ALEXANDRIA, VA — An unswerving dedication to improving and elevating the industry through nationwide marketing has earned Charles F. Kremp 3rd, AAF, of Kremp Florist in Philadelphia, the industry’s highest honor, the Society of American Florists (SAF) Floriculture Hall of Fame.
“For more than 40 years, the floral industry has benefited from Charles’ commitment and energy to build important programs, pursue opportunities for growth and tackle challenging projects,” said awards committee chair Chuck Johnson, AAF, of Smithers Oasis North America, as he presented the honoree. The surprise announcement was the highlight of an evening of recognition Sept. 15 at the Industry Awards Dinner during SAF Palm Springs 2011, the association's 127th Annual Convention.
Referring to Kremp’s involvement with a series of national marketing efforts, going back to SAF’s American Floral Marketing Council in the 1980s and early 1990s, the national marketing order Promoflor and, most recently, the Floral Marketing Funding Initiative Coalition, Johnson said, “an eternal optimist with a never-say-never attitude, Charles has worked relentlessly to promote the industry and create new pathways for progress.”
The SAF Floriculture Hall of Fame designation recognizes an individual who has made lasting contributions to the floral industry.
Read the full text of the Floriculture Hall of Fame presentation below.
SAF Floriculture Hall of Fame Tribute to Charles F. Kremp 3rd, AAF
(Presented by Chuck Johnson, AAF on Sept. 15, 2011, at the Westin Mission Hills ResortRancho Mirage, Calif.)
It’s been said by philosophers and other deep thinkers that a man is the sum total of all his experiences. If that is true, then Charles F. Kremp 3rd is one extraordinary man.
For more than 40 years, the floral industry has benefited from Charles’s commitment and energy to build important programs, pursue opportunities for growth and tackle challenging projects. An eternal optimist with a never-say-never attitude, Charles has worked relentlessly to promote the industry and create new pathways for progress.
His efforts on behalf of the industry literally have taken him around the globe and to seats of power in Washington, D.C., but also to floral businesses in every corner of our nation, large or small, successful or struggling, well-established or just getting started.
In fact, Charles has focused so much of his energy on giving back to the industry it’s easy to forget that he also has built his own business into one of the country’s premier retail flower shops.
If you were to ask 10 people what they think Charles is most recognized for, nine of those would assuredly say “nationwide marketing.” With an intensity unmatched in the industry, Charles’s passion for national marketing has played itself out on a wide range of industry stages. Charles was chairman of SAF’s American Floral Marketing Council and helped implement other SAF consumer marketing programs. He was a lead player in getting the national marketing program PromoFlor off the ground, and most recently he was a principal architect of the Floral Marketing Funding Initiative Coalition. In that capacity he worked with federal officials and industry members to find a way to generate funds for nationwide marketing.
In each of these instances, Charles focused like a laser on the need for persuasive, compelling and consistent marketing messages to increase visibility of flowers and plants and ultimately to increase sales.
“Charles has always believed that the only thing holding back the floral industry is lack of marketing and promotion,” said last year’s Hall of Fame inductee Harrison “Red” Kennicott, III, AAF, of Kennicott Brothers Company in Chicago. “He’s worked for the past 25 years to build support for a national effort to promote flowers.”
A crowning achievement, done primarily to promote flowers and plants to consumers, was Charles’s floral chairmanship of four Presidential Inaugurations. In that role, not only did he demonstrate his mastery of logistics and event planning, but he delivered a resounding message through media outlets across the country that flowers and plants play a critically important role in our lives and at our nation’s premiere party.
Charles’s passion for nationwide marketing is matched only by his career-long desire for industry unity and inclusiveness. As chairman of the American Floral Marketing Council and then as SAF president, Charles worked toward building unity. He has always believed in the value of debate and bringing together people with opposing views to build relationships, forge bonds and find areas of common interest to help the industry. For example, Charles has made multiple trips to Colombia to build support and understanding for nationwide promotion.
As SAF president, Charles worked to generate more diversity into the SAF volunteer leadership by attending the Black Florists Association conventions and adding several of their members to the SAF volunteer leadership.
Charles was also instrumental in establishing a presidentially appointed seat on the SAF board of directors for someone from Colombia, and he integrated industry members from Colombia into several of SAF committees.
It is undeniable that working at a national level, Charles is the kind of leader who can simultaneously identify opportunities, steer national initiatives through rough seas, address negative perspectives with a positive outlook, and motivate and inspire people.
Those same characteristics – and others — are also apparent in Charles’s work at the local level. His knack for finding new business opportunities, his ingrained optimism, strategic drive, and marketing prowess have helped him build his award winning and distinctive retail shop.
If the floral industry is his hypothetical family, then his many late nights and early mornings at the shop with his wife Gina, sons Steve, Drew, Chad and Scott and daughter-in-law Leslie, have only helped to reinforce and strengthen the personal bonds that come with being a family-owned and operated business.
There is rarely a time when Charles and the Kremp family do not make their support and enthusiasm for the industry heard. It’s a testament to Charles’s dedication that the next generation is as committed to the power of flowers as he is.
This commitment to the industry and Charles’s bias for action is evident in roles both informal and formal. At wholesale shows, networking events and convention hallways Charles is always listening, prodding and thinking about the next best way to help the industry. But he has done the same as president of SAF, the Pennsylvania Florists Association and the Allied Florists of Delaware Valley; and also as a trustee of the American Floral Endowment, and board member of the Philadelphia Flower Show and his local chamber of commerce.
Charles’s many contributions have brought other honors. SAF recognized his work with the Paul Ecke Jr. Award in 1989. In 2006, WF&FSA named Kremp Florist its National Retailer of the Year.
In Willow Grove, his dedication to bringing people together was recognized when he was named the city’s Citizen of the Year, and in 2007 the Willow Grove chapter of the NAACP awarded him its Humanitarian Award.
For his unswerving dedication to improve and elevate the industry through nationwide marketing, his commitment to open communication and his qualities as a leader and ambassador, SAF is proud to induct Charles F. Kremp 3rd into the Floriculture Hall of Fame.
Source: Society of American Florists