business is blooming at World Flowers - and to cope with demand, the north Hampshire company has invested £1million in building a new warehouse, which has just become operational.

World Flowers is the UK's largest importer of cut flowers and, from a base of just one warehouse in North Warnborough in 1989, it now has three.

This will help the company cope with its predicted 15 per cent a year growth for the next couple of years.

The latest warehouse has four new docking bays for the storage, packing and loading of fresh cut flowers that are delivered every day to outlets all over the UK.

The company is also building a new canteen for its 200-plus workers, which includes 100 from Basingstoke.

The expansion is part of a long-term investment programme since its move to North Warnborough eight years ago.

Since 1995, the company has grown tenfold to have an annual turnover of £60million and a customer base that includes supermarket giants Tesco, Sainsbury's, Debenhams and Laura Ashley.

As its investment grows, World Flowers now uses five to six million stems a week and delivers more than a billion flowers a year to its UK customers.

Most of the flowers are grown on farms in Kenya and flown into the UK every day, which is why the company is strategically located on the M3 corridor.

In excess of 600 tonnes of flowers are flown in each week on two daily flights.

Managing director Jim Floor said: "We are perfecting the most sophisticated systems for delivering the freshest cut flower quickly to our customers.

"We deliver more than one billion flowers a year in the UK and Europe, therefore it is imperative we adopt the best methods to ensure we reach our precise delivery requirements."

The flower industry grew by 11 per cent last year to create a business with an annual value of around £1.2billion.

Mr Floor said: "Supermarkets have changed our buying habits for cut flowers. They control 60 per cent of flower sales in the UK and self-purchase is the biggest reason for buying.

"Self-purchase is a low fat treat - instead of chocolates! We now treat ourselves rather than wait for someone to treat us."

Sales director Sarah Mills said because young, upwardly mobile and independent women regularly buy their own treats, World Flowers had just launched a "Lifestyle" arrangement for Sainsbury's.

Work is also being done on increasing the vase life of flowers, as Mrs Mills said: "People in the UK like to buy value for money."

Spray carnations, roses and chrysanthemums are still top favourites, with rose sales in 2003 up 30 per cent on last year. And now exotic foliage, such as palm leaves, is becoming a floral fashion setter.

As World Flowers expands it is finding new markets on the internet.

Orders via the web may only account for five per cent of its total business, but this figure has grown by a staggering 1,000 per cent in the last year.