Delivery and pickup messages

Flowers are time-sensitive, and customers often can't be home. So three short messages carry most of the weight: the confirmation, the reminder and the delivery note. Each has one job, and an AI tool can draft any of them once you give it the order details.

The confirmation

Send it straight after the order. Its job is to let the customer catch a mistake while you can still fix it. Include:

• What they ordered, in plain words.
• Whether it's delivery or pickup.
• The date, and a time window rather than an exact time you can't promise.
• The delivery address or your shop address, written out in full.
• The total price, and what it includes.
• The card message, repeated word for word.
• How to reach you if something's wrong.

Repeating the card message and address back is the most useful part. Customers spot slips in their own words faster than in yours.

The UK government's distance-selling page says a seller must give delivery arrangements, costs and timing before an order is placed¹. It also says to give a copy of the contract in a form the customer can save¹. Treat those as UK rules only. Elsewhere, look at your own government's business site. A clear confirmation email is a good habit anywhere.

The reminder

A reminder is for pickup orders, or for deliveries that need someone at home. Keep it to a few lines:

1. The order, in a few words.
2. The pickup time or the delivery window.
3. Your shop hours and street address.
4. What to do if they're running late.

Send it the day before, or the morning of for same-day orders. If there's a rule about how long you'll hold an unclaimed bouquet, say so. Write it from your own policy and don't let the tool suggest one.

The delivery note

This is the one the customer may never see, so write it for the driver, and keep a version for the recipient. Cover:

• The recipient's name and the exact address.
• A phone number for the driver to use.
• Where to leave the flowers if nobody answers, such as a neighbour, a porch or a front desk. Get the sender's permission first.
• Anything the driver should do or avoid, for example "don't leave in direct sun."
• Whether the sender wants a photo of the delivered bouquet.

Don't let a draft invent a safe place. Only you and the customer know whether the porch is out of the weather.

Using a tool to draft them

Give the tool the order as plain facts and ask it to fill a template you've written. Something like: "Here's my confirmation template. Fill in these details and change nothing else." This works better than asking for a fresh message each time, because the structure stays the same.

Two cautions. First, a customer's name, address and phone number are personal information. Australia's privacy regulator advises against putting such details into public AI chat tools². If you do use a tool, put placeholders like NAME and ADDRESS in the request. Fill in the real details yourself afterwards. Outside Australia, check your own regulator's advice.

Second, one tool maker names wrong dates among the ways its model can fail³. It also says to treat the output as a draft you check yourself³. Dates are the usual slip. If a draft says "Saturday" and the order says Friday, the draft is wrong however well it reads.

Special days

Dates for gift days vary by country. Wikipedia puts Australia's Mother's Day on the second Sunday in May. Ireland and the UK use the fourth Sunday of Lent⁴. A template from one country can carry the wrong day for yours. See planning for Valentine's Day and Mother's Day for how to set cut-offs, and checking drafts for a routine to catch wrong dates.