Magnolia Flower Merchants Gateway

Came up to Gateway with the intention of ordering a bunch of flowers sent to a local high school as a surprise birthday gift.nnAfter a quick lesson from the florist that ‘earthy colours’ actually meant Native Flowers (each to their own I guess), we told the florist we didn’t want natives or the Lily’s she was suggesting, after all we could get Lily’s at Coles or Woolies for a much lower prince tag.nnWe looked at a few options, waiting for the florist to suggest something, she pointed out nothing at all suggesting we probably couldn’t afford anything within our price range of $60-$70, which she told us was their minimum spend.nnFeeling like paupers we ended up suggesting maybe a Purple -ish colour with some cheaper fillers or green foliage that was within the price range. No Lily’s though!nnOver to the cash register and there is a $22 delivery free within Palmerston (!!) which seemed highly over priced considering the high school is only 5 minutes away at best.nnWe paid $82 for a bunch of Lily’s which we specifically asked not to include in the bouquet, all of which were not open anyway so the birthday girl had flower buds galore but no so many flowers. It may have looked much nicer than the photo shows if there had been one or two Lily’s opened?nnThere were also some magnolias (?) maybe in the bouquet as well, so that was nice.nnThis price was high and so was delivery in comparison to other florists around Darwin and Palmerston who have had my custom for over 20 years.nnThis business maybe caters more to weddings and large events? The shop itself is beautiful with gifts and smells like a dream.