Florists Fear A 'No Deal' Brexit Would Wilt The Flower Business

Valentine's Day is usually a boon for florists. But in the United Kingdom, a cloud hangs over the industry.

Rosa Ashby, who runs Rosa Flowers in the English market town of Witney, is anxious. Every flower in her shop, including lilies, chrysanthemums and lisianthus, is either grown in or distributed through the Netherlands. That has worked just fine since Ashby started her business 22 years ago, because the U.K. has been inside the European Union's single market, and flowers — and countless other products — have flowed seamlessly across the border.

On March 29, though, that could change as the U.K. is scheduled to leave the EU and there is still no deal to keep trade moving smoothly.

"We're very worried," says Ashby, sitting at a table in her shop in Oxfordshire, which she leaves mostly unheated during the winter to preserve her flowers. "We don't know what's going to happen on the 29th. The government doesn't know. Nobody knows. And our worry is: When will we get the flowers? What price will they be if tariffs go on?"