When people think about candle making, they think about wax and fragrance first. The vessel is usually an afterthought. I get it. We did the same thing when we started Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. at our kitchen table during the pandemic. But here is the truth I learned after pouring tens of thousands...

If you are learning how to start a candle business, choosing fragrance oils is one of the first decisions that will quietly make or break you. I know that sounds dramatic. But when my wife and I started Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. at our kitchen table during the pandemic, we wasted more money on the ...

Everybody wants to talk about getting new customers. New followers, new craft fair faces, new wholesale accounts. And yes, you need new people coming in the door. But I will tell you the thing that quietly built Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. from a kitchen table operation during the pandemic into a bra...

I still remember the night I sat at the kitchen table with a calculator, a stack of packing slips, and a knot in my stomach. We had started making candles at that same table during the pandemic, and now the little business we built for fun was quietly asking a much bigger question: was it time to le...

If you are figuring out how to start a candle business, it is easy to get stuck in the details. You might be wondering whether you need to show your face online, how to safely ship glass candles, whether Etsy is worth the fees, how to finish your Shopify site, or when it makes sense to open a phy...

I want to tell you about the most expensive mistake we made in the early days of Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. It was not a bad batch of wax or a wick that tunneled. It was words. For almost a year, our online product descriptions said things like "8 oz soy candle, lavender scent." That was it. We had ...

It is the middle of July, it is hot, and the last thing you probably want to think about is pumpkin, pine, and peppermint. I get it. But I am going to tell you the same thing I tell everyone in our free Facebook group every summer: the holiday season is not won in November. It is won right now, in t...

If there is one thing that will make or break your candle line, it is scent throw. People forgive a small wet spot on the glass. They forgive a label that is a little crooked. What they do not forgive is lighting a candle they paid good money for and smelling almost nothing. When we started Garsnett...

Nobody dreams about labels. When you first learn how to start a candle business, you are thinking about scents, jars, and that first perfect pour. The label feels like an afterthought, the boring sticker you slap on at the end. I thought the same thing when my wife and I were pouring our first candl...

I still cringe when I think about the first product photos we shot for Garsnett Beacon. It was 2020, we were pouring candles at our kitchen table in Holland, Michigan, and I set a jar on the counter under the yellow overhead light, snapped a picture on my phone, and uploaded it to our brand new shop...

If there is one thing that humbled me in the early days of Garsnett Beacon Candle Co., it was wicks. We started at our kitchen table in Holland, Michigan during the pandemic, and I honestly thought wax and fragrance were the hard parts. Nope. The wick is the engine of the whole candle, and getting i...