What do you do if you can’t leave the house, go to town, or attend a funeral? What if all the flowers available to purchase are too costly after shipping is added to the total? Is there still a way to show your love, concern, and care? Can you still send flowers?
Overview: Our Top Picks
Email Virtual Flowers
Text Virtual Flowers
Jump ahead to these sections:
- Step 1: Decide on Virtual Flowers
- Step 2: Choose Delivery Method
- Step 3: Choose Type of Flowers
- Step 4: Gather Recipient Information
- Step 5: Write Your Message
- Step 6: Check Details
- Step 7: Hit Send
- Where Else Can You Send Virtual Flowers or Condolences?
- Frequently Asked Questions: Virtual Flowers
Absolutely! You can send virtual flowers, complete with an e-card, to anyone! As long as your recipient has a working email or mobile number, you can send her a beautiful bouquet of her favorite flowers to say, “I’m thinking of you,” “I love you,” or “I’m sorry for your loss.”
Step 1: Decide on Virtual Flowers
You may be wondering whether you should send funeral flowers if you attend a funeral. There are a number of reasons why sending live plants may not be the best idea and virtual flowers might be just the ticket. Here are several reasons:
- Family requests: Check funeral information for specific requests. More families request donations to a loved one’s favorite charity in lieu of flowers.
- Allergies: Some family members might be allergic to types of flowers commonly used in funeral bouquets. If you know of any family member who has pollen allergies, live flowers probably aren’t the best idea.
- Memorial or celebration site: If a memorial or celebration of life is a virtual service or the site is anywhere other than a funeral home or church, the location might have a hard time accommodating floral arrangements sent ahead of time.
- Travel arrangements: If the funeral or memorial is planned for an out-of-town location that family members will travel to, they’ll have nowhere to go with the floral arrangements after the service has concluded.
- Tough to manage: When every well-meaning family member or friend sends flowers to a funeral home or to the family’s home, it can be too much. The time of grieving and mourning is difficult enough without having to worry about finding space for several oversized displays of flowers and making sure they all get water.
- Expensive: Attending funerals often require travel and potentially extra expense that wasn’t expected. If you’re tight on funds but you still want to show friends or family you care, virtual flowers are one way to send some encouragement without breaking the bank.
Step 2: Choose Delivery Method
The first thing you’ll need to do is decide how you want your flowers delivered. Determine whether the recipient prefers email or text messaging as a way to receive messages. Based on their preferred method of communication, proceed with the various options available.
Email flowers
If the recipient prefers email as their chosen method for communicating, there are numerous programs you can use. Many options are completely free, making it possible for you to send flowers numerous times to as many recipients as you’d like. Some options for emailing flowers include:
- Phillipp’s Florals: Virtually send flowers and a message for any occasion. A wide variety of flowers is available to choose from and virtual cards can be sent with any floral arrangement.
- iFlowers: Send unique arrangements of virtual flowers with a message to friends or loved ones. This site also has an option to input and save special dates.
- 123Greetings: This site has provided quality ecards since the internet first began, and now it continues the tradition by combining ecards with flowers. If you want to send one message with flowers, a greeting, and a song, this is the best option.
- VirtualFlowers: One of the original virtual greeting companies, virtual flowers offers a wealth of options. Each floral arrangement is free and you can attach a heartfelt message to the greeting.
Text flowers
Texting your floral message can be a bit trickier. You’ll want to make sure that the person you’re sending them to has a phone plan that allows picture messaging without costing extra. Old phone styles like flip phones rarely support GIFs or images. If the recipient has a smartphone, make sure they can receive data-oriented text messages without getting charged extra.
Once you’re ready to send the recipient a text message, choose from the following options:
- Bouquet of Flowers: This is another Android app that allows you to send virtual flowers. These are picture-only options, so you would need to add text as a regular message if you wanted to share a thought, too.
- Flower Garden: For a unique twist on sending virtual flowers, this Apple app allows you to grow your own virtual garden. When blooms are ready, you can pick and arrange them how you’d like and send a personalized bouquet to anyone on your contact list.
- Flowerling: If you have a few dollars to invest and want to send virtual flowers that arrive on screen as a bud, slowly bloom, and complete the life cycle just like a real flower, this Apple app is your best option. Numerous options are available from single roses to whole bouquets.
Step 3: Choose Type of Flowers
Depending on your recipient, you can send funeral flowers in nearly any type of floral arrangement to show your love, sympathy, or support. There are some general guidelines to consider, however.
Type and color
If you’re sending flowers as part of a memorial or virtual funeral, it’s a nice gesture to send the type of flowers the deceased friend or relative enjoyed while they were alive.
If you’re unsure of the deceased’s favorite flower, instead try sending a bouquet with his or her favorite color.
Symbolism
Many flowers are known for the symbolism they hold. While not everyone adheres to these common flower meanings, it’s interesting to keep in mind. For example, flowers that are commonly associated with love include tulips and daisies.
Flowers used for funerals include carnations and lilies. Red roses are symbols of love, loss, and grief.
Step 4: Gather Recipient Information
To send your virtual greeting and flowers, you’ll need to input standard information about the recipient. This includes their name and email address for email or a phone number if you’re going to text them.
Double-check to make sure you have their information correct. Just one wrong letter or number will keep your timely message from reaching its destination.
Step 5: Write Your Message
Most virtual flower options allow you to send a sympathy note. This can be the hardest part of sending flowers to a friend or loved one. After all, what do you say?
Depending on the reason for sending the flowers, there are numerous guides you can use to create the perfect digital greeting that conveys your love. Here are several things to keep in mind:
- Keep it short. When sending an email or a text message, write just as much as you would if you were sending a physical card or a note with live flowers. Keep it short and heartfelt.
- Keep it sincere. The person you are sending a message to will be grateful to have your words of encouragement, love, and sympathy. You don’t need to try and impress them with your vocabulary. Sometimes a sincere, “I’m so sorry for your loss. I’m grieving, too,” is more than enough.
- Keep it simple. The message that accompanies your flower greeting should be simple. Most apps and email options will limit you to a certain number of lines to write your message and that’s not a bad thing. Grieving families are often overwhelmed by messages of love and sympathy. As much as they want to read them all, extremely long messages can be too much for a family member or friend who simply needs to be told, “We’re sorry, we love you, and we’re here for you.”
If you’re sending flowers to say thanks so someone, check out these thank you note ideas, instead.
Step 6: Check Details
After you’ve typed the recipient’s information into the correct boxes and written your message, read over everything one last time.
There’s nothing worse than misspelling a name, inserting a typo, or forgetting the @ sign in someone’s email address. Double-checking will help make sure none of those mistakes occur.
Step 7: Hit Send
Don’t forget the final step! The person you’re thinking of will only get to enjoy your floral virtual greeting if you hit send.
Feeling hesitant to push that little button and send virtual flowers to brighten someone’s day? It’s understandable to feel a bit nervous. After all, what if they don’t like it? What if the flowers aren’t the right combination?
If these thoughts go through your head while your thumb hovers over the “send” button, just remember, the person on the other end will love it. Why? Because you sent it to show how much you care.
Where Else Can You Send Virtual Flowers or Condolences?
Virtual flowers can be sent to loved ones, relatives, and friends through other platforms besides texting or email. Here are three of the most common ways people send virtual flowers.
Social media
Social media is the perfect place to post or send someone virtual flowers. Here is how you can send flowers through the most popular social media platforms.
Facebook: You can post virtual flowers to your wall in someone’s honor then tag their nearest relative or loved one. You can also post virtual flowers to a loved one’s wall along with condolences or a sympathy message.
Facebook posts are generally public and can be seen by a person’s “friend” network. Only post virtual flowers on someone’s wall or while tagging them if a public post is appropriate.
Facebook Messenger: If you want a private method of sending someone a sympathy message along with virtual flowers, you can send someone a private message via Facebook Messenger.
Instagram: Post virtual flowers in someone’s honor under your account and tag your loved one so they see it. This is a public way to send virtual flowers, so be sure public posting is appropriate.
WhatsApp: WhatsApp is a messaging platform that functions similarly to Facebook Messenger. Here, you can send someone an instant message with virtual flowers and words of sympathy directly to their message inbox. This is another private method of sending virtual flowers.
Online memorials
Online memorial webpages are starting to be used in place of or in addition to traditional obituaries. Most memorial web pages include an interactive digital guestbook, where visitors can share messages of sympathy, memories, and even virtual flowers.
Some memorial pages provide a bank of digital flowers for guests to choose from when signing the digital guest book, but others do not. If no digital flowers are provided, then you’ll need to upload an image of the flowers you’d like to send and attach it to your message.
Funeral home memorial pages
Funeral homes are starting to offer memorial webpages to the families they provide services to. These pages are similar to online memorials that can be set up using a third-party website.
While nearly all funeral home pages provide an easy one-click shopping experience for sending real flowers, some offer the opportunity to attach virtual candles or virtual flowers to a condolence message when you sign the digital guestbook.
Frequently Asked Questions: Virtual Flowers
Do you still have a lingering question or two about sending virtual flowers? Here are four of the most common questions asked about sending digital flowers.
What do virtual flowers mean?
Flower meanings depend on the type and color of the flower you choose. For example, red typically represents love, and white represents purity. Yellow usually stands for joy and youthfulness, while purple represents royalty.
Types of flowers that are commonly associated with death include carnations, chrysanthemums, roses, lilies, and orchids.
When sending virtual flowers, you can go in a couple of different directions. One, you can pick a flower or a bouquet based on the meaning of the flowers and their color. If you do this, you might choose a bouquet of red roses for someone you loved dearly. Or you could choose a bouquet of yellow carnations for a young person.
Your other option is to choose a bouquet by picking the deceased’s favorite flowers. In this case, the traditional flower meanings don’t matter.
Are there different types of virtual flowers?
There are several types of virtual flowers you can choose from, including single flowers, bouquets, a flower garden, and a virtual flower that grows. You can typically choose from any of these items if you send a text or use an app, but only bouquets and single flowers are usually available on memorial websites.
Are there any good alternatives to virtual flowers?
If you’d rather not send virtual flowers, or you’d like to send something digitally in addition to your virtual bouquet, consider sending an ecard instead.
Sympathy ecards can be sent through email or text. These often have a still picture of flowers or a beautiful nature scene. Some are tastefully animated, as well. Most ecards are accompanied by background music, providing a complete package you can send digitally.
Send Some Love
When you can’t be there for someone you love, or you want to take an extra step to show that you care, sending virtual flowers is a perfect way to provide encouragement. Cheer someone up, show your support, and include a virtual hug anytime, anywhere.
If you need more ideas, head on over to our ideas for get-well gifts, sympathy care package ideas, and small gifts for friends.