Bloomist is Blooming Thanks to IP Knowledge and Skills
September 18, 2024
Norah and Sarah Aloufi are two sisters who always dreamed of starting a business together, and in 2019 they launched Bloomist, a flower shop based in their home country of Saudi Arabia. With the intellectual property (IP) knowledge and skills they developed through the Academy of the Saudi Authority for IP (SAIP), which is a WIPO Academy Intellectual Property Training Institution (IPTI), they were able to keep their business afloat during the pandemic, and now they are ready to go global.
Sister act
Norah is very passionate about entrepreneurship, having had her own photography studio in the past, and the duo loved organizing events for family and friends, especially when it came to floral arrangements. The natural next step was to make their dream a reality and start a flower shop together. They learned the basics of floral arrangements from a renowned florist before they established Bloomist, their own flower shop where they could demonstrate their creativity and style.
The Bloomist name and logo are inspired by the Dutch word for “florist”, since the Netherlands is renowned for its flowers, and their “where your feelings bloom” slogan relates to the offering of flowers to someone when your feelings for them blossom.
Once the pandemic hit and the lockdowns were in effect in 2020, their sales started to suffer, so Norah and Sarah decided to expand Bloomist with online sales through their website, social media accounts and third-party delivery services. Moving their business online urged them to formalize Bloomist with IP protection by trademarking their logo at the national level with SAIP in 2021.
Sometimes people think IP rights are only for big businesses, but that is not the case, they are important for MSMEs too! IP protection is a great investment for small businesses, and worth the cost.
Norah Aloufi, Bloomist Co-founder and IPTI beneficiary
The strategic shift to e-commerce enabled Bloomist to survive the pandemic, helped secure the livelihoods of Norah and Sarah’s five employees, and reach a wider market of customers.
The gift of knowledge
Norah’s legal background primed her for the importance of protecting her IP, having helped local businesses with IP issues in the past when practicing law. After registering the trademark for Bloomist, she discovered the IP Academy of SAIP, which offers training opportunities for entrepreneurs like herself hoping to up-skill in areas of IP and business.
In 2023, Norah participated in the IP Commercialization and Monetization Project for MSMEs in Saudi Arabia, which featured a skills-based training and mentoring for entrepreneurs and equipped her with an IP strategy on how to gain a competitive edge in the market. The project was implemented as part of the joint cooperation between the WIPO Academy’s IPTIs Program and the IP Academy of SAIP, with the support of the WIPO COVID-19 Response Package to enable entrepreneurs to achieve a sustainable economic recovery from the pandemic.
Twenty-seven entrepreneurs from Saudi Arabia benefitted from the project, which featured a range of elements, including an in-person skills-based training program on IP at SAIP, and a mentorship program where entrepreneurs were given tailored guidance on how to identify and monetize their IP assets.
Through the project, Norah learned how to expand the products on offer at Bloomist, protect other IP assets associated with their business such as the industrial designs of some of their new creative floral packaging ideas, and how to franchise the business in other countries once the Bloomist logo is protected internationally.
For the entrepreneurs who are unsure about their IP rights, I encourage them to enroll in the IP Academy courses on offer so they can learn how to protect their businesses. Thanks to the IP Academy of SAIP training program, which was delivered in cooperation with the WIPO Academy, I was able to develop an action plan on how to monetize the other IP assets of my business. The next steps for Bloomist are to protect our industrial designs and franchise internationally.
Norah Aloufi, Bloomist Co-founder and IPTI beneficiary
What are the IPTIs?
The WIPO Academy establishes IPTIs in member states to provide self-sufficient, high-quality, locally tailored and accessible IP training and skills-building for people at the national and regional levels. The WIPO Academy IPTIs Program works under three areas of support to achieve this goal:
- Helping countries set up their own IP training centers to deliver IP trainings to local audiences.
- Working with established IPTIs as partners on the ground in delivering joint cooperation projects to reach key economic sectors and audiences, particularly women, youth and entrepreneurs.
- Sharing the knowledge and lessons learned from the experiences of IPTIs through free online courses and an IPTIs networking space.
Discover IP training opportunities at IPTIs around the world