Here is a secret nobody tells you when you are figuring out how to start a candle business: the name on the label sells the candle almost as much as the scent inside it. I learned this the slow way. When my wife and I started Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. at our kitchen table in Holland, Michigan durin...

Everybody talks about wax and wicks and scent throw, and all of that matters. But the thing that actually keeps most new makers stuck is quieter than that. It is the fear that nobody will buy. When we started Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. at our kitchen table during the pandemic, I remember pouring a b...

Let me tell you about one of the quietest, most underrated wins we ever had at Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. It was not a viral video. It was not a booth at a packed market. It was a single line in our Google Analytics that showed a stranger typing "soy candles in Holland Michigan" into Google, landing...

When we started Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. at our kitchen table during the pandemic, I wasted more wax to bad math than I want to admit. I would eyeball how much to melt, come up short on the last pour, then melt a second pot and end up with leftover wax hardening in the pot. Multiply that by a few ...

If you have ever pulled a candle out of the mold, held it up to the light, and thought "well, that is not what I pictured," welcome to the club. When we started Garsnett Beacon at our kitchen table during the pandemic, our counter looked like a graveyard of rejects. Tunneled candles, frosty tops, cr...

When we started Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. at our kitchen table during the pandemic, I never pictured myself standing in front of a room full of people teaching them how to pour a candle. We were just trying to sell enough to cover the next fragrance oil order. But a few years and 160 plus wholesale...

When we started Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. at our kitchen table during the pandemic, our "packaging" was a candle, a strip of bubble wrap we saved from an Amazon box, and a prayer that it would survive the mail. Some did. Some showed up with cracked jars and wax smeared across the tissue paper. Ever...

Everybody wants to talk about wax, wicks, and pretty labels. Nobody wants to talk about the paperwork. I get it. When we started Garsnett Beacon Candle Co. at our kitchen table in Holland, Michigan during the pandemic, the last thing I wanted to think about was an LLC or a sales tax license. I wante...

People ask me all the time what tools we use to run our candle business. Not the fun stuff like fragrance oils and pretty vessels, but the boring back office stuff that actually keeps the lights on. The scale on the pouring table. The software that tells me if we are making money. The shipping accou...

Most stories about how to start a candle business skip the boring parts and the scary parts. You see the finished storefront, the pretty flat lays, the "we did six figures" headline, and none of the nights spent pouring wax at the kitchen table wondering if any of it was going to work. So I want to ...

Color is one of those things nobody warns you about when you first start making candles. You get your wax, you get your wicks, you nail your first good scent throw, and then you pour a candle that looks a little plain sitting on the table. So you think, "I'll just add some color." That is where a lo...