Why by local flowers?

Thanks for visiting our Flowers on Summit website. We are a locally-grown, urban farm in Olathe, KS (a suburb of the Kansas City metropolitan area). We specialize in unique cut flower bouquets and arrangements. If you’ve found your way to our blog, then you likely either know about us already, or found us through our good friend, the internet! Either way, we’re glad you’re here, that you’re getting to know us and we’re getting to know you!

Some of our friends have known about our small business since the onset. Others have found us through our signage in a busy suburban area. Sometimes, people just happened to be driving by and saw our flowers on the front lawn and just had to stop by, because what they saw captured their attention. However we’ve met, we’ve been so thrilled to meet you and bring the joy and beauty of our cut flowers to your families, your loved ones, and especially to you! Flowers have a way of bringing people together and showing how much we care about others.

When we began this journey, we didn’t realize that this phenomenon was taking the country by storm (sometimes, quite literally). The cut flower business in the United States is growing. However, did you know that only about 22% of the flowers you get when you go to the grocery store or to a local florist are actually grown IN the United States? Isn’t that crazy? In a country known for its agriculture states, particularly here in the Midwest, we are still importing 78% of our product and flying it in from other countries?

If you think about it, it makes even more sense to support your local flower farmer! When a flower is grown in another country, it has to endure a long flight and much of the time, it takes days or even a week to get to your florist. It gets shipped to the airport, then to a flower wholesaler, and then off to your local florist. It could be 2-3 weeks old by the time it gets to the customer. What it takes to make that happen is a lot of effort, and more importantly, a lot of chemicals to preserve them. One of the things that you tend to find among the cut flower farmers in the United States is a fairly like-minded purpose to NOT use harsh chemicals on our flowers. In fact, most of us use methods of growing and pest control that rely on Mother Nature and our ecosystem to produce our flowers.

Another primary reason to buy from your local flower farmer is because you usually get a significant cost savings passed on to you by your grower. Some flower farmers, like us, also do their own flower arrangements, too. That means you’re getting unique designs using only our materials. When you order from us for a special occasion, you’re going to get a one-of-a-kind arrangement, often with a lot of thought given to the person you’re gifting the flowers to. Because we grow and produce our own flowers, you’re not getting a flower purchased from a wholesaler, so there’s not as much markup on the product.

Have you ever seen a dahlia or a lisianthus in a floral arrangement? One of the most amazing comments we hear when visiting our flower stand is “What is this flower? It’s so unique!”. People have often not seen, nor heard of, many of the flower types and varieties that we grow here at Flowers on Summit. They may be well known in the floral industry, but not to the typical consumer.

Finally, when you purchase flowers from your local farmer, they are actually likely to last longer for you! This is a major win for you, the customer. We typically harvest our flowers the day of or before we sell them. So, you’re getting a freshly picked bloom!!!

So, we hope you’ll stop by and take a look at our flowers on the flower stand. Chances are, you’ll see Mark and I out working, too, and we hope you’ll say “hi” and introduce yourself to us. We love to get to know our customers. Our story is a fun one and we want to get to know yours, too. We’re so happy to bring our love of flowers to your homes and to your loved ones. That’s what this journey is all about. Bringing love and joy into the world, one bouquet at a time.

With gratitude,

Mark and Amy

What’s new for the 2025 season?

As Mark and I reflected on our first growing season, we can’t even express how much we’ve learned about growing flowers for their production value instead of to enhance the beauty of our own personal gardens. We were introduced to growing more plants, not just for their aesthetic nature, but also for their vase life, for our customers’ likes (and dislikes), for the USDA zone that we live in, for our type of soil…..the list is endless. We’ve also been introduced to new varieties of plants that we’d never heard of, let alone grown. So, this year, along with our tried and true stalwarts (dahlias, zinnias, sunflowers, ranunculus), we’re adding a lot of new types of flowers and greens to our farming repertoire. We’re excited to see what our customers think about these new varieties, and even more importantly, about what we’re able to grow and manage in our flower beds this year.

So, for 2025, we’re adding some fan favorites (tulips, anyone?), but also going to introduce a flower that takes an insane amount of patience to grow….the lisianthus, or lissie, for short. You’ll also see some new varieties of zinnias and we’re doubling the varieties we will plant in our beds this year, taking into account a lot of customer feedback on their favorite types and colors. We also gave up on a few plants we trialed last year, and that’s likely to be the case for us every year as we try and experiment with new things each year.

We’re also going to bring in some new varieties of chrysanthemums. These are NOT the same mums that we see each year at the local big box, do-it-yourself “hardware” stores that we frequent every weekend. These will look so completely different than what you’re used to that you’ll not even recognize that they are a mum! We can’t wait to see how well they grow in this Kansas clay and if we’re even able to overwinter them.

We’ve also got a dahlia tuber sale coming up that you won’t want to miss. If you want to try and grow the customer favorite “Kelvin Floodlight” dahlia that always got a lot of “ohhhhhs!” when people drove by the flower stand, you’ll have ample opportunity to grab a tuber in our online store when it opens. We’ll likely keep Kelvin around for all the years that Flowers in Summit is in business because I think it may have become synonymous with our brand the first year we were in operation. And, don’t worry….we’ll walk along with you as you try and grow Kelvin, or one of his other counterparts, in your own garden. Dahlias are surprising pretty easy to grow on a small scale and the reward when they bloom is so incredible. We definitely think you’ll agree! Pictured below, you’ll see a “Kelvin” bloom that really did grow to be the size of a dinnerplate. If you look closely, you’ll see that I set it on an all-white dinner plate for comparison.

So, if you’ve been with us from the beginning or you’ve just come along for the ride, you’re in for a treat at the flower stand in 2025. We think you’ll agree!

Dahlia Tuber Sales….what’s all the fuss?

If you’re a serious dahlia lover, like we are, you’ve probably heard the term “dahlia wars”. If you’re not, let me try to explain. This phenomenon has taken social media by storm. Flower farmers and dahlia addicts (there’s an actual group called that, along with a website!) alike are busy every fall digging up and dividing their tubers, then storing them for the winter. Those dahlia tubers that survive storage and winter then are posted for sale and dahlia growers will flock to those sites to get the coveted “unicorn” varieties from a reputable supplier. These are NOT the same tubers that you can get commercially at your local big box store (in fact, we kind of recommend you NOT buy those, because they often have a type of dahlia virus called “gall” and it will cause all sorts of issues in the soil you’re growing in). There are professionals who grow dahlias for a living (like we do) and then there are gardeners who just love dahlias. What’s not to love, right?

So, in these social media groups and followings, us flower farmers will sell our extra dahlia tubers to other farmers. It’s a beautiful community of like-minded, beauty appreciating, and gardening loving folks. And, let me tell you that these are some of the nicest people on the planet. Until…..the dahlia wars commence. Because, there are only so many of the newer and most beautiful varieties of dahlias, and sometimes, there are only certain farmers licensed to sell these newer types. Think of it like Black Friday when Cabbage Patch kids first came out (if you’re not old enough to know what that reference mean, then we don’t know how to help you, but the internet might.) Websites crash. People get things removed from virtual shopping carts without them even knowing, and prices skyrockets for something that looks like a cross between a russet and a sweet potato. And, because of all this, there are very few winners of the dahlia wars and most of us, we have to say it….we’re losers in the Great Dahlia Wars.

Here at Flowers on Summit, we’re just observers of the Dahlia Wars, but we hear about it often from other growers. We’re still building our stock of different varieties to offer our customers, and our business hasn’t grown to the point where we’re going to spend insane amounts of money for one single dahlia tuber. However, if you know of anyone who has the “Missis Amy” dahlia, we think we might have to break our rule on what we’re willing to spend! It’s probably the single most beautiful dahlia ever produced, with the “Bloomquist Mark B” being a very distant second place winner. Full disclosure, though, we’re completely biased about these, just because of their names!

Be careful what you say to her…..

When we tell the story of how Flowers on Summit ever came to be, it comes with a very important moral to the story. Never give Amy an idea, even unintentionally, because this is what happens. This is how we ended up being flower farmers and small business owners. This is why we’ve made new friends with fellow flower farmers from across the country. This is why we watch YouTube videos about growing different flowers when we’re bored. This is why we no longer have “free” time. This is why our basement storage area is full of dirt, lights, and teeny-tiny little plant babies. And, this, is the lesson that Mark has learned to keep his thoughts to himself…..sometimes, or really, very little of the time!

That’s how it all started. With one seemingly inconsequential, innocent comment that went something like, “you know, we should try to make some money selling these.” By “these” he meant the small garden we’d created just for zinnias and sunflowers one year. It likely was not that he wanted to open a full-fledged business empire selling cut flowers to the masses. Slowly, he’s learning, that once an idea is in her head, she carries it out to fruition. In full force. With gusto. And a lot of elbow grease….and compost. Ask Mark how many times he’s made trips to get compost and he’s likely lost count. But, as much as he grumbles about the chore that it is, he really loves doing it (he’s admitted this privately).

So here we are. One year later. In all its glory, heartache, joys, trials and tribulations. We present “Flowers on Summit” and haven’t looked back!