scifichik

I wouldn't go with polyethylene. Polypropylene is better suited for compatibility with fragrance oil.

Kforbs, the Uline bags I bought from the classifieds are polypro. Sporadic brings up a good point. Some plastics can leech or "suck out" the fragrance from your products, leaving a plain old chunk of wax in their wake.

CraftyChris here, been awhile, like a YEAR!!! Thought I would share some of the goodies we make in our shop.... We use mostly paraffin, but also work with gel, and soy in some of our candles, depending on the look I am trying to achieve.

For those who don't know me, I Christine, and I make candles full time for a living. I have been at it for about 15 years now, and have a staff of 7. We have a retail store, but specialize in wholesale orders, supplying a few chain stores here in Canada, and a lot of gift shops. I used to post on here all the time!! I found a lot of inspiration from my on line friends, and hope some of our candles inspire you as well.

Those are lovely! Several look too beautiful to think about burning I'm curious about the pouring happening in the handcrafted.jpg How are the wicks being centered there?

You're in luck! I recently bought some Uline bags in different sizes, here from the classifieds. There is one size that is perfect for that size melt, which is what I am going to use them for. I'll be at my shop tomorrow and will get you the Uline catalog number. If you PM me your address, I'll be happy to mail you a couple to see if it is what you are looking for

Just a quick follow up. The store owner would rather keep our sales separate, so it'll basically be the same as I always do in collecting/reporting taxes.

If I had it to do over again, I would start out the with the Peak's candle making kit for beginners, which includes IGI 4630 wax, FOs, dyes, wicks, pour pot, thermometer, and tins. etc. That will give you a good starting point.

That's how the bug bit us, with a kit from Peak's. We were working with our boys in cub scouts, helping them earn a badge. We had so much fun and awesome results that we reordered all the kit components and started experimenting with fragrance, wicks and containers. That was four years ago and it's been very fulfilling to learn the science behind making safe and quality products.

We live in the heartland and feel very good about our choice of soy wax because it supports family and friends who are soybean farmers. The cleanup from making soy products is so quick and clean, too!

Good luck and enjoy your learning.

It depends on the diameter and thickness of your product. What are the measurements?

What you need to do is get her Sales Tax ID #.

There are forms for each state.(sales tax exempt forms).

She needs to fill in her ID# and sign it stating that the store is collecting the tax on your products.

That way you are not paying sales too! (Don't want to pay the gov. twice on your product:eek: )

Just keep the exempt form with her ID for your files in case you are ever audited.

Then when you fill out your sales tax each quarter, their will be lines that say:

Taxable sales - (Private sales you may have that you collected tax for)

Non Taxable sales- Sales that have been tax exempt because the store your product is in is paying the sales tax.

I hope this is making sense to you.. I know what I want to say... Just not always good at puting it in writing...

I know this is super old, but it was precisely the answer I was seeking and just wanted to say thanks for sharing the info. People are still reaping the value of it.

I know this is super old, but it was precisely the answer I was seeking and just wanted to say thanks for sharing the info. People are still reaping the value of it.

Thanks, Vicky! I've always sold at craft fairs, etc, where I sell directly to the customer and collect the sales tax myself, so this was new territory. I knew the answer would be found here

A new home decor shop in my town wants to carry our product on consignment. How should she collect sales tax? Do I provide her a copy of my tax ID certificate?

Candle science

Drakkar noir: reminds me of Avon Black Suede

Nag Champa: very earthy with leather undertones

Frankincense and mhyrr: very manly

Your product is beautiful! Congratulations on your success with Whole Foods!

The unrelenting heatwave in Missouri has fried my brain. Someone asked a simple question today about how to measure fragrance oil and I couldn't explain the formula/ratio to save my life!

Let's say the load is 12%, I know two pounds of wax is appropriate for that. Most of our fragrances are happy with a 1 oz oil to 1 pound wax ratio.

I've sold 4x more melts this month than I have candles. I've only been selling since February and from what I understand it's more of a seasonal trend than it is an industry trend. Plus, I think cost is also a factor. I sell my melts for $3.99 and my candles for $11.99. One woman I spoke with who used to make candles and such said she never buys candles during the summer and I think that's the norm. If I'm not mistaken candle sales should start picking up around September and then start dropping off again in April/May of 2013.

I really like your tagline!

I really appreciate Scentsy's marketing campaign on the wickless line. It's really boosted my sales

Our attorney advised for our hobby grown into a business that an LLC was our best option. The creation of a legal business entity protects our personal property and assets. In Missouri, there is a step by step process that is easy to follow on the secretary of state's website. Everything from the creation and registration of your fictitious name, articles of incorporation, application for state tax ID and employer ID number (for the day when more than yourself and partner are working the business) can be found there. If memory serves, we accomplished all that for under $75 grand total

And as an added benefit, all that registration qualified us for a free business checking account at the local bank.

Our mother passed away three years ago and left us her mortgage free home which is still fully furnished (minus beds). We use the kitchen to store wax, color and scents. We have several presto pots on the counter, mix in our our pots there. We move to dining room with a 12 person table where we pour and cure. One bedroom is the office/print shop for labels, flyers, etc. the other bedroom is storage for containers and finished product.

This was our childhood home. We feel that our mother would approve of the way we've made use of it as she asked us to not sell it, as it would be a safety net in this economy to know there would always be a place for us to live if something should happen between us and our husbands or someone's household income being lost due to illness/accident. It's also just a peaceful escape from chaos and a nice place to take a nap

I'm wondering if this is just in my area or if it's a current industry wide trend: has anyone else experienced a dramatic decline in the sales of their traditional wicked products and an increase in wickless (melts, tarts, clamshells, tins to sit on warming units, etc)?

We haven't sold a wicked candle since December but other items are moving well. We are overly saturated with Scentsy in my area, but I'm grateful for their overpriced short life products because they've cause an increase in business for me.

Walmart does sell clamshells for $2 but the scents don't last long and the bricks are smaller than ours.

Just curious to know how things compare in other parts of of the country and world. I'm in southeast Missouri (USA).

Love that beautiful collection of color! What did you pour in?

totally scary, isn't it??

Yes, BEYOND scary. I know I lived on this board and a couple of others, gleaning information for about a month before we even purchased our first beginner kit from Peak. I'm sure it was six months after we'd tinkered and tested that we had anything we were willing to have family and friends test to offer their opinions.

Where did TEN MINUTES come from? She said that's how long it took her friend to show her the ropes and the amount of time it took to make the candles in her "class," then she went to Nature's Garden website and ordered a ton of supplies.

If it was so easy I wonder why she was getting out of the business? Maybe it just wasn't challenging enough. (Yes, that is sarcasm.)

For *some* odd reason, after her first order of 250 candles to a friend for a wedding, the "market for soy candles just bottomed out." I'm wondering if there was some reason for her to experience that? (Yes, also sarcasm! Bazinga )

Here's a quick chuckle for the weekend.....

On our local CraigsList a chandler had decided to go out of business and listed all of her soy candle supplies, plus bath/body, for sale. In her listing, she had stated, "If you want to learn to make candles, I can teach you in 10 minutes how to make them."

My sister and I went, and did buy some fragrance oils, containers, and a case of wax she'd just purchased. It was a Golden Wax that I'd used before with success, but I was still mentally chuckling about the "teach you in 10 minutes" thing, so I asked her what she typically used as her top temp to melt. She had these plastic melting machines (that looked like what my nephew uses to make crayons with), and said she really didn't know what temp. She just loaded up the melters and when the wax melted, she dumped in a few tablespoons of fragrance and poured.

"There's really nothing to it. Anybody can make candles and sell them cheap. Just stick a wick in whatever jar you want, and you're done."

My sister laughed in a good-natured way and said to me, "Well, we've been doing it all wrong by monitoring temperatures and testing wicks with different containers and fragrance."

The lady didn't understand sarcasm. She waved her hand. "Oh, yeah. Complete waste of your time, girl." She was serious! "I hear some fools take years doing all that testing."

I guess she didn't realize we were some of those fools We didn't offer any debate points, paid for our items, and giggled a considerable bit on the drive home.

Nicely done! Beautiful!

My eyes are crossed from wasting two hours searching for the answer on Ebay and can't find it so hoped someone here would know for sure - If a 'buyer' basically (I won't go into the whole ridiculas thing) threatens to report me for NO reason if I don't ship her orders (3) for FREE - can I just cancel her orders and refund her money and be done?? Or is that against their friggin rules or something?? TIA

What details regarding shipping did you post with your item? That may give you your graceful out of the situation.

That is gorgeous! Birds of Paradise is one of my favorite fragrances, too. With your candle, it would be the best of both worlds---something to delight the eye and nose.