The Best Flower Clippers That We Use Every Day.

When looking for the best floral clippers, not all snips are alike. After using many different pairs, we finally landed on one that we use in our studio every day.

The ARS HP-103DX Light Pruner is the best floral clipper on the market. After hundreds of hours of use in our floral studio, we know that they are light, sharp, affordable, long-lasting, comfortable, and built with quality components that do not gunk up. We highly recommend them.

Let’s take a closer look at why these floral clippers should be your first choice when snipping some stems.

Why These are Our Favorite Clippers

We love these Japanese-made floral clippers because they have been very reliable in practically every situation in the floral studio. The mark of a good quality pair of clippers is the fact that you don't notice them while you are using them. They just continue to perform the desired task day in and day out. Continual use causes clippers to either get dull or start to retain resin-like gunk from the floral stems. This will cause noticeable problems during use.

As a wedding florist, I have found the ones that work for me. I put the ARS HP-103DX (Affiliate link to Amazon) through serious use. While doing in-studio work and weddings every weekend, I cut every single floral-related thing you can think of. This includes chicken wire and zip ties. Sometimes I really should be using wire cutters, but when you are on a wedding site you have to move fast. It takes too much time to lug around every tool you could or should use when these clippers can do it all. These are the snips I rely on in high-pressure situations.

I replace mine after about 8 months of this level of extremely hard use. If you take proper care of these I suspect they will last for years. But know this, they are no slouch and can tackle situations well outside of their intended purpose. Even with dents in the blade, they slice through almost everything my floral studio can throw at them.

Although these have a little higher price tag than some cheap clippers on the market. Their quality is more than a bargain, as the level of use you can get out of them well outweighs their cost at $30 a pair.

One thing that I love about the ARS HP-103DX is that they are light in hand, and well balanced while sporting a blade that you would find on a larger pair of pruners. It is the best of both worlds. Nimble enough for the small tasks, but large enough to tackle hardwood branches up to half an inch. They will not easily cut larger branches, but you really should be using something a little more heavy-duty for that. I would suggest a small saw.

When it comes to cutting a dozen roses in a bunch, these work extremely well over and over again.

This is what happens when you cut metal wire with your clippers. They still work great.

The Blade

Arguably the most important part of any pair of pruners is the blade. The blade of the HP-103DX is made from marquenched chrome-plated high-carbon tool steel. This is a very fancy way of saying the blade is sharp, strong, can be sharpened, will not crack or stick. The chrome plating process that ARS applies also insures that it will take longer to rust than normal and that you can easily wipe them clean in between uses.

We have two favorite features about the blade. They stay sharp for a long time while being able to be sharpened, but most importantly, these shears do not stick. The coating on the blade keeps the gunk from building up quickly and sticking the blade together. They stay smooth on every cut. A pet peeve of mine is sticky floral shears. These simply don’t stick.

All floral clippers cut well when you first buy them. The best floral clippers cut like the first day you bought them months later after heavy use.

The Handle

The comfortable handle is made out of PVC plastic with a steel core and is very comfortable to hold in your hand. The handle is a little heavier than the blade, so they are weighted to sit in your hand when it is open. This helps when you are moving fast because the clippers won’t slip from your hand.

The lock is straightforward in its use. It simply keeps the blade from opening. Its smooth operation does not get stuck like some other brands which we have dealt with.

The spring in the handle provides the perfect level of resistance. It keeps the blade open and in motion with your hand. It never feels slack. The spring is not too strong where it makes cutting difficult either. Overall the cutting is very easy smooth and consistent.

The handle also has a little lip around the base of the spring to protect against pinching. Many clippers pinched my hand in the past when I was cutting with them. I notice the handle on the ARS HP-103DX keeps the spring tucked away just enough to avoid this problem.

The bumper in the handle, under the spring, makes repetitive use smooth and free from vibration which could cause some discomfort over time.

The Runner Up

There is another pair from ARS that we like as well. Although we think the HP-103DX is the better choice, the ARS HP-SE45 is quite good and a little more affordable.

Through using these we have noticed a few things. First, these clippers have a needle nose shape which is very handy if you need to sneak them into an area of a floral arrangement with some precision. We like to use them if we have some edits in a tight area.

These clippers are very sharp and do a great job at cutting most flowers. But once you get into hardwood stems, you might need to step up to something with more cutting power.

On the negative side, the edge retention of these clippers is not as good as the HP-103DX. We noticed they became dull at a faster rate and overall are just not as sturdy feeling. They last, but not as long as their sibling.

They are lighter in weight, which could be a good or a bad thing for you. We love the weight of the HP-103DX. To us, it feels like it is of better quality. The HP-SE45 does not have metal in the handle. It is fully plastic. If you are looking for lighter clippers this might a big upside for you.

The one reason I am not a fan of these clippers is that they pinch my hand. The spring sometimes pinches the inside of my hand at the base of my fingers.

With that being said, we still like and use these clippers. They are great to have around as a backup.

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