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No. 28 of 50 · Erdington, Erdington & Castle Bromwich
Williams Florist
Ninety years on Erdington High Street, and no website at all.
src/art.py). No third-party or business-owned imagery is used anywhere on this site.The verdict
Williams Florist has been on Erdington High Street for over ninety years, which makes it the oldest business in this guide by a margin of decades and, as far as I can establish from the public record, the longest continuously trading flower shop in Birmingham. It occupies a double unit at 18 to 20 High Street and has done through the war, the demolition and rebuilding of most of Erdington around it, the arrival of supermarket flowers, and the internet. Ninety years is not a marketing claim, it is a structural fact about the shop, and it changes what you are buying. A florist that old holds the institutional memory of a whole district: which crematorium wants tributes delivered when, which church takes what size of pedestal, which families have used it for four generations. That knowledge is invisible on a website and completely decisive when you need it. And there is no website. Not a thin one, none that I can find. The shop appears across every Birmingham trade directory with the same address and a 0121 number, and that is the entire digital footprint of a ninety-year-old business. The stock listed is straightforward: bouquets, vases, chocolates, soft toys, hand-ties, silk flowers, greeting cards. If you want to buy from Williams you go in, or you ring. I have scored ordering at three for that, and roots at ten, and both are correct.
The shop trades as Williams Florist Ltd from a double unit at 18 to 20 High Street in Erdington. The published stock covers fresh bouquets and hand-ties, arrangements, silk flowers, chocolates, soft toys, greeting cards and vases, with funeral work a substantial part of the business. The over-ninety-year claim is carried consistently across independent directory listings rather than resting on the business's own marketing, since the business does very little marketing at all.
Best for
Funeral and sympathy work in Erdington and the surrounding wards, where nine decades of relationships with local churches, crematoria and funeral directors is a genuine practical advantage.
What I would order
Go in. There is no alternative, and the shop is on a high street with a station at one end of it. Ask them what they would send, rather than telling them.
Worth knowing
There is no website, no online ordering, no published prices, and no published opening hours. If you are not in Birmingham this is close to impossible to buy from, and that is the single reason a shop with this much history does not rank higher here.
Over ninety years on Erdington High Street, the longest run of any shop in this guide.
Who it is not for
Anyone ordering from another city. Flower Worx covers Erdington on same-day delivery and can be ordered from anywhere.
How it compares
Joan's Florist on the Coventry Road, trading since 1966, is the next oldest shop in this guide and has the same virtues and the same digital problem. Winspers in Kings Heath goes back to 1970 and at least has a photographic record.
Getting there
Erdington High Street, a few minutes from Erdington station on the Cross City line, with cheap short-stay parking on the surrounding roads and the high street car parks. Easy to reach, easy to park, which is more than most of this guide manages.
Where this assessment comes from
Desk research only, and unusually dependent on directories because the business publishes nothing itself. The address and company registration are firmly corroborated. The ninety-year claim appears in several independent listings but I have not seen it evidenced to a founding document, so the 1935 date shown here is an approximation drawn from it.
Sources consulted: Central Index and 192.com company records for Williams Florist Ltd at 18-20 High Street, the Infoisinfo Birmingham business card, the Birmingham Post and Stratford Pages directory listings, the Florist Central B23 6RH record, and the UK Wedding Planner directory entry.
This is a desk-based, opinion-led write-up, not an inspection: I have not audited this business, tested a delivery, or spoken to the owner. Everything above is one person’s reading of information that anyone can look up, and none of it represents the views of the owner of this domain. If you run this shop and something here is wrong or out of date, please tell me and I will fix it.