Scams inspire Valentine’s Day stinky florist pop-up shop

The flowers come with a collection of Valentine’s Day cards which help normalise talking about romance scams. Photo / Jamie Wright

More Kiwis are becoming unwitting money mules, a big bank says, as a special pop-up shop highlighting scams emerges today.

The Valentine’s Day pop-up in Ponsonby Central will give people the chance to smell a stinky flower.

A florist will be offering flowers with intentionally foul fishy scents.

The specially engineered “Scammers Bloom” rose and the Love Stinks pop up shop were devised to educate people about scams, ANZ’s Alan Thomsen told the Herald.

“Getting a fishy smell just highlights that you’re not really getting what you expect,” said Thomsen, head of customer protection for the country’s biggest bank.

He said many people had heard of scams where a perpetrator quickly asked for money, and though that still happened, fewer people probably knew about investment and money mule scams.

In these cases, a person would promise fabulous investment returns and might tell the target: “I can help you invest your money to grow your wealth.”

Thomsen said these scammers often created mules by saying: “I can’t receive the money because I don’t have a bank account in New Zealand. Can you please just forward that on to my bank account overseas?”

He said some people still incorrectly believed only the elderly were susceptible to scams.

“It’s a misconception. The split is pretty even between males and females in terms of those who are impacted.”

Last week, the Herald reported on a woman who wasted two years and more than $375,000 on what turned out to be a romance scam with an impersonation of Kiwi actor Martin Henderson.

ANZ said the average loss for a romance scam was about $13,500 compared to $2500 in other scams.

The bank said it hoped the Auckland pop-up flower shop would have an impact, and also provide practical tips on how to spot romance scams and keep finances safe.

ANZ said it was witnessing about three cases a week where a customer lost money to a romance or friendship scam.

“Over 95% of romance scams begin online, often on social media platforms,” the bank added.

Last week, the 2025 Norton Cyber Safety Insights Report found generational perceptions often led people to believe other age groups were more at risk than themselves.

The Norton report also found there were about seven scam attempts per capita last year in New Zealand - about 35 million in total, or a scam attempt every second.

Norton said scams in order of prevalence were romance scams, catfishing, fake dating sites, visa or migration scams, and “sugar daddy” or “sugar baby” scams, where people impersonated rich older men or attractive younger women.