Farmhouse Floral Design in Middleburgh. Photos by Chris English.
Owner Jess Beretz at her Farmhouse Floral Design business in Middleburgh.
Owner Jess Beretz tends to flowers at her Farmhouse Floral Design business in Middleburgh.
By Chris English
MIDDLEBURGH — Growing up on her family's farm in Schoharie, Jess Beretz developed deep agricultural roots.
So, it's no big surprise that she now owns her own floral business, Farmhouse Floral Design at 207 Mill Valley Road in Middleburgh. However, the journey to that destination was not a straight shot for the 2005 Schoharie Central School graduate.
After years of helping to grow crops, tending livestock, keeping bees and many other things agricultural on the Hessian Hill Farm in Schoharie now run by her sister and brother-in-law, Beretz ventured forth to college. She earned a bachelor's degree in Animal Science from SUNY Cobleskill and a master's degree in Education from North Carolina State.
"Growing up, I always gardened with my grandfather and my mother," she explained in a recent interview at Farmhouse Floral. "I have always enjoyed picking and arranging flowers but didn't start considering it as a career path until after I moved back to the family property after grad school. When I moved back home from North Carolina, I started growing there and got into a few farmer's markets and did just that for awhile.
"At the same time, a bunch of my girlfriends from high school and college were getting married, and I was doing their wedding florals. I had taken some classes as like a credit filler in college."
Step by step, the path that brought her to where she is now became more clear for Beretz. She was in her fourth year teaching special education at Schoharie Central while at the same time running a floral business when she arrived at a crossroads.
"I never looked at it as a (full-time) career until my son was born," Beretz noted. "When he was born, I was teaching at Schoharie and trying to do gardening and farmer's markets at the same time and it got to where it was too much. I took a year's leave from teaching to focus fully on the floral business. That was nine years ago and I never went back to teaching."
Her business, now in its 12th year, operated for many years from a location on Main Street in Middleburgh before moving to its current spot at the beginning of 2023. Beretz rents two buildings and an acre of ground there for her own business while also managing an airbnb on the same property, called Farmhouse Under The Nose, for a friend.
Jess' husband John Beretz is also a business owner and is now in his 17th year of operating John's Firewood and Tree Service in Middleburgh. The two help out with each other's ventures when needed.
"He's my handyman," said Jess of her husband. "He built all the flowerbeds and brought in all the top soil. He's my moral support."
Jess Beretz describes Farmhouse Floral Design as a full-service florist, providing floral arrangements for weddings, funerals, memorials and other events while also "everyday florals" to anyone to wants to come in and buy a floral arrangement for whatever reason. The business can supply just about any type of flower, she emphasized.
"We offer same day delivery," said Beretz. "If we have special requests, we do ask for 24-hour notice so if it's something we don't have right there, we have time to either go ourselves to a wholesaler in Albany or have it delivered to us.
"We grow as much as we can right here on the property and also work with other local growers during the growing season. When it's not growing season, we work with a wholesale market that can bring flowers in internationally for us."
Beretz has one full-time employee, Leanne Baker, and two part-time employees who work on an as-needed basis. Farmhouse Floral Design was able to weather the Coronavirus pandemic that impacted so many businesses across the globe in 2020.
"We fully shut down a lot of that year," Beretz recalled. "Our main business is weddings, and we did 10 that whole year as compared to 75 in a normal year. Then, the year after Covid, there was a huge boom in the entire wedding industry _ not just florists but caterers, DJs, photographers, everyone _ as we all had this huge mad dash to get through all the rescheduled events.
"Slowly, that pendulum has swung back down so we're now at a more manageable level of work coming in. It's very consistent, it's steady and we're very happy with where we're at. There's enough work for the team, enough work for everyone to go around."
In more than a decade of owning and operating a floral business, Beretz has learned a few things.
"Trying to be the biggest doesn't always make you the best," she said. "You can easily overextend yourself financially and physically in a small space when it comes to florals. You can have high impact florals without having to have a five-acre farm. That's kind of the business model for myself, that less is more. I focus on what I know I'm good at and try not to add in a lot of other things just because it may bring in a small stream of revenue."
Farmhouse Floral Design is at 207 Mill Valley Road, roughly a mile off of State Route 30, in Middleburgh. The business is open year round with hours of 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and by appointment on Tuesdays and Saturdays, and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and by appointment Wednesdays through Fridays. The business is closed for stop-by customers on Sundays and Mondays, with those days reserved only for appointments.
For more information, call Farmhouse Floral Design at 518-701-4964, email farmhousefloraldesign@gmail.com or visit the website shopfarmhousefloraldesign.com. Anyone interested can also visit the establishment's Facebook (facebook.com/farmhousefloraldesign) or Instagram pages.
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