Art Conforti

Arthur "Art" Conforti is the florist who reviews the flower guides on LocalFlowerShop and its sister site. He co-founded Beneva Flowers in Sarasota, Florida with his father in 1986, worked closely with the people behind Teleflora in the 1990s, built a community marketing program that florists ran from Miami to Seattle, and founded RateAFlorist.com to help people find the real local shop behind their flowers.

Why a working florist reviews these guides

Flower advice is easy to write and easy to get wrong. A care tip that sounds sensible can shorten the life of a bouquet, a price quoted from a national website can be far from what a neighborhood shop charges, and etiquette advice for a funeral or a hospital visit can embarrass the person who follows it. The guides on LocalFlowerShop cover exactly these everyday questions: how to make cut flowers last, what to send when someone dies, how to plan wedding flowers, what a fair price looks like, and how to tell a real local shop from an order-gathering website.

So each guide is read by someone who has spent decades behind a flower shop counter. When a guide carries the line Reviewed by Art Conforti, it means Art has read that version of the guide and checked it against how real florists actually work. The date beside his name is the day he reviewed it.

In the flower trade since 1986

Art co-founded Beneva Flowers in Sarasota with his father in 1986. An independent shop sees every kind of everyday flower order, and that experience at the counter is what the guides draw on.

By the mid-1990s Art was building the retail side of the business and investing in the technology of the day. He bought the RTI shop system from Redbook because he believed in buying the tools a shop would need to grow, not only what it needed that year, and he became one of the florists running the system successfully. That brought him into contact with Teleflora. He introduced himself to Gregg Coccari, then president of Teleflora, and the conversation began an important chapter in his career.

Through Teleflora, Art came to know Jack Howard, who remains a friend, and met Stewart and Lynda Resnick. What stayed with him from those years was the Resnicks' view that flowers are not simply a product. They carry love, gratitude, sympathy, celebration, congratulations and remembrance. That idea runs through the way the LocalFlowerShop guides talk about choosing flowers: start with what the flowers have to say, then choose the stems.

Sarasota's Favorite Mom

When the Resnicks launched America's Favorite Mom in 2008, a national program celebrating mothers, Art saw a way for an independent florist to do something similar at home. He created Sarasota's Favorite Mom, a local contest that invited people to nominate their mothers and tell the story of why she deserved the title. He brought local businesses and sponsors together to support it, and each year's winner received a commemorative pendant. The names of the winners went up on a plaque at Beneva Flowers.

He did not keep the idea in Sarasota. Art built a website called Flower Manager and traveled the country helping other florists set up their own versions of the program, in markets that included Miami, Los Angeles, St. Louis, Atlanta, Des Moines, San Mateo and Seattle. He ran it for seven consecutive years, from 2008 to 2014. The point was always the same: independent florists can build relationships in their own communities that national advertising never will.

Why he started RateAFlorist

After decades in the business, Art saw a new problem. The technology connecting florists had changed enormously, but accountability had not kept pace. A customer could order from a website that looked like a local shop, pay full price, and never learn which florist actually made the arrangement or how much of the money reached them. These order-gathering businesses are the reason both sites exist.

RateAFlorist.com was created to be a neutral place: not a wire service, and not a competitor to the florist. It points people to the shop's own phone number, website and storefront, so more of every order stays with the person arranging the flowers. LocalFlowerShop shares that purpose and the same listings. You can read the full story on the Why Rate A Florist page.

What a review covers

A guide is marked as reviewed only after Art has read it with these questions in mind:

• Is the care advice what florists actually do? Cutting stems, clean water, flower food, conditioning, and the fixes for drooping roses or tulips that keep growing in the vase. Advice that sounds clever but does not work in a real shop is taken out.
• Are the prices honest? Where a guide talks about what an arrangement costs, the figures should match what an independent shop charges for real flowers, not a website's "starting at" price before delivery and service fees.
• Is the etiquette right? Sympathy and funeral flowers, cards, hospital rules and religious customs are where bad advice does the most harm. These sections get the closest reading.
• Does it help someone buy from a real local florist? Every guide should leave the reader able to call a shop, describe what they want and know what to ask, including delivery cutoffs and same-day timing.
• Is anything out of date? Seasons, availability and shop practices change. Anything that no longer holds is flagged for correction.

What a review is not

Reviewing a guide has nothing to do with ranking florists. Art does not rate shops, and his role does not change where any shop appears in the directory, including Beneva Flowers, which he co-founded and which is listed under the same rules as every other shop. Star ratings on RateAFlorist come only from moderated customer reviews, and they cannot be bought or boosted.

A review is also not a promise that every shop will do things exactly the way a guide describes. Florists differ, and the best answer to a specific question is still a phone call to the shop that will make your flowers.

How the dates work

Each reviewed guide shows the date of Art's review. If a guide is changed after that date, the reviewed line comes off until he has read the new version, so the credit always refers to the text in front of you. Guides that have not been reviewed yet do not carry his name.

Guides Art has reviewed

• A gift orchid's first year, month by month: A twelve-month calendar for the phalaenopsis someone gave you: what it should look like, what to do, and the warning sign to catch each month. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Eighteen vase life tricks, tested: A florist sorts 18 popular vase life tricks into works, harmless and actively bad, with the reason behind each and a five-step routine that holds up. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• How to save a bouquet, from the first hour to the first year: A timeline for preserving flowers: what to decide in the first hour, the three-day deadline, week one drying, month one framing, and year one care. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Two weeks from a dozen roses, day by day: A day one to day fourteen log of what a dozen roses should look like and what to do each day, plus quick fixes for bent necks, tight buds and browning edges. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Anniversary flowers from the first year to the fiftieth: Every traditional anniversary flower from year one to fifty in one table, with colour cues, gift pairings, and honest notes on skipped years and modern swaps. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Birth flowers by month, and the bouquet to build around each: All twelve birth flowers, what each one traditionally meant, a three-stem bouquet recipe for every month, and an honest note on what florists can actually get. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Start with the message, end with the bouquet: A reverse lookup guide to flower meaning: pick what you want to say, then see which blooms and colors carry it and which ones muddle the message. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• The florist's calendar of what is cheap and what is scarce: A month-by-month supply calendar for flower buyers: what is abundant, what is scarce, which dates spike prices, and the substitution a florist would make. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Which flowers are safe around cats and dogs: A florist's three-tier guide to flowers and pets: the red list to keep out entirely, the amber list that comes down to placement, the green list you can build anything from. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• How to spot a fake local florist in sixty seconds: A quick red-flag checklist for florist websites, phones and checkout fees, plus a step-by-step trace of one identical order placed two different ways. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• What 40, 85 and 175 dollars buy at a real florist: A florist's breakdown of what $40, $85, and $175 buys in stems, vessel and design time, plus every fee that can legitimately appear at checkout. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Casket spray or standing wreath, worked out in three questions: A simple decision tree for funeral flowers: answer three questions about relationship, service type and budget, and land on one arrangement with a size and price. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Fifteen funeral flower questions people are embarrassed to ask: Plain answers to the funeral flower questions nobody wants to ask out loud: cost, timing, card wording, faith customs, and whether you can send anything at all. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Send condolence flowers to the service or to the house: Service pieces and home arrangements are built differently. A florist's guide to choosing the destination, timing the delivery, and ordering the right object. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Sympathy card lines that land, by situation: Ready-to-copy sympathy card lines sorted by relationship and situation, plus the phrases to skip and how to sign off clearly. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Sympathy flowers and customs, faith by faith: A florist's quick reference to funeral flower customs across six faith traditions, plus what to send instead, when to send it, and how families vary. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• What to do when the family says in lieu of flowers: Decode the exact obituary wording, from named charities to "no flowers please," and match each phrase to a respectful response with honest cost ranges and timing. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• How to read a wedding florist's answers: A wedding florist consultation is an interview. Learn what a strong answer sounds like, what should worry you, and the follow-up question to ask in between. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• The wedding flower countdown, twelve months to the day: A month-by-month wedding flower checklist from 12 months out to the morning of, plus a rescue plan if you are starting late or chasing a peak date. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)
• Your wedding date decides your bouquet: A month-by-month wedding flower planner: hero stems, palettes, honest swaps when your first choice is gone, and a rough cost multiplier for every part of the year. (reviewed Nov 2, 2026)

Questions about the reviews

Who is Art Conforti?

Art Conforti is a Sarasota, Florida florist who co-founded Beneva Flowers with his father in 1986. He worked with Teleflora's leadership in the 1990s, ran the Sarasota's Favorite Mom program and helped florists across the country run their own versions from 2008 to 2014, and founded RateAFlorist.com.

What does "Reviewed by Art Conforti" mean on a guide?

It means Art has read that version of the guide and checked its care advice, prices, etiquette and buying advice against how independent florists actually work. The date next to his name is the date of that review.

Why do some guides not show a reviewer?

A guide shows Art's name only after he has reviewed it. If a guide is changed after his review, the credit is removed until he reads the new version, so it always refers to the text on the page.

Does Art rate or rank florists?

No. Reviewing guides has nothing to do with the directory. Shops are listed under the same rules whoever they are, and star ratings on RateAFlorist come only from moderated customer reviews, which cannot be bought.

Is Beneva Flowers treated differently because Art co-founded it?

No. Beneva Flowers is listed under the same rules as every other shop, and Art's role as reviewer covers the guides only.

Does a reviewed guide replace advice from my own florist?

No. Florists differ in what they stock and how they work. A guide prepares you for the conversation; the shop making your flowers has the final word on what is fresh, what it costs and when it can deliver.

How do I report something wrong in a guide?

Use the contact page. Corrections go to the editors and, for anything about flowers or etiquette, to Art for his next review of that guide.

Where can I read more about Art and why RateAFlorist exists?

The Why Rate A Florist page tells the full story, from the early wire services to the order-gathering websites that RateAFlorist was created to counter.

Read the full story on the Why Rate A Florist page, browse all the flower guides, or send a correction.