Mentors, Micro-Mentors & Miss Piggy: A Chat with Mike Black of Jet Fresh
A year and a half ago, Mike Black changed his title at Jet Fresh from president to head coach — because that's what he actually does: coach his people and "keep them out of danger." That reframe sets the tone for the whole conversation Vonda and Lori have with him, which ranges from mentorship and the next generation to color-enhanced roses guarded like Willy Wonka's factory. It opens with a very current pain point — Skype, his lifeline to farms in South America for decades, shutting down May 1st, and the young people on his team walking him over to Teams so he doesn't miss a single spot deal. Which is the episode's thesis in miniature: the generations need each other.
Micro-mentors and mentor ribbons
At SAF's NextGen conference this year, Lori and Mike — affectionately known there as the aunt and uncle — were both handed badge ribbons that read MENTOR. Lori found that total strangers approached her because of it: first-timers who saw the ribbon and decided she was a safe person to ask questions. Vonda, a longtime mentor through AIFD's program, adds the part the ribbon-wearers forget: people aren't just coming up to you, they're watching you — how you treat vendors, how you interact — and deciding what kind of professional they want to become.
Mike's own mentor story starts at 16 in the 28th Street flower market, working for his dad, uncle, and grandfather. His dad was the obvious mentor — but the market gave him what he calls micro-mentors: some 40 friendly competitors on the same street who'd talk freely to "Eddie's son" because a kid was no threat. Later, when he launched a bouquet company in his late twenties, a supermarket buyer named Danny — an old friend of his father's — told him bluntly he wasn't ready and sent him away to get experience. Mike listened, built up smaller accounts, bought a bouquet line financed with twelve post-dated checks, and came back. The first purchase order was around 400 boxes of bouquets due in three days; his crew worked nearly around the clock for two days and delivered on time. From then on, Danny kept a spot for him even when bigger, cheaper competitors came knocking. That's what mentorship looks like when it has skin in the game.
"It's a lot of bull that young people don't want to work"
Asked what young people in the industry need to hear, Mike first torches a myth. His experience says young people absolutely will work — long hours, weekends, holidays — when the work rewards them with accomplishment, travel, experiences worth sharing, and a place in something creative. "If you're a clock watcher, the flower business ain't for you," he says — but for the curious and hard-working, it's an industry where you can fast-track without an expensive degree, because "the schooling that you get working in a flower company... there really is no college for that."
His proof walks around the warehouse. Pinky started washing buckets; Jet Fresh saw something in him, moved him up through packing and sales, then invested in him with three weeks in Holland — a week on a truck, a week in a cash-and-carry, a week with an exporter. He came back with a head full of ideas and, at 30, was just asked to manage the department. Mike's son Connor chose the flower business after attending NextGen and meeting peers his own age; he's now thriving in sales. But Mike pairs the optimism with a hard-won leadership rule he repeats in meetings: just because you're a good producer does not mean you're a good leader. He's made that promotion mistake "a thousand times," so now the conversation comes first: do you even want the responsibility? Because losing a great employee to a bad promotion helps no one.
Golden tickets and the Heinz of flowers
On the what's-new front, Mike is buzzing about a partnership seven years in the making: Jet Fresh Growers is now the only officially licensed manufacturer and distributor of VIP Roses' waxed "Choco Roses" — fresh roses finished to look chocolate-dipped — for the U.S., Canada, and the Caribbean. He calls the VIP family "the nutty professors of flowers," the creative geniuses who convinced the world color-enhanced flowers are okay, and dubs the brand "the Heinz of flowers." The operation runs under strict franchise-style approval, in a brand-new building at his Ecuador farm you literally cannot enter without a golden ticket — Willy Wonka rules. His pitch to retail florists: something genuinely new for your website's landing page, available from wholesalers in quantities as small as 20 stems. Meanwhile, the farm bought neighboring land and will build three hectares of greenhouses this year, with a ten-year plan to keep expanding as cash allows.
Loyalty is the product
The line florists should tape to the cooler comes near the end: "We don't really sell flowers and we don't really sell quality. What we sell first and foremost is loyalty." Flowers, Mike notes, remain one of the last handshake businesses — and it infuriates him when growers take his orders all summer, then vanish the moment the market gets hot. He's transparent about imperfection, too: he tells on himself about a customer order of white anemones gone wrong twice, and the ongoing work of making it right. Lori's Airbnb-review test applies — customers don't expect zero mistakes; they read how you respond. That extends to Google reviews, where a recent guest on Mike's own podcast claimed it can take 350 positive reviews to offset one negative. And in a stat worth sitting with, 95% of the farm's management team in Ecuador is female — a balance Mike says he's actively working to bring to Miami as well. Somewhere in there, Lori and Mike also bond over a shared love of Miss Piggy. Naturally.
Key takeaways
- You don't need one perfect mentor — collect micro-mentors, and be one; people are watching how you act more than what you say.
- Young people will work hard for reward, growth, and experiences worth sharing — invest in them like Jet Fresh invested in Pinky.
- A great producer isn't automatically a great leader; ask if they even want the responsibility before promoting.
- Loyalty — with suppliers and customers — is the real product; honor the handshake even when the market gets hot.
- Mistakes happen; what customers judge is how you respond, in person and in your review replies.