St Barths fills up for Christmas and New Year, and so does everything that has to reach it. The flowers are the easy part once one piece of paperwork is in place, and that piece of paperwork is why this is an October job rather than a December one.
Here is the whole picture, in the order it actually happens.
St Barths has no cargo airport, so the flowers clear at Sint Maarten
Nothing is imported into St Barths directly. Every flower box that reaches a yacht in Gustavia has landed at Sint Maarten first, cleared there, and crossed afterwards. That matters for one reason: the import permit you need is a Sint Maarten permit, and the flowers travel to St Barths under it. Nine hours in the air to Sint Maarten makes it the shortest lane in the Caribbean, which is the other reason it is the right way in. More on the Sint Maarten lane is here.
Sint Maarten does require a permit. If you have shipped flowers into the island years ago without one, the rules have moved, and we plan for a permit every time now.
A Caribbean import permit takes 5 to 7 working days to be granted, and it has to be granted before anything is bought. That is the only part of the chain with a real wait in it, and it is the only part you cannot compress in December.
How long does the Sint Maarten permit take?
This is the part most crews do not expect. The permit is not a per order document. Once it is on file, it stays valid for later orders on the same species list, for the rest of the season.
So the October work is a single application, and every order after it, in December, in January, in March, runs on about three days from your message to the flowers standing at the passerelle.
Which makes the species list the most important thing you will send us this month. The permit covers what is named on it, and nothing can be substituted afterwards. Put down everything you can imagine wanting between December and April, not only what you want for New Year’s Eve. Roses, hydrangea, orchids, peonies if you want them in February, the foliage you like, the things the owner always asks for. A name you leave off in October is a name that needs its own application later.
What an order looks like once the permit is on file
Three steps, and none of them need you to do anything clever.
You message us with the date the flowers should be on board and where the boat will be. We need 48 hours before the flowers are bought at the auction in Holland, so that we are buying for your date and not out of stock. The flowers are then one to two days in the air, and they come to the passerelle cold.
About three days, end to end. That is the number to plan around, and the full timing picture is on the shipping page.
Two constraints sit on top of it.
Monday to Friday only. Nothing leaves at the weekend, because the flight and the export paperwork both need a working day. Count backwards from the date you want and land on a weekday.
A shipment is at least 100 kg volumetric, which means it is measured by the space the boxes take rather than by what they weigh. Flowers are light and bulky, so this is less than it sounds, and the dry goods count towards it: floral foam, containers, tools, sundries. If a single week looks thin, send a fuller box one week rather than two half boxes in two.
When do you order for Christmas and New Year?
The charter weeks run from around 20 December to 5 January. In 2026, Christmas Day falls on a Friday and New Year’s Eve on a Thursday. Both are working days, which helps, but the days either side of them are not.
In practice that means two orders, not one. Flowers that have to look right on Christmas Eve are bought in the week before. Flowers for the 31st are a second order, placed while the boat is already full of guests. The second one is the one that gets forgotten, because nobody is thinking about it on the 23rd. Put both dates in the diary now and we will carry them for you.
If the owner’s party is confirmed late, which it usually is, the three day figure is what saves you. But it only applies if the permit is already sitting on file. That is the whole argument for October.
What to send us this month
A short list, and most of it you already know.
- The ports and the dates, as far ahead as you have them, even if they are provisional.
- The species list for the permit, as generous as you can make it.
- The dry goods you want held: foam, containers, vases, tools, anything you would rather not carry across from Antibes.
- How often you want a refresh. Weekly is normal on a boat with guests on board.
- Your agent at Sint Maarten, if you already have one, and the name of whoever signs at the passerelle.
Provisional dates are fine. The permit does not need a confirmed itinerary, it needs a destination and a species list. We would far rather apply in October against a plan that changes than apply in December against a plan that is certain.
Where St Barths sits in the wider picture
If the winter programme takes the boat on to Antigua, Tortola, St Thomas or the Grenadines, each of those is its own permit, and each follows the same shape: one application early in the season, then quick orders for the rest of it. October is the month to do all of them together rather than discovering the paperwork one port at a time. Our St Barths page has the detail for Gustavia itself.
What you can find locally in the islands is a separate question, and a short one. Some foliage and some tropicals, reliably. Hydrangea, good roses, peonies, scented stock, the things a dining table actually needs, no.
The next step
Send Maxime a message on WhatsApp with the boat, the ports and the rough dates. We will come back with a species list to approve and start the permit this month, so that from December onwards you are simply asking for flowers and getting them.