After 34 years of service, Monday Morning Flower and Balloon Co., a mainstay of both Nassau Street and the Princeton Forrestal Village in Plainsboro Township, closed at the end of June. For all celebrations and ceremonies, they offered high quality flowers in an array — and arrangement — of types, colors and styles, eventually doing the same for balloons.
As they incorporated balloon décor in their services, owner Georgianne Vinicombe was able to learn from every arch, centerpiece and column. She started out as self-taught with no design experience, instead relying on her business background. When she spoke to U.S. 1 for a look back at her career, the entrepreneur was still cleaning out her space at 111 Main Street in Forrestal Village, which has been a site of many changes itself.
Alongside co-owner and husband Kevin Vinicombe, Georgianne constantly reimagined Monday Morning, incorporating the new while remaining cognizant of the classics. This especially factored into their approach to COVID-19, with the couple working seven days a week while growing the product line to include pre-packaged food baskets and goods.
Prior to the pandemic, the couple had been searching for potential candidates to take over the business. But when those efforts proved fruitless, they simultaneously announced their retirement and the final chapter of the store’s history.
“I would say this year was always a target date for us to be out of the business. We felt like that would be good timing for us both financially and age-wise,” Georgianne says, originally setting out “to situate the business in a way that would make it manageable for someone to purchase if they were interested.”
Unfortunately, COVID disrupted that process, but after “coming out on the other side” of the pandemic, the Vinicombes listed Monday Morning again for sale.
“We always thought there was a possibility that it wouldn’t sell. A lot of flower shops, over the last 30 years in Princeton, did not necessarily change hands,” she says. Following the dropping of the last offer, they began to inform their staff “fairly early, so that we could discuss as a team the best way to wind down the company,” Georgianne says.
Georgianne Vinicombe first founded Monday Morning Flowers in May, 1988.
Before she realized her budding desire for business, Vinicombe dreamt of going into TV production, with communications always pushing the gregarious go-getter in that direction. In college, she was informed that there would be few job prospects for her after graduation. Devastated, Vinicombe then worked in a city bank before realizing that instead of being a secretary, she wanted to have one — and swiftly switched to a management track.
Vinicombe reflects that she “was really made for entrepreneurship,” because when she thought back to her earlier occupations, she “never really fit in as being an employee.”
“I was always looking for responsibility,” Vincombe explains, never one to shy away from volunteering to be the person in charge.
“I think what happened was when I was working for other people, they either loved that about me, or they may have found it annoying. If I worked somewhere where they didn’t want me to make suggestions on how things could be done differently, or how we could be more efficient,” she says. She found herself feeling restrained or hindered, wanting to achieve more than the tasks assigned.
Vinicombe knew that “reinventing the job” sometimes meant reframing how to be more efficient, or provide better customer service, but as some positions declined to consider her advances, others gave her the freedom to be a leader.
“I noticed the jobs where I was the most successful in were the ones where they let me do my thing, and that, without me really realizing it, I was probably always better suited for being responsible for other people,” she says. “That was always in my personality.”
As a testament to that, at just age 23, Vinicombe established “Mrs. V’s Cleaning Service,” running it so efficiently that she returned to school to get both her AAS in management and small business management from Brookdale Community College.
Her Monday Morning concept first sprouted on a much smaller scale, using a subscription model to deliver fresh flowers at the start of the week “to small offices that wanted them for their lobbies — the business that full-service florists really might not have wanted because they were small bud vases and inexpensive,” Vinicombe said in a previous U.S. 1 article, “After 25 Years, Monday’s Every Day” from April, 2013.
She nearly completed a third degree in marketing, but with two small businesses to now oversee, Vinicombe shifted her priorities. She watched videos on composition to improve, so while her initial goals first seemed out of reach, she would later launch a successful YouTube channel highlighting their featured products.
In the beginning, Vinicombe was at the helm of all operations. After hiring a driver, then a floral designer, she was able to happily handle the service aspects of the business by ordering and processing flowers, meeting with clients, and assisting customers.
Vinicombe became “the orchestra leader that made all the pieces work together,” stepping back from arranging to fully manage the salesmanship side.
“I got into the flower business to have a business; I did not get into the flower business to be a designer. I do not have a green thumb, I live in a townhouse, and my husband waters the plants at home,” she says with a laugh, pleased to just earnestly enjoy flowers.
“When I was dabbling in flowers and doing my part-time with that, if you had said to me that 34 years later, I would still be in this industry, or in this business, I would have said no way. Because in my mind, I always had envisioned growing Monday Morning Flowers, and then selling it,” Vinicombe says of her intentions.
But the industry captivated Vinicombe, so she never moved on — especially after the internet and social media kept challenging her professionally.
“I have new things I’m always having to learn and always having to do. I will say that some people, they might find that overwhelming. I found that that’s what kept me passionate and excited about still being in industry.”
It also helped that her husband, Kevin, officially joined the business in 2002. His background in accounting and MBA from Rider University led him to be the perfect candidate for handling office aspects such as payroll, and he was already well acquainted with the shop.
While customers gave their sincerest goodbyes these past months, some inquired about their second location in Yardley, Pennsylvania, which opened in 1998. Perhaps unbeknownst “to the average person that knew our business,” Georgianne explains, the Vinicombes’ lease ended there about five years ago following nearly two decades in operation.
With transfer of services between locations, “nothing really had changed” for customers upon its closure. By “folding everything over” from Yardley to Plainsboro, Vinicombe says that they were able to give “the consumer in Bucks County, and out here, more of a consistent experience.”
“They weren’t talking to different team members, there weren’t different designers. It was all coming from here, so it really made sense, and in the long run, it was one of our better business decisions to do that,” she explains.
In 1999, when Georgianne needed to move from her original Princeton spot as soon as possible, it was Forrestal Village that offered her the last retail space available — she calls the ordeal a “karmic experience” after the panic of not knowing where to go or her next move.
“It was a stressful time, and Forrestal Village made it a very easy decision for me. The rent was right, the location was right, and I still love being here, but obviously, it’s completely changed around me — which was due to no fault of the Village. It was just really the way retail was going, and the way the business environment was going,” she says, fondly reflecting that “everyone felt like I was here from the beginning, even though that wasn’t true.”
Years ago, Forrestal Village was conceptualized to be a leader in the retail and office spaces, with its open-air layout an attempt to compete against other bustling shopping areas such as downtown Princeton’s Palmer Square. Unable to beat out existing competitors, the Village instead switched to hosting outlet stores.
In recent years, it has also added medical facilities on-site as well as a Westin hotel, restaurants Ruth’s Chris Steak House and Salt Creek Grille, and various other tenants. As the Village fluctuated, Georgianne expanded her original property to include a refrigeration unit, production area, and even an office around the corner.
The Vinicombes rented a new storage space to not just separate their home life from their work environment, but also for if they consider consulting in the future. Currently, the couple plans to spend more time with loved ones and travel in what Georgianne refers to as their “honeymoon period of retirement.”
While the Vinicombes have not ruled out helping others, they both want to relax before making that decision, doing so on their own terms.
“If they really come to us, they have to be serious that they’re looking for some help. We would find that way more rewarding than just having people hit us with problem after problem, and they’re not going to do anything about it,” Georgianne says, leading into her observations about entrepreneurship as a whole.
“I did not start my business in the right way. Being a little more knowledgeable is good,” she says, noting that with the internet, especially Facebook, it has been easier for people to reach out for help. Vinicombe congratulates those who do, because back in the day, she wished she accepted that outstretched hand of advice and support before online networking.
“Don’t be too shy to ask for advice or help, and then once someone gives it to you, you have to be open minded towards it,” Vinicombe continues. “If you hire people, especially if they have experience, you’re paying for their experience, so you might as well listen to what they have to say.”
Because of her earlier days where others discredited her ideas, Vinicombe says, she greatly emphasizes the importance of listening to employees. It was her hope that she evaluated their ideas with a thorough discussion rather than discouragement.
If Monday Morning Flowers stayed in operation, or was handed over to a new owner, Georgianne admits that she and Kevin would have made other changes as well.
“My biggest advice that I’ve always given people that either are thinking of starting a business, or in business now, is you just have to always think from the point of view of that you are in service to other people. I’ve met many business owners over the years that tried to start businesses to do what they wanted to do, and I will always say, ‘you have to do what the customer needs, and what the customer wants you to do,’” she explains.
However, in awareness of the modern market, Vinicombe says that every side plays an equal role.
“You can’t help others until you help yourself, and in helping yourself, that means you have to have a viable business. You have to have a profitable, viable business, and that is a very difficult position to straddle, because you want to give the customer what they want, but you have to give it to them in a way that makes sense for you financially,” she explains.
She previously repeated the mantra of “never say no,” but now, focusing on the enterprise’s financial needs can mean putting a foot down “so that you are being responsible to your suppliers, yourself, and your employees … if your business is not financially stable, you’re not putting yourself in a position to be there for the customer years from now.”
Vinicombe also recommends thinking of operations as a pyramid, with customers at the top, management in the middle, and employees on the bottom, to help visualize the big picture.
“Management had to somewhat be in the middle because we had to service the customer in a way that makes sense for them, and we had to be in a position that we could pay our employees at the bottom of that pyramid. No matter how you looked at it, employees are not possible unless management does a good job running a fiscally responsible organization, but then that’s why the customer has to be first.”
Instead of designing flowers for personal satisfaction, it was also imperative to Vinicombe that prospective hires understood making the customer happy with the finished product — both on the sending and receiving ends — held more importance than a personal aesthetic or preference.
“If you’re doing something and you’re trying to serve only your own needs, then it’s not going to succeed that way,” she continues. “An opportunity like Forrestal Village came up as an opportunity for me and I took it, balloon decorating came up as an opportunity for me and I took it, social media came up as an opportunity and I took it. It wasn’t what I originally had set out to do.”
“If I had stayed with that, my business would never have been able to take all these twists and turns, which grew me to be a fiscally responsible company,” Vinicombe says. “Whenever people have asked me about business, that’s what I’ve always said: be in service of others, do it in a way that’s profitable for you, and don’t be closed minded, just change with the times if needed. Sometimes you just have to be willing to make a change, or again, be responsible for yourself, and be responsible for others.”
While Monday Morning “stepped a little bit back from” weddings closer to its final days in operation, those were one of the features that Vinicombe expressed the most pride for. Her goal was to ensure that each order differed, so her genuine love of every flower helped, as she took “great joy” in helping elevate the event.
At their peak, the business did seven weddings in a weekend and an average of 120 a year, driven by the desire to let couples “express what flowers made them happy,” she says.
Still, Vinicombe recommends not starting out as “shoestring” as she did.
“It was definitely a struggle, and if I had to do it over again, I wish I’d had a little more information about what I was doing — but in the long run, it all worked out,” she says. “If I had known how hard it was going to be, I think I would have been maybe a little bit too frightened, so I think ignorance sometimes can be good, because you don’t know what you don’t know, so you’re not scared.”
Vinicombe says that her and Kevin’s favorite moment was when longtime customers Walter and Holly came in together, a bottle of wine in hand. They were the clients for one of the first weddings that Monday Morning Flowers ever helped with.
Since their marriage about 25 years ago, the two had been constantly giving flowers to each other, visiting for the last time once Georgianne reached out to tell them about the business’s imminent closing.
She had not seen them as a unit in years, given that Georgianne did not personally deliver their tokens of enduring love, but the two gave them “the most delightful card with a little drawing and said that their marriage worked because they had us to send flowers back and forth,” she fondly recalls.
“I have a lot of great memories, but I think now, as an enclosing one, that one comes to mind because of such a long relationship with them, and then just the way that they came in at the end is amazing,” she says, adding that “they were customers, literally, to the end.”
Georgianne Vinicombe does not take the way that Monday Morning “touched lives” lightly — her relationships and interactions with customers, as well as employees, were always just as important to her as the beauty of the fresh flowers.
The Vinicombes will likely continue to visit botanical gardens and other floral paradises in their free time, but as the endlessly entrepreneurially spirited Georgianne says, she constantly wonders about how to best be of service yet again.
