After his time in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Shlomo resumed his zeal for florals by studying at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. By 1970, he had completed his undergraduate studies, focusing on floriculture, education and floral genetics. In 1972, he finished his master’s studies in science education and floriculture from Hebrew University and an MBA in export marketing from Technion, the Israeli Institute of Technology and Israel’s equivalent to MIT.

While in the process of earning these degrees, Shlomo began his career in florals working for Carmel-Agrexco, the national export arm for Israeli agricultural products, as a quality control inspector. He then moved to active sales and marketing at the Agrexco airport office in Tel Aviv. In 1974, he was transferred to Frankfurt, Germany, to become the Agrexco floral market manager deputy and traveled extensively throughout Europe to market the entire Israeli floral industry. In 1976, Shlomo became the floral marketing manager. This position allowed Shlomo to be present as Agrexco started to make Israeli flowers available on the American market. In addition, he also was part of the team that developed the Cologne-Bonn Airport into a hub for all of Israeli agricultural products and began to send Israeli flowers to the Dutch and German auctions.

In 1981, he left Agrexco to pursue the “American dream” of living and working in the United States—landing in Chicago, IL. During this time, domestic production still dominated the floral market in the USA by about 80 percent, and Chicago was considered the main international hub. Shlomo started one of the first American companies, Flori-ad, that imported specialty cut flowers from South Africa, Italy, France, and the Netherlands. He also brought in a variety of flowers previously unknown to the American market, including alstroemeria, ginestra, French tulips, ornitugalum-dubium, and mini-callas, along with out-of-season flowers such as winter tulips and liatris. At the peak of his company, Shlomo employed over 50 people in six offices worldwide. His company then integrated with a large organization that invested intensively in growing roses in New Mexico, completely sustainably, and using hot underground spring water to run the generators installed in the greenhouses.

Then, during the stock market crash of 1987, the large organization that integrated with Shlomo’s company collapsed. It was a devasting loss.

Three months after the crash, with the great help of his growers, he started a smaller, leaner import venture called S.D. Trading with only one location in Chicago. There, things began to turn around. S.D. Trading became a major importer of fresh cut flowers to wholesalers using Chicago as a distribution center. The company also became a major wholesale importer to the Midwestern florists. During that time, Shlomo was one of the first to introduce Ecuadorian roses to the U.S. market as well as exporting them directly from Ecuador to Russia.

Shlomo was extremely fortunate to enjoy great success in this venture, so, in 1996, when he was 50, he sold S.D. Trading and retired. He decided to pursue another passion and went back to school to study history at the Spertus Institute in Chicago. Shlomo loves history and believes that learning from it brings great value to one’s life. After two years of study, however, he decided he could no longer stay retired and began work in the floral industry once again.

As a hobby, during his studies, he developed and marketed the DA-SH Board—a color reference tool designed to enable precise communication regarding the color of a flower. During this time, the floral business was conducted primarily over the phone, making accurate flower color choices challenging. Knowing the precise color of the desired flower is vital, especially in the wedding and event planning industry.

Soon after, in 1997, he built and launched Blooming of Beloit in Wisconsin—a 100-acre “cornfield” to become a flower farm of sustainably grown, specialty field crops, including fresh cut flowers, blooming trees and berried branches, and other woody ornamentals. He conducted cloning by selection and sold his products domestically. He took pride and pleasure in this successful venture. About a year after starting Blooming of Beloit, he made a strategic business

decision to complement his crops with other imported, specialty cut flowers. This enabled him to become a year-round source to the wholesale industry for out-of-season items under the name Shlomo Danieli Inc. Shlomo was the first to offer peonies all winter long, from January through May, and lisianthus, a popular flower for weddings and special events, all 52 weeks of the year. Later he provided his customers with ranunculus, scabiosa, tweedia, and many more varieties grown in Israel.

In March of 2018, he sold Blooming of Beloit, and moved to Sedona, Arizona. He continues to operate his international flower import company, Shlomo Danieli Inc., from an office in West

Sedona. Shlomo is happy to share that he thoroughly enjoys life in Sedona—exploring, hiking and taking pictures of the expansive and beautiful landscape. He enjoys spending time with his wife, Claudia, new and old friends alike and keeping up with his three adult children as they build successful family lives and careers themselves.

Shlomo has devoted more than half a century of his life to innovative enterprises in the floriculture industry. He is intimately familiar with every aspect of the business including growing, education and marketing.

High Points in Shlomo’s Floriculture Career:

• One of the first Israeli-born citizens to serve Agrexco in Germany in an executive capacity (1974).

• One of the first to introduce imported, previously unavailable, out-of-season and novelty flowers to the American market (1981).

• Developed a color catalog with a digital color spectrum concept to improve the American Wholesaler and Florists’ ordering experiences (1985).

• One of the first to import Ecuadorian roses directly to the American market (1987).

• Turned fresh-cut peonies from a 6-week item to an almost full-year item (1996).

• Turned a 100-acre cornfield in Wisconsin into a sustainable (in complete harmony with nature) fresh-cut flower farm that supplied the industry with florals eight months out of the year (1997-2017).

After the infamous 9/11 attack, one of the steps that the American government took was to tighten the inspection on importing. The flower industry became a victim, as suddenly, instead being inspected by the USDA, flowers were inspected by US Customs and Border Protection officers. This made inspection an expensive, time-consuming and bottlenecked process. Solutions were needed, so Shlomo partnered with three other business owners and proposed to operate a perishable center that would serve the entire Midwest for floral, pharmaceuticals, fresh produce and other perishables coming into the US through the Chicago O’Hare International Airport. Unfortunately, after three years of hard work, one of the founders made a grave error and the project ceased.