David Fields

Oh, forgot. We used to sell portion cups then molded tarts, but neither sold well, and the packaging was not good. The clamshells sell much, much better for us

We sell the 2 oz clamshells for $2 wholesale, $2.95 or two for $5 retail. Cost is 60 cents. We also sell the mid-size and large clamshell, but I haven't a clue what we sell them for or how much they cost. Not my job.

Oilphoria, thanks for the advice. We have looked at changing things on the site, but to be honest, we just have not had the time. Roughly 60% of our revenue comes from our retail store, 30% from wholesale and 10% from our website. The site works for us right now. It's sort of a "don't fix what ain't broke" thing. Our website brings in a little under 50k/yr in sales. So, most of our time and attention at this time is spent on the larger revenue generators. Fixing/tweeking our website is a backburner issue.

For breakables we pack pretty much like TallTayl. Lot of effort but first time you have to replace something including the shipping cost at your expense the effort does not seem so bad.

depends on how large your business is. We started out with a Big Chief tablet and a pencil. Then went to Excel spreadsheets. Then went to Quick Books. Been using QB for 10 or 12 years now. Works great for us. That's for accounting. For inventory control, again it depends on how big you are. POS systems can track inventory and sales really well but require lots of maintenance and time for input. A rule of thumb we were given a long time ago is not to worry about inventory control until it is a problem and you really need one or when your sales hit $600K/yr. Before either of these two instances, inventory is almost a waste of time. HTH (from our perspective)

Shopify works great for us. Been using it for almost two years. No problems. Easy to set up. nice designs. You can check out our site if you have questions. www.thecandleboxshop.com

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The dye is titanium dioxide. Use much much less than you would think. The bits of white color do not normally dissolve and will clog your wick and cause your candle to look funny. So, again use much less than you think you should and you should be fine.

Sorry, Jcandleattic, but I disagree. Priming is not necessary, but for better burns it is. Priming does more than make the wicks stand straight.

What size HTP wicks are you using? We use only HTP wicks in our jars and have for 15-20 years. Never an issue with throw. We also only use IGI wax. I believe that we use HTP 83 for our 3.5" jars (double wicked). Not sure. We don't pour jar candles where I am but at another whse. I will check to see. Wick/wax/jar diameter/shape is a delicate balance to get a good HT. HTH

Square.com You pay a flat percentage regardless of the cc processor. You can get the little doohickey that plugs into your cell phone or buy the square register setup for I think $199. Lots of reports and bells and whistles with Square. We love it. Much better than all of the standard cc processors we had in the past. Been with Square for I think four years now. No issues with them.

This has happened to us a few times; don't sweat it. With Square you go through the resolution process and provide documentation that supports you. Square sends your documentation and the customer's documentation to the bank issuing the credit card for adjudication. We have been upheld every time. Takes awhile but do send everything that supports you. All the customer can provide is " I didn't make this purchase". You have the swiped card purchase and a signature. The only way you lose is if the customer has reported the card as stolen after the purchase. So, don't sweat it.

Many companies add a handling charge to shipping.

Sndfrrdy Our store is The Candle Box located in Post Oak Mall in College Station. Please come visit. David

wththomas57 - our wholesale accounts are for the most part out of town. We have some that are close enough that they pick up at our store. And a few in other nearby states. We deliver nothing. Another thing we tried that was not working for us. We don't have issues with the Texas heat or shipping. We double box all glassware with peanut between the boxes. We normally don't ship wax products during the summer. Don't like them sitting somewhere in the heat. We get new accounts from out of town customers who come into our store, buy our products and tell friends about us. Our employees talk to our customers and suggest wholesale to ones who live out of town. We make good products and have never advertised. Word of mouth is our best advertisement. Plus, we have been in business for 18 years. That helps to develop a large group of loyal customers. Oh, we have a website that we also have our employees talk up. Out of town customers who don't have business contact buy and eventually it can lead to new good wholesale accounts.

We started out in wholesale five years ago. Did not really want it. Now, still not sure. We get new accounts weekly, and I have no idea how many we have. Wholesale revenue is up to about 30% of our total revenue; so, it is becoming significant. BUT, what we don't like are the tiny accounts. It seems that the larger the account, the less trouble they are. For us a larger account is someone who orders monthly/bi-monthly $500-1000 per order; the larger accounts (over $1000 per order) are no problem at all. Smaller than that are headaches. We started out with no minimums (big mistake) then went to $200 first order with no minimum on reorders, then $200 first order with $100 reorders, then $400 first order with $100 reorders, now $400 first order and $200 reorders. This has weeded out the small guys. We close small account weekly if they become a problem. We have found it takes almost as much time to box up a small order as it does a large order. And since we have employees pulling the orders and preparing them, the labor costs for a small order are really annoying. So, to answer the original question of this post (I think), is wholesale worthwhile? Yes, but only if you do it right so it is beneficial to US and the customer (emphasis on US).

Our clamshells cost us 60 cents. We sell them retail for $2.95 and wholesale for $2.00. I believe that's in the range of most candlemakers' prices. We could sell them for $1.00 and make a profit. We sell around 24k clamshells a year, so a small profit margin is ok. But, why would we? We don't want to hurt local candlemakers trying to make a go of it, and why sell them for a lot less when our customers believe our prices are great. The way we price products is: we start with a retail price we think covers our costs with a reasonable profit and that leaves room for a wholesale price. Then after a month or so we look at sales. If the products are flying off the shelf, they are too cheap, and we raise the price until they move well but are not flying. If the products are not moving well, and we see customers pick up the item, look at the price and then set it down, we know we are too high, so, we lower the price until it sells well. If we are not profitable, we discount the products and move on to something else. Although, we have had products that moved very slowly but flew off the shelves when we raised the price. Go figure. Pricing to us is very, very important.

ditto Vicky

Reminds me of the two Aggies who graduated from Texas A&M with business degrees and decided to go into business. They bought a truck, drove to the valley and bought a truck-load of watermelons for $1 each. They drove home and set up by the side of the road with a sign that said "Watermelons - $1 each". In an hour they were sold out. After selling tlast watermelon one of the guys looked at his partner and said "you know what this means don't you?" The other said "yep, we gotta get a bigger truck".

NO!. Fragrant Oils are solvents. They will eat through just about anything., Excess oil in clamshells will eat through the plastic. Too much on the tops of candles may drown the wicks. So, NO!

We started our website a year ago this April. We average $1200-1500/month gross. And about 60% profit. So, I guess it is working well for us. We have noticed that we will get an order from a city we have not had customers before, and then within a month we will get another order or two from different folks, and that spreads. Online sales is slow. It takes word of mouth to increase your business. None of our customers to my knowledge have just ordered out of the clear blue; all that we correspond with say they experienced our products from someone else who bought them. Bet that's the way it is for everyone. We also don't waste our money on increasing our spot in a Google search.

We only give samples to long-time customers when we have a new scent or product that we want them to assess. Otherwise they never get an opportunity to try them. Everyone else we don't. period.

It depends. For small label batches we print in-house. For large label needs we use Dac Label out of Dallas. In between we compute our needs over a year's time and see which option is cheaper. We prefer to go with professionally printed labels. We order them with a "mat lam" finish. Mat lam finish is a mat (non-glossy) laminate overlay. That way there is no damage to the label from moisture. The labels we print smudge too easily.

Anchor Hocking Specialty Glass (a manufacturer with low minimums) Libbey Glass (also a manufacturer but with super high minimums, but we buy pallets from distributors who stock Libbey glass) AAA Candle Supply out of a suburb of Dallas, don't remember the town. tele no. 214-542-1520 or 342-9898 one number is no good. They have good pallet prices Lonestar Candle Supply in Keller TX. They also have good pallet pricing. We order one to three pallets of the glassware we pour in and have to give a "heads-up" to the two distributors above when we need Libbey glass. We alternate between the two because even our heads-up might be out of their ordering cycle for Libbey. The distributors order by the trailer load to get better pricing and freight reductions. So, they like pallet orders. HTH

What you are asking about is mica powder. We have used it for years, and have not noticed any problems, except it gets all over everything!. We first put it on all of our candles, but realized quickly that it became boring. Now we have just one scent on which we use it. It has improved that scents' sales. We sprinkle a small amount on the top just before the wax hardens. HTH