Outside the Office: Ron Watts grows flowers for father-daughter business

As a pastor, Rev. Ron Watts is always planting seeds. Scripture uses this metaphor of sowing and reaping throughout the Old and New Testaments. But for Watts, planting and harvesting are not just metaphors for the divine.

Watts likes getting his hands dirty. He studies the dirt. He makes his own compost. And he nurtures the half-acre lot in the back of his Cape Girardeau home for growing plants.

His daily duties as pastor of LaCroix Church in Cape Girardeau mostly require the labor of the soul and the mind, not the body. In his spare time, Watts gardens, because he likes the physical nature of the work. Now, he’s growing flowers along with his daughter, and together they sell bouquets as a side hobby.

His daughter Stephanie Heffner lives in St. Louis. Heffner obtained a degree in interior design, which she’s not yet had the chance to use in her professional life. But she has an eye for beauty, and a few years ago, Heffner and Watts began dreaming about the possibilities of combining the father’s talent for growing things with the daughter’s talent for making things beautiful.

Flowers are arranged in one of the Ferrari Flowers bouquets. Rev. Ron Watts and his daughter Stephanie Heffner grow tulips, daffodils, ranunculus and anemones, among other flowers. (Photo submitted by Ron Watts.)

“A few years ago, there was kind of this whole subculture of small operations of locally grown vegetables, produce and flowers,” Watts said. “And there’s a niche of people out there promoting it on YouTube and so forth. She and I started talking about what it would look like if we did something with flowers.”

The result was a small startup side business called Ferrari Flowers. While spelled like the famous sports car brand, the name comes from Watts’s mother’s maiden name, pronounced ferr-AIR-ree. Watts’s mother’s parents were Italian immigrants.

For most of Watts’s gardening years, he’s mainly grown food items, along with sunflowers. Now, he has 10 raised flowerbeds. Between the father and daughter, they’ve planted 1,200 bulbs for next year.

There are two seasons for growing flowers: spring and summer. The tulips and daffodils come to life in early spring — the two main flowers Ferrari Flowers uses. In mid to late spring, they harvest ranunculus and anemones, larkspur and snapdragons, among others. Then in the summer, they grow zinnias, roses, black-eyed susans, eucalyptus, sunflowers, strawflower, cosmos and basil.

Watts and Heffner launched their first pop-up sale in Watts’s driveway in Cape Girardeau a couple of years ago. This past year, they sold bouquets at the Cape Girardeau Farmer’s Market every other weekend.

Watts has always enjoyed the earthy nature of gardening. But combining his hobby with his daughter has all new kinds of benefits. Watts said they’re not yet making a profit off their growing and selling, but that’s not the point.

“This has been a wonderful creative outlet for my daughter,” Watts said. “What it is for me is a wonderful connection with my daughter, and that’s worth it to me. We’re on the phone every day in the growing season. We’re buying bulbs, buying seeds. Her dream is to have this flower business.”

Watts said the key to growing beautiful flowers is the soil. He said Missouri soil is clay-based, which is why he adds compost and topsoil together. Although he makes a lot of his own compost, he can’t make enough for all his beds, so he supplements with purchased compost.

Rev. Ron Watts grows flowers in his backyard to use in Ferrari Flower arrangements. Watts creates his own compost for his flower beds.

Heffner turns the flowers into bouquets. She also has provided flowers for a few weddings.

Watts said they’ve sold more and more flowers at the farmer’s markets. At the last one, they sold almost 90 bouquets. They also offer a subscription service online.

He said some entrepreneurs have been able to make a living off lots about the same size as his.

He hopes his daughter will someday be able to turn the business into full-time income. For now, he’s enjoying helping her, and seeing her more often. The water, the soil, the bulbs and compost ultimately will yield beautiful tulips and other types of flowers to be shared with hundreds of people.

But the ultimate harvest, Watts said, is watching his daughter’s talent come to life.