How to Send Flowers to Lagos from Abroad (UK, US and Canada)

Why this is harder than it should be

Roughly a fifth of the people who order from us are not in Nigeria. They are in London, Houston, Toronto, Dublin and Dubai, sending to a mother in Surulere, a wife in Lekki, or a friend whose father just died.

They all run into the same four problems, and none of them are about flowers.

Payment is the first. Nigerian payment infrastructure was built for domestic cards, and an international card frequently fails at checkout for reasons nobody explains. People try three cards, assume the site is fraudulent, and give up.

Trust is the second. Search for flower delivery in Nigeria from abroad and you will find Nairaland threads of people asking which sites are real. That question exists because people have paid and received nothing, and the diaspora sender has no way to walk into a shop and check.

Addressing is the third. Nigerian addresses often do not work the way a sender in Toronto expects. There is frequently no usable postcode, buildings are identified by landmark, and estates have gates with their own rules.

Timing is the fourth, and it catches almost everybody. A sender in Los Angeles placing an order at lunchtime is placing it at nine in the evening Lagos time, which is tomorrow’s delivery.

This guide solves all four. It is written from the receiving end, by the people who actually hand the flowers over.

Order direct, not through a relay site

This is the most valuable advice on the page and it will save you money.

International flower sites do not grow or deliver anything in Nigeria. They take your order in pounds or dollars, keep a margin, and pass a reduced instruction to a local florist they have never met. You pay a premium for the booking and the local florist receives a fraction, which affects what gets made.

The gap is not small. A bouquet you pay seventy pounds for on a relay site may arrive as a local arrangement worth considerably less, because the relay margin, the currency spread and the handling fee all come out before the florist sees it.

You also lose specificity. Relay sites work from a catalogue of generic descriptions. The local florist substitutes freely. You chose a photograph. Somebody else decided what arrived.

Ordering direct from a Lagos florist means you speak to the people making the arrangement, you can send a photograph of what you want, you can change the card message five minutes later on WhatsApp, and the whole amount goes into the flowers.

How to tell a direct florist from a relay. A direct florist has a Nigerian phone number you can reach on WhatsApp, a physical Lagos address, prices in naira, and photographs that look like their own work rather than stock. A relay site shows prices in your currency, has no Nigerian phone number, and uses the same photographs as several other sites.

How to pay from the UK, US or Canada

Payment is where most of this goes wrong, so here is what works in practice.

International cards. Visa and Mastercard issued abroad work on properly set up Nigerian checkouts, though they fail more often than they should. If a card is declined, it is usually your bank blocking a Nigerian transaction rather than the merchant. A quick call to your bank to authorise it normally fixes it first time.

Bank transfer. Reliable but slow, and a transfer from a UK or US bank can take one to three working days to land in Nigeria. Fine for a planned order. Useless for a same day apology.

Transfer apps. Many diaspora senders pay a relative in Lagos through a remittance app and have them order locally. This works and often gives the best rate, but it adds a person to the chain and depends on their availability.

WhatsApp and a payment link. The most common method we handle. You message us, we confirm what you want, we send a payment link, you pay in your own currency, and we go. This is the fastest route for an urgent order and the one we recommend for first time customers, because you have a conversation before any money moves.

Two practical points. Pay before you travel if your order relates to a trip, because sorting payment on Nigerian mobile data in a car from the airport is a different experience entirely. And keep the receipt or transaction reference until the delivery photograph comes back.

Getting the address right

Nigerian addressing is descriptive. It assumes a human being will find the place, not a satellite.

Give the street and house or flat number if there is one, then the estate name, then the area, then Lagos. That is already better than most orders we receive.

Add a landmark. This is the part overseas senders leave out and it is the part our riders actually use. ‘Opposite the mosque’, ‘behind the filling station’, ‘third gate after the school’. One landmark converts a difficult delivery into an easy one.

Give a Nigerian phone number for the recipient. Not your number in London. Our riders call on approach, every time. An order with no reachable local number is the single most common reason a delivery fails, and in a gated estate it is fatal, because security will not admit a rider who cannot reach anybody inside.

Say if it is a gated estate or a secure office tower. Several estates in Lekki and Ikoyi and several towers on Victoria Island require the resident to clear a visitor in advance. If we know, we plan for it. If we find out at the gate, we lose an hour.

For office deliveries, give the company name, the floor, and the recipient’s full name as reception would know it. A card addressed to ‘My Love’ is charming. A delivery label addressed to ‘My Love’ does not get routed.

If the delivery is a surprise and you cannot ask for the address, tell us. We handle this often. A rider calling the recipient to ask where they are is sometimes the only way, and we can do it without revealing who sent it.

Timing: the hours that actually matter

Lagos runs on West Africa Time, which is GMT plus one, and Nigeria does not observe daylight saving. The gap to your city therefore changes twice a year even though Lagos never moves.

Our same day cut off is 6PM Lagos time. In practical terms that is 6PM in London during British Summer Time and 5PM in winter, noon in New York, 9AM in Los Angeles, and 9PM in Dubai.

The Los Angeles number is the one that catches people. By the time a sender on the US west coast has finished the morning, same day delivery in Lagos has closed. Order the night before.

Deliveries run through the working day and we prefer mid morning for offices, because anything arriving at a Lagos reception after four o’clock frequently sits overnight.

We take orders 24/7 and deliver on Sundays too, but book Sunday and public holiday deliveries in advance. Public holidays vary, and the Muslim holidays move each year against the Gregorian calendar, which overseas senders routinely miss.

For birthdays, order the day before and schedule for the morning. A birthday bouquet arriving at six in the evening has missed most of the day it was meant to improve.

For funerals and condolences, send quickly. In Muslim families burial usually happens within a day, so a condolence delivery three days later arrives after the gathering has dispersed.

What it costs, in naira and in your currency

Prices in naira, because that is what you are actually buying, with rough conversions that will drift as the rate moves.

A modest hand tied bouquet starts around N45,000, which is roughly 25 pounds or 30 dollars. This is a real gift, not a token.

The range most diaspora orders sit in is N60,000 to N150,000, roughly 35 to 85 pounds or 40 to 100 dollars. This gets a full arrangement with good stems and room for chocolates or a gift alongside.

Premium and luxury arrangements run from N250,000 upwards, past N600,000 for large rose counts and imported stems. This is proposal, milestone anniversary and major apology territory.

Hampers for a family household run N80,000 to N200,000, which is the usual choice when you are sending to a home rather than a person.

Delivery is charged by area across Lagos, and the exact fee shows at checkout before you pay. Deliveries outside the standard areas are quoted individually.

One honest note on exchange rates. The naira moves, sometimes sharply, and a price quoted in pounds today may not hold in a month. We quote in naira for that reason. If you are comparing us to a relay site showing a fixed price in your currency, remember that the fixed price exists because they have built in a margin wide enough to absorb the movement, and you are paying for that margin.

Before you compare two quotes, check the Central Bank of Nigeria’s published rate for the day. It is the reference the whole market prices against, and it tells you instantly whether a price quoted to you in pounds or dollars is a fair conversion or a margin wearing a disguise.

How to avoid being defrauded

This needs saying plainly, because the fear is reasonable and the question is all over Nigerian forums.

Ask for a delivery photograph before you pay. Any legitimate Lagos florist sends one as a matter of course. We photograph every delivery and send it to the person who paid. A business that will not commit to this in advance is one to avoid.

Check for a real WhatsApp number and speak to a human before paying. Thirty seconds of conversation tells you more than any website.

Look for a physical Lagos address and a Google Business Profile with reviews written over time. A profile with twenty reviews all posted in the same week is not evidence.

Be careful with Instagram only vendors. Many are excellent. Some are an account, a highlight reel of somebody else’s photographs, and an account number. Ask for the physical address and see what happens.

Never pay to a personal account when you were expecting a business. If the name on the account does not match the business, stop.

Start small if you are unsure. A first order of N45,000 that arrives with a photograph tells you everything you need to know before you send N300,000 at Christmas.

And use the diaspora network. The Nairaland threads asking which florists are real exist because people share answers. Ask somebody who has already sent.

What to send, and what the recipient will actually appreciate

A few patterns from years of diaspora orders.

To a mother. Mixed soft bouquets or lilies rather than red roses, which read as romantic even within a family. Nigerian mothers overwhelmingly tell our riders about the card rather than the flowers, so write a real message.

To a wife or partner. Red roses still carry the meaning best, and the distance makes the gesture land harder than it would locally. Add chocolates. Add the card in your own words rather than ours, because she knows your voice.

To a household you cannot visit. A hamper outperforms flowers. It gets opened in front of everybody and it covers the family rather than one person.

For a bereavement. White lilies and white roses, sent fast, with a short restrained message. Do not reach for meaning. ‘I am so sorry. Thinking of you and your family’ is enough.

For a birthday. Bright mixed bouquets, a balloon if the recipient is young, and delivery in the morning.

For a new baby. Soft pink, white or lemon, and something for the mother rather than only the child. Almost everybody sends for the baby. Sending for the mother is remembered.

And write the card yourself. We will write it for you if you ask and we are good at it, but a message in your own words, including the way you actually speak, in Pidgin or in your mother tongue if that is how you talk to them, carries more than anything we could compose.

If you are flying in soon

A specific case, because a large share of these orders come from people who will be in Lagos within the month.

Do not carry flowers. A bouquet will not survive nine hours in a cabin and excess baggage on anything substantial costs more than buying locally.

Order to arrive the morning you land. Walking into a family house where your flowers are already in a vase changes the arrival, and it costs no more than sending them a week earlier.

Write the list of houses you owe before you fly. Diaspora visitors consistently underestimate this and end up ordering six gifts in two days at December prices.

Sort payment while you are still on a stable connection abroad.

If you are coming for December specifically, the order deadline that matters is 15 December. After that, availability narrows, prices rise across the Lagos market and delivery windows disappear.

And give yourself a day of slack on anything tied to an event. Lagos traffic has no respect for a schedule made in another country.

Recurring deliveries from abroad

A pattern we see often enough to be worth describing. Someone abroad sets up a standing arrangement rather than ordering each time, usually for a parent.

Monthly flowers to a mother or grandmother is the most common. It costs less per occasion than people expect and the effect is substantially greater than one large delivery a year, because the point is regularity rather than scale.

The dates that get forgotten are the ones worth automating. Birthdays and anniversaries are remembered. The anniversary of a father’s death, the first Monday of the school term, a difficult month, these are the ones that land hardest precisely because nobody expects them.

Give us the dates once and we will hold them. You can change or pause any of them with a message, and we will confirm a few days ahead rather than taking the money quietly.

This also solves the time zone problem permanently. You are no longer trying to place an order from Los Angeles before a cut off that falls at nine in the morning.

And it removes the guilt loop that a lot of diaspora customers describe, where they intend to send something, keep meaning to, and then realise six months have passed.