"Bidding war erupts over Boston Flower Exchange; Developers turn up heat on $35m offer for Albany St. site; wholesalers raise concerns" by Dan Adams, Globe Correspondent April 07, 2015
A bidding war has erupted over the Boston Flower Exchange’s property on Albany Street in the South End, with three more developers matching or exceeding a $35 million offer for the land made last year.
Not even a paragraph in and theirs have wilted. For anyone following this blog in any fashion, you know how sick I am of seeing everything framed in a war context in the war-promoting paper and how I've tired of wannabe reporters internalizing those values right down to the choice of terminology.
The new offers on the 5.6-acre parcel, which analysts say is one of the city’s most sought-after properties, were disclosed in a March letter from the exchange’s board of directors to its shareholders that was obtained by The Boston Globe.
The letter did not disclose who had bid on the property, but a sale of the property, which the board called “the only realistic path forward,” would require the owners of two-thirds of the company’s shares to vote “yes.” The exchange is owned by wholesalers who run stands inside the warehouse, its board of directors, and descendants of former flower growers who operated out of the facility.
The approximately 200 shareholders have until April 14 to respond to a questionnaire about the sale. If holders of at least 5,510 shares respond in favor of a sale, the board said it would “proceed to negotiate the best possible deal with a buyer.” Otherwise, it will not pursue a sale.
When the wholesaling collective moved to Albany Street in 1971, the area was a gritty industrial district prized mostly for its access to nearby railroad lines and highways. Today, the exchange’s massive low-slung warehouse is an anachronism in a gentrified South End. Propelled by a white-hot market, the value of the Albany Street land has soared in concert with luxury housing complexes under construction nearby, such as the Ink Block and Troy projects.
You know, you can roll a scroll and see how basically, the BG is basking in the glow of all this 1% money serving the 10% while the rest of us a getting a royal $crewing.
The exchange was founded in 1909 by a collective of 123 growers that wanted a single marketplace from which to hawk flowers to retailers.
I didn't even highlight anything there because the situation of that institution is heart-breaking to me. You might not know it from the anger here, but I love flowers! Flowers are life, flowers are beauty, flowers are peace.
Of course, they were "hawking," the beauties of nature -- as opposed to say, looting schemes devised as financial products or weapons of war, to name a couple of wares that are "hawked."
Many of the current shareholders are descendants of those 123 growers or of former wholesalers. They have little remaining connection to the exchange’s day-to-day business.
So they don't care like big shareholders of multi-national conglomerates and such, that seems to be the implication there from my .01% pre$$, and no big deal regarding all the individual livelihoods uprooted and destroyed.
Of course, it's all going to be made better, economy is growing, numbers are great, blah, blah, f**in' blah.
Despite its age-old business model, trucks from dozens of area florists and grocery stores still stop by the exchange early each morning to load up on flowers.
Yeah, "despite the age-old business model," they are still doing well, thank you.
You know, I've really, really had it with this rich man's corporate $will known as the Bo$ton Globe.
The wholesalers have warned of disruptions to the region’s flower supply — and to their livelihoods — if the Albany Street warehouse closes....
And then what will Eliza Doolittle do?
--more--"
