The Wholesale Florist & Florist Supplier Association conference opened Oct. 24 with a sold-out exhibit area, two fully booked airport tours, a full house in the host hotel and two last-minute additions to the program: a session on social media and a free analysis of company websites.

With floral trade shows breaking attendance records and the economy ever so slowly coming back, perhaps we can look forward to better-than-usual Valentine’s Day sales.

Unfortunately, with our floral buying habits here glued to special occasions and holidays, Valentine’s Day is a make-or-break event for many in the floral industry. Let’s go for it and have plenty of product on hand. Remember, you can’t sell out of an empty wagon.

AYCO Farms added three essential team members to support its growth and expansion. In the last three months, the company has hired Lou Kertesz as melon category manager, Mike Dickman as category manager for greenhouse peppers and Jason Miller as key accounts for all vegetable sales. 

Green Tree International Inc. in Visalia, CA, which is now in the fourth year of its citrus program, will have Navel oranges from “about three different packinghouses that will pack our fruit for us, the same ones as in the past,” according to Fred Van Zandt, citrus category manager.

“We will have fruit that we run through those houses as well as fruit that we will be using of theirs” to fill customer orders, Mr. Van Zandt said Oct. 18. “We will have the ‘Green Tree’ label, and we will also have the ‘Green Giant’ label.”

Atlas Produce & Distribution Inc. in Bakersfield, CA, this fall introduced a new package, a 12-ounce clamshell, for all of the company’s products, according to Ben Antongiovanni, sales manger.

The company is also in the process of “rolling out our new website, which is CarmelNaturel.com,” he said Oct. 22.

VISALIA, CA — California Citrus Mutual held it's 35th annual meeting far from the hurricane winds of Sandy, but the effect was felt on the opposite coast anyway.

Rebecca Bech, deputy administrator of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal & Plant Health Inspection Service-Plant Protection & Quarantine, was scheduled to speak. She lives in Maryland and escaped major damage to her home there, but she was not able to catch a flight to California in the wake of the storm.