Taylor Hettinger is giving Durango flower farmers a new opportunity to have their products seen by the community. Her business, Sweet Nothings, launched a flower cart this month that will travel to different locations around town.

“We can be booked for events, like weddings or birthdays, but we are also planning on doing community pop-ups,” she said.

On the cart, the flowers are grouped by variety so that her customers can create their own arrangements. Hettinger believes this flexibility makes her business unique. She also plans to use the cart to hold floral arranging, flower crown and wreath-making workshops.

The cart is open when local flowers are blooming, likely from May to early October. Hettinger has partnered with four different local flower farmers – Passion Bouquet Flower Farm, Lady Southwest, Pink Paintbrush and Thistle Flower Farm – and she plans to work with more in the future. She also plans to partner with other local small businesses, like the Durango Picnic Co., which caters picnics for private events.

“The goal of the business is to provide a unique outlet for local flower farmers to get their blooms out into the community,” she said.

Hettinger found her passion for making flower arrangements after spending more than seven years in Maui, Hawaii. At the time, she was working in wedding planning, but she developed a passion for selling leis on the side.

“While in Maui, I learned the art of lei-making, which is very important culturally over there,” she said. “It connects you to nature and gives you the opportunity to share love and aloha with others. And that's what made me discover that I loved flowers and floral design.”

When Hettinger traveled to Durango, she wanted to continue her business, but she felt something was missing.

“In Hawaii, I would source my flowers locally, because it was very common to see little stands out with fresh fruits, vegetables and flowers at the end of people’s driveways,” she said. “When I moved here, I missed being able to buy fresh-cut local flowers.”

Knowing that Colorado was well-known for its wildflowers, she decided to implement her business in a new location, this time, incorporating the Hawaiian-style farm stands she had seen.

“Just because I left Hawaii, I don’t want to ever stop making leis and sharing that aloha. The idea to build a mobile flower cart came from wanting to continue working with flowers, especially locally, and to embody the Hawaiian-style stands.”

Her flower cart took about two weeks to build, and was completed with the help of Marc O’Connor, owner of Lost Dog Construction. Hettinger said O’Connor loved the idea of the flower cart as soon as he heard it.

“We had one meeting about the cart build, and the next thing you know, we were spending hours at Home Depot and a local lumberyard picking out materials,” she said.