THE GENERAL STRUCTURE OF CUT FLOWERS MARKETING IN TURKEY AND THE ROLE OF AUCTIONS IN MARKETING FUNCTIONS

The cut flower consumption in Turkey has been rapidly growing due to increasing income, changing cultural habits and effectively celebrated many anniversaries related with both in home country and all over the world such as; four national holidays (April 23, May 19, August 30 and October 29), two feasts (religious festivals), Mothering Sunday, New Year's Day, St. Valentine's Day and etc.. As it is well known that the best gift during these kinds of anniversaries is to present someone a bunch of flowers which is the statement of credulousness, love and sensitivity.

Although the internal trade of cut flowers has been organised by co-operatives via auctions, the external trade is under controlled of “Turkish Cut Flowers Exporting Association” in Turkey. During “The Valentine's Day” in 1998, more than 10 millions of cut flowers were exported as means of stems and approximately 2 millions of total revenue was gained from this selling. This fact proves that the marketing opportunities of cut flowers can be easily extended to foreign countries on a large scale in the near future while having satisfactory sales and returns obtained in our home country.

The primary aim of this research is to determine the marketing structure and developing possibilities of the cut flower sector in Turkey as well as to put the role of auctions in these stages forward.

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