starts from your waste rather than from a competitor's price tag: with 15% of purchases binned, "double the cost" earns you about 70% on top, not 100%.

How much flower markup is typical in a shop

There is no single "correct" figure. A kiosk at a railway station pays more per square metre than a neighbourhood shop, and a studio working to order hardly bins anything and can live with a lower percentage. So the ranges below are a rough guide for a retail florist in a large city, autumn 2026. Shelf prices tend to be higher in Amsterdam, Paris or London.

Cut flowers sold for less than twice their cost almost always lose money: after waste, rent and wages nothing is left. If the shop down the road sells roses at close to cost, it is most likely clearing stems that will be in the bin tomorrow, or using one item as a price hook to bring people in.

Three numbers tell you what your flower markup should be: your waste share, your monthly costs, and the turnover your location can realistically make. How they fit into a model of the whole business is covered in our article on the flower business.

Markup vs margin: formulas and an example

The two get confused all the time, and that confusion makes a shop think it earns twice as much as it does.

• Markup = (selling price − purchase price) ÷ purchase price × 100%. Calculated on cost.
• Margin = (selling price − purchase price) ÷ selling price × 100%. Calculated on the selling price.

Say a 60 cm rose cost you €1.00 and you sell it for €2.50 net of VAT. The difference is €1.50. On cost that is 1.50 ÷ 1.00 = 150%. On the selling price it is 1.50 ÷ 2.50 = 60%. Same rose, same €1.50, two different percentages.

To convert without a calculator, keep this table to hand:

The conversion formulas, with percentages written as decimals (100% = 1): margin = M ÷ (1 + M), where M is the markup; and back again, M = margin ÷ (1 − margin). Margin can never reach 100%; markup can be any size.

Profitability is usually discussed in margin, while the price tag is set from cost. When a supplier, an accountant or a partner quotes you a percentage, ask straight away what it was calculated on.

Flower markup and VAT

In Europe the price a consumer sees includes VAT, so a markup calculated on the shelf price is overstated. Take VAT off first, then compare with your purchase price, net of VAT if you are VAT-registered and reclaim it on purchases.

The Netherlands applies its reduced 9% rate to flowers and plants, and Germany its reduced 7% rate to cut flowers and plants. In other countries, check your national rate with your accountant or the tax authority. The rate can also differ between the flowers themselves and add-ons sold with a bouquet, such as vases or chocolates, so ask how mixed orders should be treated.

How to price waste into your flower markup

Take the example used throughout this blog. On Friday you bought €4,000 of flowers. By Tuesday €600 of them had opened and gone in the bin: 15% of purchases. You sold flowers that cost you €3,400.

If you sell everything at exactly twice cost, turnover is €6,800 against €4,000 spent. The real markup is 70%, not 100%. Thirty percentage points went in the bin.

The multiplier you need: (1 + target markup) ÷ (1 − waste share). With a 100% target and 15% waste: 2 ÷ 0.85 ≈ 2.35, which means 135% on what actually sells. At 25% waste you would need ×2.67.

The lesson is simple. Cutting waste from 15% to 10% often pays better than raising prices: customers do not notice it, and profit grows. How to break losses down by product and cause is covered in our article on flower waste.

Bouquet cost price: what goes into it

A bouquet is not one item but a set: several kinds of flowers, greenery, wrapping, ribbon, sometimes a card or a box. Its cost price is the purchase cost of all of that, and it pays to mark the parts up differently.

A practical scheme: flowers and greenery at your cut-flower multiplier, with waste already built in; wrapping at its own multiplier; the florist's labour as a fixed amount. Then a complex designer bouquet that takes half an hour does not cost the same as a bunch of nine roses with the same purchase cost. Charge delivery separately, because its price depends on distance, not on flowers.

A full calculation for three bouquets, budget, standard and premium, with final prices and margins, is in our guide on how to price a bouquet.

Markup for retail and for trade customers

A wholesaler lives on volume, not percentage. Its flower markup is a fraction of a shop's, usually tens of percent rather than hundreds, and it varies a lot by product, volume and market. Wholesalers bin flowers too, but less: stock leaves by the box within a day or two.

Here is how a discount affects a wholesaler's profit. Say a rose costs the wholesaler €0.70 and the open price list says €1.00.

A 5% discount on price took a sixth of the wholesaler's profit on every stem. That is why a personal discount for a regular shop is given for volume and regularity, not to stop them leaving, and reviewed each season.

Confusion starts when different customers pay different prices: an account manager gives a discount from memory to the wrong customer, and the monthly figures stop adding up. On a Petala website a guest sees the open price, while a registered trade customer sees their own contract price after logging in, and the cart applies their personal discount and minimum order sum. You can see how this looks to a buyer on the demo website.

Pricing for Valentine's Day and Mother's Day

Before big holidays, auction and supplier prices rise, and shops raise their shelf prices. The mistake is to keep the old percentage on the old purchase price, or to raise prices "like everyone else" without a calculation.

What works:

1. Price from the holiday purchase of the batch you will actually sell, not from last month's price list.
2. Allow for more waste: after the holiday, unsold flowers are hard to move, and you cannot recover them in the price later.
3. Compare euros, not percentages. If a rose normally earns €1.35 over cost and the holiday batch at the same multiplier earns €2.00, that may be enough without raising the percentage.
4. Price ready-made holiday bouquets with the same scheme as on normal days, with the florist's labour as a separate charge: on those days every minute counts.

How to prepare stock, staff and display for the peak is covered in our article on the Valentine's Day flower shop.

How to check that your prices work

A percentage on the price tag says nothing about money in the bank. The check is simple; do it weekly, or at least monthly.

1. Add up turnover for the period, net of VAT.
2. Subtract all purchases for the same period, including what was binned.
3. Subtract discounts and refunds.
4. Subtract costs: rent, wages, wrapping, delivery, utilities.

If what is left is less than you expected, the cause is almost always in one of three places: waste is higher than you allowed for, discounts are given more often than you think, or some items still sell at the old price after their purchase cost went up.

It is easier to get this answer without combining spreadsheets by hand. In the Petala CRM for flower wholesalers sales, purchases and expenses are recorded in one place and the profit and loss report is built from them, so you see what is left after contract discounts rather than the percentage printed on the price list.