A bouquet sent across the country used to sit in coolers for days, passing through a wire service and a local florist before it reached the door. Jared Polis, a young internet entrepreneur, founded ProFlowers in 1998 to skip all that. Customers ordered online, and the stems shipped in a box straight from the farm. By the time its parent, Provide Commerce, went public in December 2003, ProFlowers was one of the largest flower sellers online.

No Florist, No Warehouse

The bet was that cutting out the middle of the supply chain would mean fresher flowers and lower prices. ProFlowers carried almost no inventory. Growers packed and shipped each order, and Provide Commerce's software coordinated the work. The company later applied the same model to gourmet foods and fruit, and it bought rival gift sellers. Demand came in steep seasonal peaks. The software had to handle a few huge days each year.

Valentine's Day at Scale

Provide Commerce priced its IPO at $15 a share in December 2003 and listed on Nasdaq. Sales grew around big gift holidays such as Valentine's Day and Mother's Day, and the company kept buying other businesses. In 2006 Liberty Media bought Provide Commerce for about $477 million. Jared Polis left the business world for a career in politics. The ProFlowers brand continued under later owners for many years.

Cover: Two Poppies, Yokoyama Seiki. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for two poppies (straight from the field).