10/16/2026
In 1984, while working as a stockbroker, Stan earned a trip to Kauai. While there, we visited a local orchid nursery where Stan bought a few plants to take home. He studied and learned about growing orchids and adapting them to the Colorado climate and was pretty successful. In 1986, after our first daughter, Katey, was born, we received a beautiful Phalaenopsis which bloomed for 6 months! Stan was hooked.
In 1989, after working in banking and then a 10-year career as a stockbroker and financial planner, Stan decided to start a business - growing and selling orchids. In Colorado!
To say I was taken by surprise is an understatement. We had 3 young children (we would add 2 more in the next few years) and I had gotten used to a regular income to support our family. However, Stan presented his well-thought-out and research plans and projections on his trusty yellow legal pad (IYKYK 😉) and asked that I give him 2 years to succeed, and if it didn’t work out he would return to his career as a stockbroker. With a lot of hard work as a one-man operation, he surpassed his 2-year projections within the first year and the rest, as they say, is history.
Over the course of 40 years, Stan worked long hours at Fantasy Orchids - 60-70 hours a week, in the greenhouse and always working on planning and projections for the business (again on his yellow legal pads).
He began traveling to Hawaii once or twice a year to visit orchid nurseries on Oahu, Maui, Kauai and the Big Island, establishing connections and relationships with the growers there. He especially loved going through the greenhouses, finding new plants and hand-picking all of his purchases. It was like Christmas for him when the boxes of plants arrived at the greenhouse and he could unpack them and share his excitement about the plants he had found. He made his last trip to Hawaii in January 2023, the first time back since January 2020 and the Covid shutdown. He and our son, Taylor, went to the Big Island to pick out plants before going to Kauai, where we had a long-awaited beach vacation. Stan told me that he still got excited to find new orchids and to hand-pick plants - it was his favorite part of our business.
