Pittsfield — After more than four decades of arranging flowers, tending to plants, and offering agricultural advice to Pittsfield residents, Jodi’s Seasonal founders and owners Andrea and Dave Blessing will soon be closing the greenhouse doors for the last time.
“It’s pretty demanding, you know,” Dave Blessing said of the business’s day-to-day operations. “And the workforce is hard to come by.” Now in their 70s, the couple is hanging up their gardening aprons and looking forward to retirement after the sale of the business to an agricultural company that is slated for early January, with the details under wraps until the deal is completed.
After 40 years, the pair have logged many fond memories. Dave Blessing recalled the unlikely start of the family’s florist business back in 1984. After 20 years working in the plastics industry, his employer sold the business, and he was left without a job until the couple stumbled upon the 717 Crane Avenue property. Intending to create a variety store on the tract, an administrative error required additional permits and rezoning to create that dream—and a lot more time than the couple had anticipated. Without going through the extra hoops, the Blessings were told they could only use the property as a greenhouse. “We both had a little experience, but nothing to this extent,” Dave Blessing said. “And, the rest is history. We built it as we grew. We had quite a fun time here.”
He said he went from earning $21 an hour to paying himself $6 per hour to build the business, reconstructing the rustic main building and adding outbuildings with his own hands. “The first thing I did was mow the four-foot grass,” Dave Blessing said of the property’s 1984 closing.
Although the change was abrupt for the young family that included five-year-old daughter and namesake Jodi, the move soon became a family affair, and one that has continued to this day, with both Jodi Blessing and 11-year-old granddaughter Brielle Blessing tending to the shop as well. “It’s been my whole life too,” Jodi said of the store. She recalled childhood ice skating parties held on the property’s frozen pond, complete with pizza, hot cocoa, and friends. Dave Blessing even constructed a raft for his daughter to enjoy on the water.
“I’m looking forward to them being able to retire,” Jodi said of her parents. “A lot of hard work and love went into [the business] over the years. Like any change, it’s bittersweet.”
Dave Blessing attributes the longevity of Jodi’s Seasonal to “quality.” “We weren’t the cheapest place in town, but we grew some fantastic stuff,” Dave said. “My wife ended up being a fantastic florist and, between my engineering and her flower ability, we could make anything that anybody wanted.” He recalled instances where the couple designed a motorcycle made from flowers in sympathy to an individual who died in a motorcycle accident, as well as a large arrangement in the shape of scissors for a hair stylist. “We were high on personal service,” Dave said, recalling the time he helped change out a planter for a customer or tried saving a Christmas Cactus that had been in a family for years.
With floral arrangements made over the phone and then delivered, he said the business was surprisingly very successful during the pandemic. “If you think about it, people couldn’t visit, so they sent flowers more,” said Dave, adding that Jodi’s Seasonal also provided propane, a side business that helped keep them afloat at the time.
For Andrea Blessing, the shuttering brings back memories of the store’s feral cat, dubbed “The Greenhouse Cat,” that had been living in the barn before Andrea lured it inside by dribbling roast beef toward the door. With a little coaxing, Dave consented to the feline becoming a greenhouse tenant, and it soon became a favorite fixture of their customers.
But, most of all, Andrea’s fondness for the property stems from the throngs of ducks residing on the pond, a tally she estimates to be about 200 waterfowl. “I’ve been feeding the ducks for 40 years,” she reminisced.
After spending holidays and weekends at the store, Dave said his first order of business upon retirement will be to organize their Pittsfield home. For many years, the couple put 80-hour weeks into the shop, including one Valentine’s Day season manning 325 deliveries and a fall which saw the sale of 3,000 pumpkins, he said. “We didn’t have holidays,” Dave said. “We made people’s holidays.”
As far as his customers are concerned, Dave said he can “do nothing but thank them,” with some having stuck around for the full 40 years of business. “A lot of them moved out of town when [Pittsfield employer General Electric Company] left, and, of course, many of them have passed away,” Dave said. Some of the longtimers stopped by recently to bid the Blessings “farewell” during their inventory sale.
With two decades of loyalty, Dalton resident Debbie Farrell stepped into the store for a final visit on December 30 after initially being lured in by the unique deep purple petunias only carried by Jodi’s. She left with succulents and glass containers she intends to transform into terrariums, as a souvenir. “That way, I’ll always have a piece of [Jodi’s] saved,” Farrell said.
Since the retirement announcement, according to Dave, workdays at Jodi’s Seasonal have brought in “tons of people.” “They were very happy,” he said. “And that’s what we’re about.”
