SHAFTER, Calif. (KERO) — As time wanes, traditions fade and the way people conduct business changes. In an age where flowers can be bought with a few taps of a phone screen or in a grocery store just as easy as a loaf of bread, how does the local florist make their mark in a community?
For Amanda Kirschenmann, owner of Sun Country Flowers in Shafter, it's about building relationships one bouquet at a time.
"It's a huge compliment when we get returning customers that come back, we get to build a relationship with them,” says Kirschenmann.
Kirschenmann bought the downtown staple just shy of a year ago, after working as a florist at home and building her brand online, but the history of the building and those surrounding it date back long before that.
“Most of the buildings on this street were built between 1935 and 1950. There's a few buildings that date back to the early 1920s, but the biggest thing that's changed is in those years, virtually every type of store that you would want to purchase with was located here in Shafter," says Stanley Wilson, curator of the Shafter Depot Museum. "Today that’s different.”
While the makeup of downtown Shafter businesses changes, so do the markets for florists across the country. According to Bureau of Labor and Statistics estimates, the demand for floral designers is expected to drop nearly 20% by 2032, but as things change Kirschenmann hopes to evolve with them, brightening the community that supports them along the way.
"An anniversary, a birthday, a sympathy, a wedding, just the work of our hands in everything that we do, that we can just bless someone," says Kirschenmann. "I just pray and hope that we can continue to do that for our community and which are our friends and our family."
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