Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, February 4, 1992 TAG: 9202040324
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Ed Shamy
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
SAY `NO' TO ROSES ON THE DAY
"Rose is a rose is a rose. " Gertrude Stein.The late afternoon sun is washing the azaleas, the fig plants and the mums. The regulars are arriving at Marizel's Flowers on West Main Street in Salem.
One by one, Bill Burtch is taking them aside. Some he catches near the lilies. Others he pursues to the rubber plants, near the woven country baskets.
Burtch has owned Marizel's Flowers for 11 years. He is friends with hundreds of people. He shares their lives - their weddings, their funerals, their new boyfriends and girlfriends.
Now, with one of the biggest and most profitable weeks of a florist's year fast approaching, with Valentine's Day flexing its monstrous economic muscle, Burtch has decided to draw a line.
He will close on Feb. 13, 14 and 15. He wants nothing to do with Valentine's Day because he wants nothing to do with gouging his friends.
Two weeks ago, 12 premium roses cost $38.50 at Marizel's.
This week, they're $50.
By next week, Burtch expects the roses to fetch up to $70.
Those are about the same prices as a year ago. They loom larger in a recession.
"I cannot in good conscience sell them for that much," he says. "I never like it, but I've done it in the past. This year, with the country in such bad shape, with people out of work and banks folding, I cannot sell a dozen roses for that much money."
"Right now in the Roanoke Valley, there are thousands of people working at jobs beneath their training or abilities, just to have a job. I can't take that much of their money," says Burtch.
So he'll protest. It will cost him a few thousand bucks, and - because he's acting alone - may not send a very loud message to flower growers and wholesalers.
"It should cost no more at this time of year to grow premium roses than it does at any other time. They shouldn't cost this much," says Burtch.
He's advising his customers to buy candy, to see a movie, to treat to dinner. He'll even sell their valentine's flowers this week or early next. Anything but flowers on The Day. No flowers are exempt from the Valentine's Day massacre of consumers, he says. Roses are the worst.
"Somebody has to protest this gouging. To the business community, it'll look like suicide. And to our customers . . . well, I just hope they'll understand I'm doing this for them."
Ray Downs, a regular at Marizel's, is an aircraft mechanic working as a waiter because he can't find a job in his field.
He has come in for roses.
Burtch won't sell.
Downs thinks about it for a while.
Burtch watches nervously. He did not reach his decision easily. He doesn't like the financial loss. He's acting on conscience alone - a business oddity.
As Ray Downs wanders toward the Devil's Ivy, Burtch murmurs: "I just want to do the right thing, as perceived by me."
Downs returns to the counter. He is nodding his head. He understands.
"Somebody," says Downs, "has to stand for us common folk."
He's right. Bravo to Bill Burtch.
"Sweetest li'l feller, everybody knows; Dunno what to call him, but he's mighty lak' a rose." Frank L. Stanton.