Lyn Bayfield's nerves are frayed and she has pushed her body past the point of exhaustion, but her aching hands fly as she greets customers with a smile and drives herself to meet demand on Mother's Day.
The Eumundi Roses co-owner said the build up was a logistical nightmare.
"We work two weeks straight preparing and the last two days are 48 hours straight, no sleep, and then we collapse," she said.
Blooming big day
The work towards one day in May began late last year when she and her father planted the first of three crops of lisianthus, sunflowers, carnations, gerberas, snapdragons, celosia, daisies, fragrant stocks, native flowers and foliage.
She said she hedged her bets.
"We grow an early crop, an on-time crop and a late crop and hope that one of them hits the target."
February's floods swept away seedlings and made growing conditions even tougher.
Ms Bayfield suggested making May "Mother's Month, not Mother's Day" to ease the pressure on florists, flower farmers and families.
While elsewhere in Australia, florists are buoyed by support for locally grown blooms, Ms Bayfield has expressed her disappointment at losing sales to cheaper imported bouquets.
Budding business
A total of 162,661,271 flower stems were imported from July to April 2022.
A grim report prepared by Deloitte Access Economics for the Australian government revealed that revenue and business numbers in Australia's flower industry dropped by 25 to 30 per cent in the past decade.
It was largely due to increasing imports from countries like Malaysia, Colombia, China, Kenya, South Africa and Ecuador, where labour costs were significantly lower.
The report revealed that of an estimated 616 businesses that earned $235 million from flower production in Australia, one third made less than $50,000 a year.
Flower Industry Australia chief executive Anna Jabour feared rising inflation and interest rates would leave less money in household budgets for beautiful Australian bouquets.
Flower Industry Australia lobbied for mandatory country of origin labelling to be extended to cut flowers, but Deloitte Access Economics recommended against it.
Ms Jabour said she '"completely disagreed" with the company's research findings that it was "not important to most consumers".
"They (Deloitte Access Economics) concede that most Australians don't know that flowers are grown overseas," she said.
"So, people don't think they should have country of origin labelling because they think they're grown here."
No local labelling
The federal government confirmed that it would not be introducing country of origin labelling for cut flowers.
A Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources spokesperson said it risked imposing excessive costs and could potentially place many small businesses and sole traders in the industry "at a competitive disadvantage".
Ms Jabour warned that invasive pests introduced to the country on imported cut flowers remained a real risk to flower growers and the broader agriculture industry.
Biosecurity concerns
"Some of these pests can wipe out crops, and my concern is that only 20 per cent of each consignment is inspected," Ms Jabour said.
A federal agriculture department spokesperson said active management had resulted in improved compliance and an 81 per cent reduction in the detection of pests of biosecurity concern on consignments arriving in Australia between 2017 and 2021.
