Press Kit · Petal Price

Headline numbers

1,508

Calls placed by an AI

463

Successful price quotes

US cities covered

$75

Median bouquet price

Range across cities ($50 to $100 median)

Florists who detected the AI

Openly admitted Mother's Day markup

36s

Average call length

One-paragraph summary

Petal Price is a public price index for Mother's Day flowers in America, built entirely by an AI voice agent named Maya. Between April 29 and May 7, 2026, Maya called 1,508 small business florists across 17 US cities to find out where to buy the cheapest Mother's Day bouquet. 463 florists answered. The median quote was $75. Median prices ranged from $50 in Detroit to $100 in New York, a 2x spread for the same product in the same week. 10 florists realized they were talking to an AI; one asked Maya to laugh to prove she was human. 22 florists openly admitted that prices go up specifically for Mother's Day, with one saying flower wholesale costs "go up about three times" during the holiday week. The full dataset, recordings, and methodology are public at petalprice.ai. The project was built by Promptoast, a Black-owned AI consultancy founded by Nick Houston, formerly of Microsoft.

Free to use

Downloadable charts

PNG format, 200dpi. Right-click and save, or click the download button on each.

City Rankings (all 18)

Median Mother's Day bouquet price across 17 US metros, sorted cheapest (Detroit, $50) to most expensive (New York, $100). Sample size shown for each.

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National Price Distribution

Histogram of all 463 prices florists quoted. Most cluster between $50 and $100, with a long right tail of luxury arrangements.

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Four Headline Numbers

Poster-style summary of the four most-quoted statistics from the project. Sized for social sharing.

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Why Flowers Cost More

Reasons florists actually gave for their elevated Mother's Day pricing. The wholesalers, the holiday surcharge, and one mention of tariffs.

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Social Share Card

1200x630 image for Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social platforms. The headline visual.

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Copy and paste

Florist pull quotes

Real quotes from real florists, captured on real AI calls. Free to reproduce. Florist names are not published.

Are you artificial intelligence or a human being? It sounds like artificial intelligence.

On a call with a florist

Can you laugh for me?

On a call with a florist

Oh my God, are you a robot?

On a call with a florist

Our florals go up about three times.

On a call with a florist

Right now, our minimum for delivery is $500.

On a call with a florist

It's like saying how much does a house cost?

On a call with a florist

You're like calling a restaurant going, how much is food?

On a call with a florist

I wouldn't spend less than 75. Prices are really high now, you know, 'cause of COVID and the tariffs and all that stuff.

On a call with a florist

Key facts for journalists

This is the first AI-built national flower price index. No human surveyor placed any of these calls. The agent (named Maya) ran on ElevenLabs with Telnyx for SIP trunking.
The project cost around $400 to run end to end. Phone bills, voice agent compute, and API costs combined. Built by one person.
Calls were placed between April 29 and May 7, 2026. All for the May 10, 2026 Mother's Day window.
10 of 463 successful florists detected the AI (about 2.2%). The Maya prompt instructs her to confirm she is an AI if asked. All 10 were told.
Detroit was the cheapest median city ($50). New York was $100. A 2x spread for the same product in the same week.
22 florists explicitly mentioned that prices go up for Mother's Day. The word "tariffs" came up exactly once.
The dataset and recordings are free to use with attribution to Petal Price by Promptoast.
Florist names are not published in audio recordings or pull quotes. The full searchable table includes shop names because the prices themselves are public commercial information.

Press contact

Nick Houston Founder, Promptoast · Built Petal Price nick@promptoast.ai promptoast.ai LinkedIn

For raw CSV access, individual call recordings beyond the 12 published, or interview availability, email nick@promptoast.ai. Response time is usually under 24 hours.