Dagwood

Love it!!!!

yeah, I have to be honest....it's not mine lol

I heard it from someone else a long time ago but for the life of me, I can't remember where. It's always stuck with me because I found it too funny and this seemed like a good time to use it!

My reply would have been -

KMart and I have an agreement. I don't compete with them on price and they don't compete with me on quality.

'nuff said

To be a little more specific, she is wanting the 'smell' of the little, privately owned, home decor shops... That carry the barn stars, berry swags, specialty candles, wreaths, etc.

This is what Tennessee's This Old House smells like to me. In fact, I renamed it Quaint Little Shoppe and it's sold very well for me this year.

BW's Honey Gingerbread is the best gingerbread I've found. Very strong and true. Works great in soy and parrafin.

Ditto

I use 464 but I use CD wicks. Here's a few that work great for me:

Tennessee-

Amish Harvest

Sun Washed Linen

Tuscan Vineyard

Candle Science-

Honeysuckle jasmine

Lime Cooler

Millcreek-

Berry Creme Brulee

Spicy Gingerbread

Around here the flea markets = low prices. I saw someone selling their jelly jar soy candles for $2.00.

I also do a small farmers market. It's very small and I don't make a lot but it's fun and I have built up repeat business.

I would start with the small shows. Craft bazaars at the churches, schools, etc. They usually come with a fairly low application fee and it's easy to do well at many of them.

I use the full sheet white vinyl labels from Elements. I cut them out myself. They're rectangular and I just use my fiskar's straight cutter thing. Oh and I use front and back labels.

Were your hard oils fully melted? I use PKO and I've noticed that I would occasionally get white spots. Once I started melting the PKO first and then adding the other hard oils to melt, the problem went away.

I use 464 and CD wicks.

I'm looking forward to trying their oils, I've always heard great things about them but was hesitant to order because of the previous stock issues.

This is sad, hopefully someone will pick up some of her oils. I have several dedicated Wisteria fans.

I'd call them as well, I like the "surprised" tactic. LOL

Think of it this way...your customers wouldn't like it if you quoted $8 before shipping and then billed them $12.

One thing that I've noticed is that if my soaps gel too fast or get too hot, I get more ash. Some fragrances do this more than others. With fragrances that I know will move fast, I use a bit more water and make sure my oils & lye are cooler when I start. It's helped a bit.

Other than that, nothing I do seems to prevent it.

I've been using this wax for quite awhile now, over a year. I love it. Frosts like crazy so I don't color. I use CD wicks, I've never used any other, but I do find it's much easier to wick than other soy waxes. I use smaller wicks with 464 than with other soys.

I tried the 444 once but I chose to continue with the 464.

My personal favs are Spicy Gingerbread and Berry Creme Brulee.

What I have began to do is test 1# wax with additives, fo and color then pour a few ounces into each of my jar sizes as a PRE test to check for correct wicking and scent throw. Typically the container is filled over half full with this batch size. If after 3 burns using the 1" per hour rule to assure wicking is correct and the throw is what I am looking for THEN I pour a complete set of candle sizes with the wick of choice and burn top to bottom before adding to my line. I choose this method cause some fo's I didn't care for once in wax or couldn't get wicked, and I felt I was wasting alot $$$ and time. It is an added step in testing but it is working well for me. Very rarely do I get variances in a full candle after doing the pre-test, but it does happen occasionally. I will keep an eye on this thread to see others responses, I too am always looking for keen new ideas.

I do the it the same way Brenda described. I went through several fragrances that didn't throw at all and realized that I was wasting a lot of time, wax, etc.

I do reuse my testing jars over and over. I do not offer refills to customers, they only get new jars. The primary reason for this is because I just know they'd be bringing in dirty jars, wax left in them, etc and it would really be too much work for me to clean them. Call me lazy, I guess

However, I do agree that exploding jars would not be good. LOL!

Here's some that work for me -

SW Green Irish Tweed - my BIL's fav

BCN Lime Leaf & Lily - my DH's fav, I just changed the name for him lol

AGE Salty Mariner - another DH fav

FOH Indonesian Teak - a big seller at my market this year

I use TN Candle. It's really really really really strong in my para/soy blend.

Candlemaker's Store (Steve's) - Harvest

Tennessee Candle - Amish Harvest

Candlemaker's Store (Steve's) - Silver Bells

Tennessee Candle - This Old House

Yep, it goes by state. A quick call to your state tax department would answer that for you. I know in Ohio, we're allowed to include tax but we have to state "price includes Ohio state and local taxes".

It's a real nasty-gram stating it's illegal for me to call any candle "hersheys chocolate", (fyi-my candles are NOT conical shape).

Since nobody in their right mind would mistake your candle for a true Hershey chocolate bar, maybe they should consider it free advertising!

LOL

For me, the BCN base was nice but a little too slippery, glossy feeling. For awhile, I added some additional cocoa butter and that helped.

Now I just make my own.... much cheaper and I can use ingredients that I already have on hand!

Paraffin (with all the additives already added) is definitely the easiest to work with for throw...there are very few oils that will not work. So you have the "pick of the litter" so to speak of the intensely aromatic oils. The zinc core wicks are somewhat standardized for the containers.

Soy is a little more finickey. There are some oils that will not release (notice the stickey in the Vegetable section). Plus with the variety of wicks available (ECO, LX, CD, RRD, Premier, CSN, CDN, HTP). It takes more testing and experimentation to get a final product that throws extremely well.

I agree! With paraffin, it was much easier to find FO's that provided the throw I was looking for.

It is much harder with soy but when you do find it.... it's really good!! Just be prepared to test A LOT of FO's to find them!

I guess my point is the best FO's that I've found for soy will throw as well as (if not better, for some) than paraffin. But you may only find 1 or 2 out of 30 FO's that you try. Kind of a bummer but what can you do!

I get mine from The Candlemaker's Store. They are in Ohio. Great service, super fast shipping & good prices.

:highfive:

Yep, me too! They are located about 15 minutes from where I live, so I go there all the time. Super nice people!!

Hands down......Best customer service of all of my suppliers!

Her oils are really hit or miss for me in candles but I do use several for B&B.

My favorites for candles:

Chestnuts & Brown Sugar ( I think most agree that hers is outstanding and will throw in darn near anything)

Satsuma