Robin Winkler-Rubin works from a shoe box of a store selling flowers on Devonshire Street, a downtown fixture dwarfed by skyscrapers and yards away from the Old State House.
She knows from 30 years of experience running Robin’s Flower Shop that Wednesday will be one of her busiest days of the year — Admins Day, when bosses all over Boston’s financial district and elsewhere downtown buy flowers for their administrative assistants.
Her store covers a mere 80 square feet. On warm days, the flowers surround the outside of the shop in rows, stacked on shelves four or five high. At night, the flowers are moved inside, with no heating, to allow them to naturally cool.
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“I don’t necessarily color block,” Winkler-Rubin said of her entranceway, referring to arranging flowers by color, regardless of their type. “But I like keeping like flowers and like prices together, cause I think it’s easier for the clients to differentiate between them. It’s not all scattered.”
Winkler-Rubin has had a lot of time to consider the best way of organizing her inventory. She went into business with her brother in 1985, selling flowers out of a kiosk on Boylston Street. Soon, the business moved to the cozy space it occupies downtown.
These days, displays are less ornate than they were in the ’80s, which, according to Winkler-Rubin, was the heyday of flower-selling. “If you could have been here then,” she said, “my display was outrageously crazy, with the amount of flowers.”
But she still works long days, describing her hours as “early to late.” The shop is open every weekday from 7:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. Even on the busiest flower-buying days of the year, including Mother’s Day and Valentine’s Day, when lines can stretch down the block, the store has been a one-woman operation.
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Winkler-Rubin’s brother died some years ago, and she credits him with the longevity of her business. “For me, being here, it’s just a lot of things,” she said. “Being able to still be here after 30 years, and having all the skills that I have because of him . . . it works, and I’m blessed.”
