I wear many professional hats, and I’m putting on a new one this coming January. I’m excited and humbled to have been elected to the board of directors of the Association of Specialty Cut Flower Growers (ASCFG) as the Mid-Atlantic Regional Director. This organization was hugely important to me in my early days as a flower farmer. In fact, attending my first ASCFG national conference before even planting my first official crop surely is part of the reason why Love ‘n Fresh Flowers turned out to be so successful.
The ASCFG is a tremendous source of information about flower farming know-how and a wonderful group for networking with other knowledgeable and passionate growers. Some of my favorite ASCFG moments have actually been on bus rides, to and from tours during conferences. You pretty much have to shout while on the bus because every single person on there is passionately yammering to their neighbors about flowers. That to me is evidence that no flower farmer will ever be lonely or bored at an ASCFG conference because we all love to talk about the same thing and don’t need any agenda to do so!
Never a shortage of conversation at the conferences!
It will be such an honor to take a leadership role in this organization. I’m looking forward to helping the ASCFG and members embrace new approaches to marketing and new avenues for sales, particularly floral design, not just growing. It also means I get to dust off my pen and write regular articles for the Cut Flower Quarterly, the ASCFG’s member publication. I’ve got a long laundry list of fun topics to tackle!
If you’re a flower farmer or want to become one, I’d strongly encourage you to join the ASCFG and start gleaning from the tremendous troves of information in the online member forums, at meetings, and in the Quarterly. This is the perfect time of year to sign up as you’ll have all winter to read through the archives and answer tons of your questions about how to plan for the coming spring.
Congrats! That’s awesome! You will do a fabulous job!
So glad to see this post. I have been debating spending that money on the membership, or on more supplies. I think you just swayed me. Thanks! 😉
Glad to hear it, Erin! Just join for one year if you can’t afford it every year. Then spend that one year reading every bit of info in the member forums and the back issues of the Cut Flower Quarterly. It’s worth every penny, I promise!!!
Jennie!!! Congrats!!…so exciting and a well deserved seat for sure! I am joining tomorrow:). You are such an inspiration! xo
Aw, thanks, Jennifer!! So excited you’re joining! Then I’ll have your smiling face to look forward to at future conferences too!!
Congratulations, Jennie! I just joined a few weeks ago and was reading my first issue of the Cut Flower Quarterly last night. I am so happy that you are a Regional Director and can’t wait to meet you in 2014!! Happy planning, writing and planting~ Andrea
All your hats look great on you. congrats!
Jennie, any chance of access to the Quarterly or a kind of co-opted membership/special subscription for growers outside of the States? Just wondering… I’m so envious of your resources. We have very little of that kind of thing here. Congratulations on the new role! J
Hey Jeanine! I’m pretty sure you can still join ever from New Zealand. I know there are members from Northern Ireland in the ASCFG. You could do that right now at the regular membership price and be able to read lots of issues of The Quarterly and also access the online member “bulletin board” which is really loaded with years and years of Q&As between knowledgeable members. I’ll bring up the idea of an international membership fee at the next board meeting. Good idea!
congrats, are you on twitter if so can you send me on the details
Thanks, Mary. We’re not on Twitter. We’re hard-core Instagram users instead. @lovenfreshflowers