We are proud to call the Houston Museum of Natural Science one of our customers and it is our pleasure to feature HMNS in an especially timely edition of our Customer Spotlight today.

Why is it so timely? Well, because the HMNS is distributing buttons to commemorate an impending experience that has been described as “a combination of rotting vegetation and rotting flesh.”

Wait…what?

Allow me to explain.

The HMNS is currently home to a rare flower called Amorphophallus Titanum, commonly referred to as the Corpse Flower because of the pungent odor released when it blooms. The problem (or relief, depending on your perspective and sensitivity of smell) is that the Corpse Flower rarely blooms in captivity. (Click here to see pictures.)

Currently there are only 29 of these flowers in captivity throughout the world and it has been growing for over six years at the HMNS without flowering. What has everyone excited is that right now — literally right now as I type this — the HMNS staff and curious visitors are on high alert because the flower could bloom at any second.

And this is where the buttons come in. The HMNS has created “Team Lois”, “I Love Lois”, and “Bring on the Funk” buttons, along with many others, to commemorate the blooming of this gargantuan 6 foot tall, 30 pound behemoth of a flower.

Here are a few images of the buttons, which were made using button machines from ABM and have been selling “like hot cakes”:

The following videos provide some more background on the flower and the current excitement level about its impending bloom at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. (The first one features our buttons!)

For all of the latest information on Lois and the status of her bloom, the best places to go are the Corpse Flower page on the HMNS website and on Twitter (@hmns). Follow the hashtag #corpseflower for up-to-the-second news.

Brighid Brown – Director of Blogging and All Things Cool at ABM