MOTHER’S DAY IS SUNDAY! Here’s a friendly reminder: Teleflora is a woman-owned, woman-friendly business that we discovered last February! (see full story below). Who knew? See the story below and if you’re using a floral/gift wire service, use Teleflora and give your business to those those believe in us!
**********
I wrote an article last week for Sheownsit.com – What Owning 85% of the U.S. Economy Means. In it I talk about the power women have collectively accounting for “85% of all consumer purchases including everything from autos to health care,” according to She-conomy.com. Even more substantial,“Women represent the majority of the online market.” In other words, without us, a company would struggle, even die.
Yet, Even with all that financial power, women aren’t valued enough to determine direction or strategy in some of the biggest and most powerful companies in the world. Most are public companies owned by their shareholders who should insist on getting input from 51 percent of the population.
In my article, I singled out Jim McCann of 1-800-flowers.com for obvious reasons. Flowers are a commodity given to women. I was shocked to see that 1-800-flowers.com had 10 senior executives and only one was a woman who served in an arguably stereotypical position – as the human resource senior vp. The 1-800-flowers.com board wasn’t much different – seven men, one woman.
Today, I looked at FTD.com’s management team– seven men and one woman, albeit she is the Chief Financial Officer. They have seven board members, one is a woman , added this month.
My next hope was Proflowers.com, which is now ProvideCommerce.com. They made the business look fun, but even that couldn’t mask the fact that there were 12 men and only 1 woman on the team.
Which brings us to Teleflora, the largest privately held floral wire service and, based on the management photos on the websites above, it’s the only one that is woman-friendly. It has been owned since 1979 by Lynda and Stewart Resnick, employing more than 3000 worldwide in 20 countries with 15,000 member florists! Lynda Resnick is an environmentalist, a humanitarian and a philanthropist, donating millions to medical research, the arts and sustainability. Those who might suggest the company’s 2011 and 2012 Superbowl ads demeaned women, have their head in the sand. Demeaning women is keeping us out of the executive offices and having no remorse about posting a page of all men and only one woman without so much as a twinge of embarrassment.
Time to #TeleGIRLFRIEND about TELEFLORA.