Desertrose

You make some good points there Bernadette. Thanks! I guess it will be trial and error once we have made the molds. I know it's not going to be cheap making them either because the things I have in mind will require a LOT of silicone. It's going to be a bit different from the simple tart molds we've made so far. All good fun and games I expect!

Thanks Bernadette. Yeah, I'm thinking wick pins might be easier? I suppose it will take some experimentation once we actually make the molds themselves.

Maybe I'm just having a really dim moment but it occurred to me that as I'm having vague thoughts about creating future pillar molds from silicone......well I haven't contemplated how to wick them. Say for example I wanted to create a Buddah head mold. Something where I'd have to split the top of the mold (Like a cross shape at the top?) in order to peel the head out..... Well, how do you wick that ? At the risk of being embarrassed, co's the answer may suddenly dawn on me after I've posted it.........well... I'll post it anyway!

No worries The guy in the gift shop that already knows you as a customer may be a good place to start. Why not give him a free sample to try? Nothing better than shopkeepers seeing for themselves what you have to offer and everyone loves a freebie! When we first approached shops we gave away a few jar candles and some melts for them to try. In the scheme of things, it's all advertising! Our website is totally my husband- Richards, domain. I really have no idea what shopping cart we use or how he did it. All I know is he pulled out what little hair he has left while designing our site! I'll get him to reply to you when he gets a chance.

We prefer wholesale over consignment any day. To have stock tied up sitting there and not making any money upfront for it is a risk. For you - to have it sitting there is then out of your control (temperature in the shop, people handling it etc) From our experience so far we're finding that MOST shops want to play it safe and will only order what has been proven to them to sell.....in our case boring jars and melts (rather than our more unique items) We started out by selling at markets and craft fairs etc first before approaching shops. That way we ourselves already had a history of selling the products we were asking THEM to sell. From their perspective I guess, to know that people are already buying your product somewhere makes it less of a risk for them to make an order? Online sales for us are few and far between and personally I prefer it that way as we too use a blend of soy wax that we would worry about shipping in extremely hot weather. The palm is fine but soy can be a beast! I think it's a huge gamble when starting out to try and sell candles exclusively online....(Perhaps when you have proven your product it may be a different story?) but, well......if I were a customer seeing a product for the first time I'd prefer to be able to smell a scent before I bought a candle online. So, in summary I reckon to get out there FIRST and get some sort of a customer base through selling at markets or craft shows is a good idea - for you to be able to be confident with what you are selling, and for future wholesalers to know that what you are making DOES sell. Having storage space is just something I reckon comes with making candles.....We've even got candles stacked up in boxes in our bedroom!

Thank you! I love making them and I have my favourites that are sometimes hard to part with! Tracy

It's only scary because it's something new. Once you take the plunge ( after gathering all the required knowledge) and go ahead and make your first candle it won't seem so daunting. I look at soap making and think.....ohhhh my that all seems so complicated, but what's the worst that can happen? You make a mistake and botch it up? Well.....it's all part of the learning experience to make mistakes anyway isn't it! Don't be too worried, it's so much fun when your candles turn out and burn well. The process of getting to it is fun too, even if there's a few glitches along the way! I'd say EXPECT some hiccups! It takes time and practise to get it all right and all of us here have gone through that! Just ask whatever questions you have here on the board and I'm sure someone will answer them! Good luck!

Thanks so much everyone for your thoughts and ideas. All good food for thought! I think we'll be doing this trip very much playing it by ear. We'll be prepared and take down samples, an album of photographs, business cards etc and just scope the places out and if we feel any of the shop owners ARE approachable we'll do so if they are not looking busy at the time. If not we'll take business cards ourselves and get back to them. At the same time we'll also just appreciate getting away for a bit I'm looking forward to a break!

Gorgeous!

I've been looking to find such a tool myself for exactly the same reason. I've had the same problems too trying to search for whatever the heck it would be called!

Thanks for your input. Good to hear from a shop owner themselves. Ok, we may have to think this through......Definately not a good idea to approach too many shops that are in the same locality. We need them spread far enough apart in order for it not to be a conflict of interest. We know of one shop in particular which has already expressed interest in our stuff so we'll ring ahead and see if we can organise an appointment. Perhaps with others in different areas this can be a "scoping out likely prospects" thing and just go and browse in their shops then note down which ones we can phone at a later date.

Votives, plain pillars,tapers?,dipped things? unique shaped tarts, gift packs for valentines day, mothers day. Different scents or packaging for Spring/summer? We're having success with selling candle accessories - rusty tin plates etc.

We're taking a little trip down south after Christmas to an area well known for all it's cute little country gift stores where we feel our candles might do well. Just wondering how to go about this? We'll take a selection of products with us to show them, some free scent samples perhaps, tarts, mini melts? Richard has spent a lot of time designing a brochure, which is great but then he said it will be just to show them then and there and if they want one he'll mail it to them - reason being it's going to cost a fair bit to print them out and they may want to simply look at the website instead? I was wondering if a photo album portfolio of the candles would be a better option to show them at the time - better quality photo's etc and then all the actual information - the whole kit and kaboodle, including scent descriptions etc, is readily accessed on the website? Also, do you think it's better to phone ahead of time to each store instead of just dropping in? Seems more polite that way, but then again you might be knocked back over the phone whereas face to face they might at least consider looking at what you've got, which might prove to be of interest ultimately to them? Up till now as the shops we supply are local we've just dropped in casually and started chatting and it's all kind of just "happened" for us. How do you guys approach this approaching shops thing?

I see you've been playing Dave Really nice colours there. Very peachy! Isn't it just the greatest wax to experiment with? At first I was a bit disappointed because I thought paraffin gave you more creative scope, but I'm happy now that I've learned just some of it's characteristics. Best thing about it for us here with the incredible heat is that I can leave my palm pillars outside on a table (undercover) and they won't end up looking like the leaning tower of Pisa after a 40 degree day!

>>>caught a lady opening all of them and sniffing! She said she though they were jam scented candles....>>> lol!! See, there you go. It's just a different bunch over here. Now that we've introduced the new jars, that don't look so much like jam jars, people are buying them! Tracy

>>Did any of you notice she said "you can not screw this up"?<< Yes I did notice that and thought the same thing! I just wondered whether over there it's going the way it is here in Australia where more and more bad language is becoming the norm in media. Sounds so bad to me. She could have easily said "mess it up". Tracy

We've had quite a few people chat to us at the markets saying they've thought about making candles themselves. We tell them how much we've invested (so far) and how much testing needs to be done and you see their eyes go wide and their jaws drop. I did get a chuckle out of the beginning bit though with the hand made doll. lol! Tracy

Thanks Tammy and Ravens, and you're most welcome MParadise. Tracy

You're welcome. Stella here on the board also uses palm wax and I *think* I've seen her mention that she adds the palm stearic? We've never had a problem with unmolding palm at all so I'm sorry but I can't help you with that. Strange though that it's never been a problem we've encountered? Perhaps ask in the vegetable wax section of the board about this? Tracy

For us it was just sheer accident that we were in Perth and the local candle supplier was selling soy and palm wax. I'd only ever burned paraffin candles - cheap nasty ones, up until then. We'd never even heard of soy or palm wax but jumped in anyway and haven't looked back since. I especially don't miss the sooting and to work with palm in particular feels so much nicer - cleaner or something. Not oily/greasy like soy can be and paraffin is. It concerns me about the deforestation thing - especially when you consider what potential customers must have heard, but what can I do but trust that they say that the palm wax is coming from plantations that have lesser impact on the environment than from other sources. Tracy

In January we will be ordering our Autumn/winter fragrances for our candles. Already we are in the process of trying to decide upon a few new ones. Might have to ask for opinions here. Since January and February here are so incredibly hot I doubt we'll be doing any more markets unless we're lucky and the day in question is cooler so now is the time for planning ahead, especially for Christmas in July, which apparently is a big thing here in the Blue Mountains. Tracy

It seems I don't have priveleges that enable me to create a tutorial on how to make these "hippy pillars" as I call them. Someone else pm'd me and asked too. I'll write it again here... Basically they are just tilted pillars that I make with palm wax - don't know how they would turn out in any other wax though. The process involves putting your pillar mold into a tray of sand or kitty litter (this is what I use because I have cats...clean litter of course ) You make up three bowls of different coloured wax. Think carefully about which colours you choose because each colour will blend with the next and you could get some horrid colour mixes! An easy and safe way to start is to mix up three shades of one colour. Make the shades really obviously different! Then you simply start pouring layers one by one into your mold which is set tilted on an angle in the tray of sand, or whatever you are using to prop it up in. Each layer must be left to cool to the point where with palm wax, it is set enough that you can press your finger on it and not get liquid wax spurting out at you. If you want a non crystalized effect with the palm wax you pour the layers at a temp which is much cooler than normal. I can't tell you what that IS because I do these now mainly by instinct and I don't actually use a thermometer (shhh...don't tell anyone! lol!) You can however pour them at a hotter temp which will still give you the feathered look. I just don't because I want the nice vivid colours and the feathering tends to cut those back a few shades. The idea is that as each layer sets it will pull away slightly from the side of the mold and when it does this you pour the next layer which will spill down over the sides of the first layer giving you that "spill" effect. Remember that if you leave a layer to set for TOO long then you will get a LOT of spill as the wax would have shrunk back quite a bit. You don't really want that. Each layer should be smallish for a more interesting look. If you get impatient and pour larger quantities of wax for each layer it is likely your end result will not look as good. I suppose that I pour about 13 layers for each entire candle, turning the mold around as well as tilting it as I do each layer. So basically you just tilt and pour, wait till it begins to set, press it with your finger to test it, poke it with a skewer if you suspect there might be air bubbles forming (I usually do that only because I get impatient and have to stab something!) and then turn it and tilt and pour all the way until the mould is full. Last layer of course is when you take it out of the tray and set it on a flat surface for the final layer which is the bottom of the candle. This whole process can take 2-3 hours- or more! (which is why I usually make 3 at a time.) Then you remain patient and wait for the entire candle to be good and properly SET! Don't be impatient like me because you want to see how the colours have all blended and try to unmold it too soon! (I wish I had clear molds so I could see how the candle is turning out as I'm doing it.) Anyway, so that's how it's done. Very time consuming and soooooo disappointing if it doesn't turn out well, but I think it's worth the effort trying because they are so fun to make when they DO turn out. Might be worth starting with a small pillar mold to begin with until you get the feel for it. Tracy

At first, seeing the title I thought Richard must have posted about our experience yesterday. Pretty bad form that they made no effort to put signs up. What, do they think people are psychic? And you pay for a table but there IS no table? lol! Pretty shabby. The one we went to is a regular craft show, not huge but well advertised- all quality hand made products. At one point we got excited because we thought some people had arrived but on second look it was just all the stall holders themselves relieving their numb bums and taking a walk around to have a squiz at other peoples stalls. I saw one stallholder getting up a few times and going outside to play his harmonica to relieve the boredom. He probably could have made more money by taking his harmonica, throwing a hat down on the pavement outside for passers by. Seems they ALL passed us by. We sold about seven things and we were luckier than most. At least we made enough to cover our stall costs. I don't know what it is right now. The last couple of markets we've done have been unbelievably quiet. I'm thinking maybe people are just rushing to the shopping malls now to buy what they know as it's so close to Christmas? Oh well, we've got three more markets to do and then that's it for at least two months as it will be too hot to sell candles here through January and February. Disappointing isn't it when you go to such efforts with your products Tracy

I too love the look you've gone for with your product. Very nice presentation! Tracy

Yeah, I could tea stain it. Good idea. Maybe tie some tea stained lace around the top to give it that shabby chique look? Tracy