Growing Flowers, Seeds and a Business, with Erin Benzakein of Floret Flower Farm

Metus dictum at tempor commodo

The Origin of Floret Flower Farm

Erin says she and Chris were like high school sweethearts — they met each other at boarding school. They worked in Seattle but wanted to get out and move to the country.

“When our kids were born, we just wanted to have a more kind of wholesome, slower-paced life, something more connected to nature,” she says. “We really just wanted to raise them in a more wholesome environment. So we left Seattle when our kids were really small, and we moved to the country. And Chris was working full-time, I was home with the kids and trying to figure out what the heck am I going to do all day besides just being with the kids.”

She says she is energetic and passionate and loves growing things, but wondered, “What do I want to be when I grow up?” 

Erin tried different business ideas. At one point she had 100 chickens and tried to do a rainbow egg business. She planted an orchard for a cider business but didn’t think about how many years it would take the trees to mature, and she grew vegetables.

“I tried everything in our backyard, and eventually I stumbled onto flowers,” she says.

Flowers were a part of her childhood. She recalls how when she spent time with her great-grandmother in the summer, her great-grandmother would have her go pick bouquets and bring them in for her bedside table.

“When she passed away, I planted sweet peas, which were her favorite flower in my garden, and they were like the beginning of everything,” Erin says. “They bloomed so incredibly that first year. I cut a bouquet of them, took them to the neighbors, gave them away to everybody. And then I got my first official flower order for $5.”

When she delivered the flowers, she expected to just drop them off and go, but when the client opened the door, accepted the bouquet and took a big whiff, they bonded over the memories that sweet peas elicited for both of them. 

“It really struck me in that moment how quickly we connected, even though we were total strangers, but it was through nostalgia, memories and flowers,” Erin says. “So that’s when I really knew, like, this is what I want to do. I don’t know what that looks like. I don’t know what that means, but flowers and me, there’s something there.”

That $5 jar of sweet peas started everything that became what Floret Farm is today.

Erin emphasizes that Floret Farm was not an overnight success. She’s worked at it for about 20 years, with slow, steady growth, and she and Chris started to really get serious about it in 2008. They started out as flower farmers, selling bunches and bouquets. They landed Whole Foods as a client, delivering flowers all over the Pacific Northwest. The business evolved into teaching and writing books, and then a seed company.

Floret Flower Farm is located in Skagit Valley, in the northwest corner of Washington state. (Photo Credit: Chris Benzakein, Floret)

Floret Farm and ‘Growing Floret’

Floret Farm is located in Skagit Valley, about an hour north of Seattle. “And it’s some of the best farmland in the United States,” Erin says. “It’s incredible. It’s this little tiny beautiful pocket of magic.”

They now have 24 acres, after starting out with just 2 acres. It was only recently that they bought the neighbor’s farm and expanded.

Magnolia Network approached Erin and Chris about filming a documentary series about their farm just as they were preparing to transform their newly acquired land. Erin is a self-described introvert and says she finds being in front of a camera easier than being in a group, but she found the production company they worked with, from Portland, to be “a match made in heaven.”

The production company is Blue Chalk Media.

“If it had been anybody but them, we would never have done it,” Erin says. She described Blue Chalk Media as great people, a small team, that agreed they would all tell a real and honest story.

“We also were able to set really great boundaries,” Erin adds. “Like, we don’t want to do a lot of time with our family, or there were things that were off-limits from the beginning, and everyone respected that. But weirdly, I have a very easy time with a camera, but I have a very hard time with people in real life.”

Who is behind the camera makes a difference. 

“The cinematographers that I’ve worked with, they’re all like the most peaceful, grounded, chill people,” she says, “and they just put you at ease and you forget that the camera is there.”

She describes it as feeling like talking to a friend, and forgetting you’re being recorded. 

Her husband, Chris, is now behind the camera much of the time. He started filming in season one when Erin needed to be really calm and comfortable in front of the camera, and it worked so well that he did much more of the cinematography for season two. 

“I feel that I can be unguarded and completely myself, and he’s so grounded and peaceful and calm that we’re just in the moment, which is incredible,” Erin says.

It’s clear when watching the show that Chris is letting Erin be Erin, as those natural moments come through, including long pauses as she soaks in the scenery and watches the birds fly over. He’s just letting that moment happen.