Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Lincoln teen’s business is blooming
LINCOLN — Carter Collins, 19, opened Carter’s Flowers and More on Bean Street, just off Lincoln Square, in February, and nearly three months later, he and his shop are thriving.
He’s wanted a flower shop “forever,” and if he couldn’t have had it, he thinks he probably would be pumping gas somewhere.
He said opening a week before Valentine’s Day was a risk, and he ordered so many flowers that they filled his large, professional-grade cooler, his entire shop, the front sidewalk and a trailer out back.
“I had seven days to order and no clue if I’d sell them,” he said.
Turns out, he sold every last one of them and had to order more.
“The day before Valentine’s, people were lined up out the door and down the sidewalk.”
He got traffic as late as 10 p.m. that day and the next day from folks leaving La Villa Mexican Restaurant, which is two doors east.
He and his aunt, Tonya Benton, who goes by T.T., worked all day Feb. 12, stayed up all night that night, worked all the next day, slept for a few hours on blow-up mattresses on the floor in the back of the shop, and then worked all day Valentine’s Day until the last order was done.
Carter said he couldn’t have done it without the help and support of T.T., his parents Rusty and Charity Collins, Nana Kay Collins, and many other family members as well as friends. They made deliveries, took orders, answered phones, helped customers, and did whatever needed to be done. This allowed Carter to focus on his natural talent, honed by certified training, of creating memorable flower arrangements.
LEARNING IN THE GARDEN
Carter’s dream to have his own, full-service flower shop had its genesis from working in the garden as a youngster with his great-grandparents Gilbert and Betty Copeland, who lived in Dutch Mills, about 10 miles southwest of Lincoln near the Arkansas/ Oklahoma state line.
He said he was the only one of his many cousins who was interested in learning about gardening, canning, cooking, and, yes, arranging flowers. He said his first arrangements involved dandelions.
When he was 9 years old, he came to the realization that what he wanted was his own flower shop.
From that moment on, his purpose and focus were set. He immediately opened a Looney Tunes account at Arvest Bank and saved money religiously, to the extent that when he opened his shop this February, 10 years later, he paid for most of it himself, with some help from his parents.
When Carter turned 11, he asked for a KitchenAid mixer and a greenhouse for his birthday. He got both. He said he ended up having a total of four greenhouses, two traditional hard-sided and two hoop houses, all 10 feet x 20 feet. He never advertised but had enough connections to sell all the hanging baskets he created and vegetables he grew.
Besides that kind of learning, Carter created opportunities to learn and practice making arrangements. For instance, he watched videos created by The Floral Institute out of Portland, Ore., to learn corsage-making. He took notes, followed the instructions and created his first corsage. Then, he took it apart and did it again, over and over, until he had the hang of it.
OVERCOMING A MYSTERY ILLNESS
Carter, who is nearly 6 feet tall, wears glasses, has a mop of dark hair, dresses casually, has a positive, can-do attitude and a happy self-confidence, but he’s had some major bumps in his relatively short life span.
In middle school, he suffered a strange illness that left him extremely tired. He seemed to recover, then in high school, the illness came back, this time with a muscle or nerve spasm that locked his head to his shoulder for two months. Then, in February 2021, “it just stopped.”
His last bout of illness happened during his senior year, 2022-23. He missed so much school he wasn’t going to graduate, but he was determined to get his diploma on time.
He contacted Northwest Technical Institute, enrolled in graduate equivalency diploma testing, and completed his GED diploma within two weeks. He graduated with other GED diploma-earners on May 17, 2023.
No diagnosis of his illnesses was ever confirmed despite tests of all kinds, and the illnesses were finally attributed to some kind of autoimmune disorder.
Carter said, “I’m completely over all of it now. There’ve been no lasting effects. It’s like a miracle.”
AN ENTREPRENEUR
Carter worked at Flowers-N-Friends in Prairie Grove during high school, and he continued there after graduation. Then, on Dec. 4, 2023, he decided he was ready to take the next step, especially after Kendra Moore of Redeem Construction in Lincoln recruited him to a newly renovated and painted retail space.
She told him, “Lincoln needs you.” Carter said he took one look and knew the space was perfect.
Another draw was his high school friend Ava Pinkerton had opened a shop right next door, between him and La Villa, called Baron Fork Clothing Company. On a recent weekday morning, Pinkerton was in and out prior to opening her shop’s doors, borrowing change and bantering with Carter, Nana, and Carter’s maternal grandmother Tammy Willis.
SEEKING ADVANCED EDUCATION
Besides the practical experience of working in someone else’s flower shop for nearly three years, Carter is professionally trained and a certified Arkansas Master Florist. He said, “It’s an old flower school out of Little Rock. I had to travel there once a month for six months, create arrangements using assigned designs, complete testing, and keep logs of my work.”
He graduated with his AMF certificate on Aug. 25, 2023, and it was during his volunteer help cleaning up afterward that one of his mentors, Ken Senter, gave him the book “Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative,” by Austin Kleon.
Senter wrote Carter a note inside that said, “Wishing you the best success in your floral journey. Thanks for all your help. Keep blooming.” Senter’s autograph is followed by the initials AIFD, American Institute of Floral Design.
Carter said having an AIFD certification is the crowning achievement for professional florists because they are then certified to work anywhere, in any state.
Carter’s skills and natural talents were notable at the school and to Senter, for he has been nominated to become a certified master florist, or CMF, and Senter told him, “You will do great things. Keep in touch.”
Besides completing the CMF program, one of Carter’s goals is to become a wholesaler, meaning he’d travel to the places where flowers are grown and place orders for direct shipment to his facilities.
Other goals are to have a space where he can showcase his designs for big events and a community garden where he can teach.
None of this is scripted, there is no land or space yet, but Carter said he likes to “reach for the stars” and has faith he will find the resources, people and materials.
Carter said he named his shop “and more” because he couldn’t list all the things he offers for sale besides flowers and plants. “And more” includes furniture such as china hutches, buffets, chests of drawers, mirrors, tables, shelves, chairs; home décor such as throw pillows, rugs, vases, wall decorations, kitchen linens; gifts such as stuffed animals, balloons, fruit baskets; and miscellaneous items that he thinks his customers might like.
His father owns Collins Auctioneering, and Carter learned from him what to look for in furniture. The furniture for sale in the shop is partly from what his father finds, but Nana pointed out that Carter has a sharp eye and finds just as many pieces on his own.
The shop’s large front windows face south and let in copious light which is reflected on white walls. Those things and high ceilings give the shop an expansive, airy, light feeling.
Colorful and eye-pleasing groupings and clusters of all sorts of items and textures, especially Carter’s hyper-realistic silk flower arrangements, line the walls and fill the floor of the front half of the shop. Carter said he moves things around once a week so that return customers may see something new and interesting.
The back half of the shop is devoted to his large cooler unit, shelves, racks, bins, tubs of flowers, flat work surfaces, ribbon spools, vases, green forms, fabrics, wire, multiple tools and whatever else needed to make any kind of arrangement for any kind of event or life circumstance. Carter said no order is too big or too small.
He said the only thing he’s struggled with is people not believing he’s the boss, that it’s hard for people to wrap their minds around someone his age being a professional florist who is responsible and trustworthy. He grinned, shook it away with a soft laugh and got to work.
Carters Flowers and More is located at 117 W. Bean Street, Lincoln, Ark. Find more information on the web at cartersflowers. com. Contact the store by emailing cartersflowersandmore@gmail.com, or call 479-824-8700.