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INTERVIEW
What doyouhope to achieve?
We want to change the way people give
flowers – that you really should not need
a reason to send flowers. You do not need
to wait for that special occasion; you
can send flowers for any reason at all,
sometimes simply to thank your mum for
whipping up breakfast for you that morn-
ing, or just to put a smile on someone’s
face. We call them
Just Because Flowers.
What researchdidyoudobeforeyou
startedyour company?
From the time we decided to do this, we
got ourselves as ready as we could be
within two months, launched it, and then
adjusted and figured out the market as we
went. There was very little research other
than to get our system up and ready. If
we’d hadmore time, I would saywewould
probably have signed up for some flower
arranging course or perhaps learnt more
about flowers and botany in general.
Whatwere thebiggest challengeswhen
youfirst started?
Our biggest headache was probably
logistics. We are in the business of de-
livering happiness, so delivery is a huge
component of our business. How to deliver
the flowers, how to keep them fresh for
as long as needed – this was completely
foreign ground for both of us. We needed
to be efficient sowe could keep our flowers
affordable, yet had to make sure our flow-
ers arrived in the best condition. And the
notorious humidity and heat in KL really
tested us. We managed to find partners
Delivering Happiness
Joanne Ho
and
Beh Lee Yen
are the ladies behind Happy
Bunch, an online flower delivery service that launched
in 2015.
Sarah Rees
catches up with the two childhood
friends to find out why it was happiness and not flowers
that inspiredthemtosetupabusinesstogether, andwhat
challenges they faced along theway.
Wheredid thepassion for flowers come from?
Our passion for the business is what drives us. Flowers, while they make us happy
with how pretty they are and how lovely they smell, are really just the vehicle we
use in delivering happiness. Having said that, we are discovering new flowers all the
time and our knowledge about flowers has grown considerably in the past year. And,
naturally, so has our love for them!
WhydidyouestablishHappyBunch?
We noticed that the floral industry has remained pretty stagnant for decades and has
never quite evolved. At the most, some conventional florists would offer their bouquets
online but they were all very similar. We noticed a gap in the market where people had
to have a good reason to send flowers because they were not cheap, so we decided to
offer something completely different to close that gap. Our bunches are very affordable,
we curate one bunch daily, we strip down the packaging so the flowers are the real
star, we do away with fancy optional gifts and we include same day delivery, all for
RM39 a bunch!
Just Because
Flowers can be
sent for any reason
to put a smile on
someone’s face
The heat and
humidity in
Kuala Lumpur
was a testing