Trade Schools
Those who love nature may have started their careers as floral designers.
Many roles are related to arranging and cultivating flowers, ranging from floral design to helping native flowers survive in the wild.
Floral designers often work in retail settings with projects like weddings and other events that involve flowers.
This allows these professionals to be creative and simultaneously have a green thumb.
Many floral designers enjoy their jobs but want to explore other careers to make more money, have faster or higher advancement opportunities, or do something different while still connecting to nature.
If you are interested in an alternative career in floral design, then keep reading to learn more about available opportunities that utilize your skills!
List of Alternative Careers
One: Gardener
Gardeners are responsible for developing and maintaining vegetable gardens, flower beds, and different live plants, mostly in a residential setting.
These experts coordinate with customers to maintain walkways, mow lawns, apply pest treatments, prune bushes, and plant fresh flowers within a garden.
Gardeners determine which plants to add to the garden, prepare the soil to expand the space, and remove weeds.
Administrative tasks include scheduling appointments and billing invoices.
Floral designers can transfer skills like working with their hands, organization, attention to detail, and business acumen to being a gardener.
No educational or training requirements are available to enter this field.
Most gardeners own their businesses, so they have the flexibility to set schedules and visit clients when the time works best for them.
Also, owning a gardening business can be lucrative, especially with higher-end clients with larger properties.
Furthermore, you get to work outside, with your hands, and implement creative designs and arrangements.
Two: Grower
Flower growers work in commercial farms and greenhouses to mass-produce seeds and plants.
Typical job duties include tracking plant growth during a season, watering plants, placing seeds, digging trenches, harvesting plants, and packing shipments.
Depending on the location and flower types being sold to merchandizers, flower growers work outdoors or indoors.
Flower growers transfer skills like attention to detail, organization, and working well with their hands from being a floral designer.
No additional education is required to transition from being a floral designer to a grower.
The greatest benefit of being a grower, if you are a nature lover, is the chance to work outside for most of the year, depending on the location.
Also, if you enjoy working with your hands, then this is the right position for you.
Three: Horticulturalist
Horticulturalists are scientists specializing in genetically modifying and breeding different types of plants, including flowers.
These experts utilize their botany knowledge to create flowering plants with unique patterns, colors, and properties while also increasing the number of blooms per plant, extending the shelf life, and modifying plants to resist disease.
Horticulturalists also utilize technical skills to expand native plants in their natural habitats.
These flower professionals can utilize several skills in floral design, including working with their hands, knowledge of flowers, finding creative solutions to problems, organization, and attention to detail.
Horticulturalists require at least a bachelor’s degree to start working.
Classes include technical topics like chemistry, soil science, hydroponics, and plant structure.
Given that you will have at least a bachelor’s degree, the salary will be significantly higher than being a floral designer.
Also, you still get to work with your hands in a lab and on-site and get to improve the environment through disease prevention.
Four: Irrigation Technician
For those seeking a more technical role, irrigation technicians utilize irrigation equipment to hydrate plants quickly and efficiently while following a schedule.
These water systems experts install irrigation systems in commercial nurseries, private gardens, and other environments where many plants need to be watered simultaneously.
Irrigation technicians are also responsible for purchasing equipment like pumps, underground tubing, and sprinklers to deliver water directly to the roots, resulting in beautiful flowers.
Similar to floral designers, irrigation technicians must be good with their hands and develop creative solutions.
Irrigation technicians must also be organized and work well with others.
For smaller private gardens, a degree or advanced training is not necessary to transition into this role.
However, larger commercial farms may require a technical degree or classes to ensure water is distributed accordingly on a larger scale.
The primary benefits of becoming an irrigation technician include working with your hands, working outside, and the ability to grow within a major company if you are employed by a commercial farm.
Also, the salary can be excellent depending on the location and company you work for.
Five: Nursery Worker
A plant nursery worker cultivates flowers in a greenhouse or nursery and grows seeds into young plants that customers can purchase and transport to their gardens.
Nursery workers manage taking cuttings from mature plants and repotting them, pruning leaves and petals, treating plant diseases, and pest control.
These plant experts also ensure the proper amount of nutrients, humidity, sunlight, and water are given to the plant.
The transition from floral designer to nursery worker is easy since you are responsible for many of the same functions.
Common skills include attention to detail, organization, problem-solving, working well with your hands, knowledge of different flowers, and customer service are all integral to success.
Additional training and education are not required to make a move into this new role.
Benefits to becoming a nursery worker include working outside, ensuring plants remain alive and of excellent quality to sell to customers, and being creative.
Six: Wedding Planner
While this may seem like a strange career path change, becoming a wedding planner incorporates floral arrangements.
Wedding planners with a floral background create custom garlands, vases, boutonnieres, bouquets, and arrangements.
Those without a floral design background will outsource the design to suppliers.
Wedding planners acquire fresh petals to decorate the venue and match the bridal bouquet.
They also select flowers based on the budget, theme, and color scheme, inspect the quality of the orders, schedule delivery, and sign off on orders.
The floral aspect of being a wedding planner is one segment of the job where the floral designer skills are best used.
These include organization, working well with their hands, creativity, customer service, and attention to detail.
Other transferrable skills include the business side of floral design, like ordering, invoicing, and managing finances.
Wedding planning doesn’t require additional credentials, but it’s always advisable to take a course or two to brush up on skills.
Transitioning to being a wedding planner offers many benefits, like the flexibility of running a business, working with various professionals across many teams, and delivering the perfect wedding for newlyweds.
Seven: Wholesale Manager
For those looking to be more part of the business aspects of the floral industry, then becoming a wholesale manager may be the best option.
Wholesale floral managers provide floral supplies and flowers to flower shops, florists, and small distributors.
These professionals oversee an operations and sales team to sell inventory to clients and track supply.
Wholesale managers can work in floral departments or for large floral companies to source flowers and manage the logistics of getting them to customers.
Although wholesale managers don’t work directly with flower arrangements, transferrable skills include excellent customer service and communication, high attention to detail and organization, working with a team, and generating new ideas.
If you seek to work for a major wholesaling company, business or management classes may be required since you will be managing a team.
Smaller wholesalers may only require a certain amount of management experience to accept the position.
The top benefits of becoming a wholesale manager include still being able to work with flowers while learning the business side of the industry, leading and growing a team, getting a higher salary, and developing better management skills for future positions.
Tips for Transitioning Careers
Consider Freelance Opportunities
One of the best tips for transitioning careers is to take on projects in the wedding planning space.
While you may not have the qualifications to manage the entire wedding, you can assist with specific tasks to gain experience in the industry.
This will help you learn the broader scope of responsibilities of being a wedding planner.
Leverage Existing Skills
Using skills like creativity and working with your hands is a great way to transition into the new role.
As a floral designer, you have mastered many skills, so highlighting and focusing on expanding these cross-functional attributes will help for a seamless move.
New skills needed for the role can be further developed with firsthand experience.
Network with Other Professionals
Networking is a critical aspect of moving between career paths. Joining professional organizations and attending seminars, trade shows, and other activities will get your name into the hands of hiring managers looking for wedding planners.
If you are planning to start a business, then joining the local Chamber of Commerce and other entrepreneurial groups can help drum up business and let customers know you are available.
Seek Additional Training
The Certified Wedding and Event Planning and International Wedding Planning Professional designations are excellent options for building your skillset, networking, and proving to hire managers and clients that you have taken steps to advance your craft.
It may also be beneficial to take several business courses to manage the entrepreneurial side of your company or differentiate from the workforce competition if joining a company.
Floral designers have alternative career paths, some working directly with flowers and plants in greenhouses and fields, while others are more of a management position.
Many change roles to see a different side of the business, make more money, or take on a new challenge.
Before making the switch, it’s important to take the proper steps that allow you to reach your educational and career goals, whether you choose to start a business or work for another company.
