Give an outlet to your creative faculties by making beautiful candles at home
and turn it into a profitable business by opening a home made candle store.
Making candles at home is very very easy if you have free time available and
you can make use of your skills.
It can lead to a profitable business and the trends are changing now and people
now prefer giving gifts that touch the heart with their beautiful designs and
heart touching fragrances.
You don’t even need lots of equipment to start a home made candle store. With
only the basic things like wax, burner and wicks, you can start candle making
at home, and as you make progress, you can buy advanced equipment and molds
for better and beautiful products.
This article will help you decide the best strategy for a good business and how
to turn it into a successful enterprise.
With their distinguished and sweet fragrances, candles, these days, are
considered as one of the easiest ways to express one’s emotions. So, if you
know how to make candles and have a creative side to your nature, its time to
start a home made candle store and establish a business of your own.
Things to consider before starting
Starting a business not only requires a certain amount of capital, it also
requires careful planning and preparation. Planning and preparing before
actually starting a business are important as they provide an insight into what
is needed to establish and run a successful business. While a home made candle
store business does not require a big capital and heavy investment, it needs
some planning and consideration on how to successfully launch it.
Anyone who enjoys candle making and knows the art of molding wax into
different shapes and sizes with beautiful fragrances can get into this
business. However, there are some important things to be considered before you
start a home made candle store. Just making great smelling and beautiful
looking candles at home is not the only thing important to start a candle
store.
Some important things to be considered before home made candle making is turned
into a full fledged candle store business are:
• Make sure your candles are unique and offer that distinctive touch which no
other home made candle manufacturer offers. This will be one thing that will
attract more customers as there is bound to be one home made candle shop in
every area.
•Candle making process is not a complicated one, but it requires time and
attention to detail for safety reasons as well as product quality. Thus, you
need to really focus on both the candle making as well as the quality control
aspect when starting this business. You cannot expect to churn out the low
quality or substandard products and expect them to sell like hot cakes.
•Decorate your candles well enough to make them look good and offer them as a
gift pack. People love buying home made candles that not only look and smell
good but are also very presentable as gifts.
•Candle making is a highly versatile craft; it encompasses unlimited
opportunities for creativity. Candles can be dipped, moulded, rolled, fused,
layered, sculptured or experimented with any combination of processes from
dyeing to paint or tinted. They can be scented or can have embedded materials
such as beads or shells, coated or whipped to make them more beautiful and
attractive for sale.
•You should have enough capital to start a home made candle store. While candle
making supplies and scents do not cost much, running a shop can be expensive.
You have to consider the shop rent, utility bills and other expenses till the
profits start pouring in. For this, you need to have a good business plan that
will give you an idea of what to expect when starting a home made candle store
business.
It is recommended that you give serious thought to all these things that are
needed before starting a home made candle store business for a successful
business venture. Their demand in homes, restaurant, churches as well as gifts
makes them a good business choice. Careful planning and complete information
about operating things and managing them can help a lot in establishing and
running a successful candle making store.
The first thing to start a successful home made candle store is to find a cost
effective supplier who can provide you candle making equipment and supplies at
low cost. While a craft store is a good place to go when starting out and
learning, as a businessperson, you will need to purchase from a wholesale
operation in order to keep the business profitable and expenses low.
Make enough candles for a beginning stock in various designs, colors and
scents as samples. As you are just starting the business, minimize the costs by
creating candles to order, but you will need enough ready-made candles to
demonstrate all the types you can make in order to get more business.
Determine the prices of candles very carefully. Assess the costs of your
materials and your labor per candle and compare prices of similar products
from other craft candle makers. Don’t charge too much as overpricing can
discourage them from buying if they can get the same type of candles at much
affordable rates from somewhere else.
Create printed promotional materials of your candle store and play on the line
that they are all home made to sooth the customers and light their lives. You
will need high-quality photographs of candles and attractive business cards to
promote your store. Consider hiring a photographer and graphic designer if you
cannot do these things on your own.
You can use these pictures on brochures and leaflets for advertising. This will
all help in promoting your home made candles store and make it more successful.
Promote your business among friends and family by giving them candles in gifts
and ask them to spread the word about your store.
Another way to make your home made candles store more successful is by selling
candles at craft fairs and small stalls in markets. They can really help you
make good sales as people in such places are on the lookout for small but nice
things to buy.
You can also sell to other local shops apart from selling at your own candle
store. Talk to other handicraft and arts suppliers such as salons, stationery, among others if they are willing to display your candles for a
small percentage of the sales amount.
Raw Materials
All the raw materials needed for candle production are cheaply available in
Nigeria. They include
paraffin wax, wick/thread, pigment, and
stearic acid.
Stearic acid is a solid saturated fatty acid from vegetable and animal fats and
oil. A small quantity is required to blend the paraffin wax. Stearic acid is
available at the various vegetable oil making companies across the country.
Machinery/Equipment
The necessary machinery for candle production are in different sizes depending
on the number of candle sticks required. They include:
(i) molding machines
(ii) paraffin wax boiler
(iii) cooling system
(iv) industrial gas cylinder
(v) water tank.
All the machines can be locally fabricated. The molding machines are in
different sizes and the costs vary from one fabricator to another. The
different sizes are:
24 sticks of candle making machine
50 sticks of candle making machine
100 sticks of candle making machine
200 sticks of candle making machine.
All the machines can be operated manually.
Production Process
Candle making follows six simple production processes as enumerated below:
Stage 1
A melting pan is filled with
paraffin wax, s
tearic acid and
pigment (if colored candle is desired).
Stage 2
Heat the whole mixture to about 120 degrees centigrade and not below 100
degrees centigrade. Too much or too low heat affects the quality and shrinking
of the candles. Therefore, it must be ensured that the 120 oc maximum and 100oc
minimum are maintained.
Stage 3
Put wick into each candle mold.
Stage4
Drain molten mixture into candle mold.
Stage 5
Allow cooling of the mixture in the mold by passing water through the surface
of the mold.
Stage 6
Manually drive a piston plate into mold to bring out the end product.
Market
The end product of the production process is packed in
nylon bags according to
already predetermined numbers and packaged in cartons ready for the market.
Candle is a mass consumption item widely used for lighting and illumination in
households, churches and other religious houses, hotels and restaurants. The
demand for candles is on the increase in recent times due to incessant power
outage across the country. Artistic and decorative candles also have very good
market potentials.
Profitability
Great profit abounds in this business as research has shown that a 200 per cent
return on investment is achievable in the first year of operation which
guarantees short pay back period.
Interested investors can contact the writer for a cost-benefit analysis
of the project.
Investment Cost Estimates N
Pre - operational expenses 50,000
Factory Premises
50,000
Machinery & Equipment 100,000
Working Capital
40,000
Contingency
10,000
Total Investment Outlay 250,000
For more information do contact us by dropping your comment below.
