Longtime Steamboat Springs resident Susanne Bostrom is in California helping to build the floats for the Rose Parade. STEAMBOAT SPRINGS — Longtime Steamboat Springs resident Susanne Bostrom can’t stop smiling these days as she talks about realizing her dream of being one of 900 volunteers who will be creating the floats for this year’s Rose Parade. “It was always a dream of mine,” Bostrom said of working on the floats that will roll just over five miles down Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena on New Year’s Day. “Fifteen years ago I went to the Rose Parade, because I was on board of directors of FTD for our district. They took the district representatives, and we were carted around in limousines. We got to go behind the scenes and meet all the main designers and went to the parade.” But even before that, Bostrom, who owned Alpine Floral & Atrium until she closed the business in 2012, dreamed of being a part of the New Year’s celebration. Last April, she learned she had been selected to work with Fiesta Parade Floats, one of the companies that build the nearly 30 floats in the parade. When she got the news, one of her first calls was to her former boss Roy Borodkin, who opened Alpine Floral in its first location at the Harbor Hotel in 1974. “I called him and said I’m working on the floats in the Rose Bowl Parade this year,” Bostrom said. “He said, ‘finally.’” Bostrom hitchhiked from Boulder to Steamboat in 1975 and arrived with $78 in her pocket and no job. But by the end of her first day in town, she had lined up jobs as a lifeguard at the swimming pool, waiting tables at the El Rancho and working at Alpine Floral. Her job at […]
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Travis Rigby is a publisher and entrepreneur focused on growing the floral industry through media, data, and product innovation. With a journalism background from the University of Utah, he founded and led PosterGarden.com for 27 years before transitioning into floral publishing. Today, Travis is the publisher of Florists’ Review, one of the industry’s most historic and influential titles, which he relaunched in 2026 with a focus on rebuilding its audience and transforming it into a modern data-driven platform for advertisers and readers alike. At Florists' Review Media, he oversees a portfolio of floral brands including Florists’ Review, SuperFloral, Canadian Florist, Flora (UK), Australian Florist, and LivingFlowers.com.
