I used Ory Florals for my wedding in 2004 and while the customer service at first was wonderful, the execution of the product was horrible. I got about 75% of the promised products. A lot of the mistakes that were made will either make this business learn their lesson or go out of business. Get *everything* in writing.
Personality: A, tons of fun to work with, expressed excitement about my ideas, was very into the planning. One warning, he is not the most organized vendor I’ve seen. Recommend: regular confirmations.
Product: C- The flowers were gorgeous. (colors and healthiness) The chuppah and overall stage presentation was better than expected. The groom’s boutonnieres were beautiful and as discussed. The reception centerpieces were good. The end aisle displays were very pretty. Now on to the not-so-good things… There were a few things that were moderate in size that were never even there. (things I had agreed to pay more for). The aisle was supposed to be MOUNDS of petals down the sides. (a picture was given of this) W e had more than one conversation about this, even going as far as calling the Hyatt during one of our meetings to ask them if they would clean the “thousands” of petals up. (they said yes) He also said he had an aisle runner that would “look great”. I had the aisle roped off so that the only people who walked on it were the wedding party and me. When I got to the aisle, the runner was twisted and torn. The vases on the head table were wrong. They were dirty. They were supposed to be vases where the BM’s bouquets sat fully inside of them. These were dollar store bud vases. (a picture of this was also given along with 2 distinct conversations about making sure this would happen as in the picture) He was given an Illustrator document showing what the head table was supposed to look like (front and top view). It wasn’t even close to the picture I provided. Instead of rose petals and dozens of votives on the front end, there was ivy and about 10 tea lights. On the cake table, we discussed rose petals all over it as well. Nothing on the cake table was provided. The girls bouquets were made of gorgeous flowers, but they were about 1/2 the size I had envisioned. My bouquet was also made of very nice flowers, but not really what I had pictured. The flowers for on top of the cake, seemed a little too small for the size of the top tier. He did provide a gorgeous day after corsage for me as a gift.
Service/Performance: He met with us multiple times, he accommodated many changes, and was overall very professional. He showed up, things were done on time, and not a single person knew of the issues other than me. There were too many things that seemed to be missing or inaccurate to give him a great grade here. He is one of my favorite vendors to deal with, until the day came and I think that’s why this was a particular disappointment. He’s very talented and can work some amazing wonders, but as a business he has work to do. One of the biggest issues in this category happened 2 weeks before the wedding. All along we had been working on a high estimate of the number of guests, since 98% were OOT. When I called a week before the wedding to go over last minute details and give him the final count, I discovered he had already ordered all of the flowers (based on the high count) and could not cancel the orders. I was so shocked and upset that I would have twice as many flowers as I needed. He was willing to work with me on this and I was grateful. As a result of this, I think the rest of the work suffered.
Overall Rating: Recommended. Overall I loved working with Ory, but I have some advice if you use him.
1. Get everything you want in detailed writing with a price estimate next to each item.
2. Confirm 3 weeks out your exact order, prices and every detail that is important to you.
3. Pictures, Pictures, Pictures. Wherever possible, provide clear labeled pics showing exactly what you want. Make sure you get these in your contract in writing. These are not so much as to keep him honest, but to keep him organized. I am extremely organized and detail oriented, so I took a leap of faith on working with someone who is a little scattered.
I would still recommend him again to people and can see him improving as he learns from his mistakes.
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