Valentine's Day is two days away, and local florists are bracing for a last-minute rush of orders from well-intentioned people.

Luckily for the procrastinators, there should be an ample supply of roses this year, and prices will be close to what they were last year. Customers can expect to pay anywhere from $80 to more than $100 to have an arrangement of a dozen roses delivered.

For those who wait until Wednesday to place an order, many florists said they should be able to fill the request, although they cannot guarantee a delivery time. The florists also will accept walk-in customers, who will have their pick of whatever is available.

At Beretania Florist, June Nakamoto said late orders happen every year, and floral shops gear up for them.

"The general public is aware, and they order things ahead of time, but we know we're going to have a lot of people call on that day because they forgot or his wife will be in the office and everybody else will have some kind of Valentine item and she won't have any and he'll call us and if possible we'll try to do it," said June Nakamoto. "Next year he won't be late."

Honolulu accountant Chad Ishibashi said he usually places his Valentine's Day order a week or more before the holiday, but waited until Friday to do so because his job kept him busy. Ishibashi said he was willing to spend $100 on his girlfriend, Corri Fujikawa, but wound up paying $146 after adding chocolates, a teddy bear and balloons to the arrangement.

Ishibashi, 27, acknowledged that he probably could have spent less if he'd shopped around and ordered earlier.

"You can spend more time thinking of things, planning," he said. "But I think it's actually worth it to add it on. It's only another 50 percent of the cost, and you get three things."

Like most men, Ishibashi wasn't aware of the variety of roses or arrangements that were available. But he knew what most women want on Valentine's Day.

"Probably just roses," Ishibashi said.

Even though many men will wait until the last minute to order a floral arrangement, chances are pretty good that the orders will be filled.

Most Island florists import their roses from Colombia or Ecuador, and the supply is plentiful and consistent. The flower heads are bigger than roses grown on the Mainland or in Hawai'i, and the South American roses tend to last longer.

Watanabe Floral has flown in one of the biggest shipments of roses at 150,000 stems, said Monty Pereira, sales and marketing director. The florist expects to put together about 3,000 arrangements and make 400 delivery runs for Valentine's Day.

Fujikami Florist anticipates filling about 1,500 orders and has flown in nearly 1,000 dozen roses, said Stephen Fujikami. Nakamoto said her florist ordered 700 dozen roses for about 1,000 arrangements.

Each florist said expenses, such as fuel surcharges, have risen over last year, driving up the cost of bringing the roses to the state. Fujikami said freight costs have risen about 50 percent.

Also, more workers are needed to trim and prepare each rose, make the arrangements and deliver the flowers, adding to the cost.

Although expenses have gone up, most florists said they don't want to pass on the cost to the consumer and will keep prices consistent with last year.

"Valentine's Day is already expensive, and we don't want to make it such a burden on our customers that they start to lose the joy of Valentine's," Pereira said.

"We make more money during the regular year selling the rose arrangements at $75 than during Valentine's at $97.50," Fujikami added. "Our cost almost doubles, but you can only charge so much to be reasonable."

Reach Curtis Lum at culum@honoluluadvertiser.com.