Frequently Asked Questions
Our large tins weigh around 210g and are 80mm diameter and 55mm tall. Picture a short, standard tin of baked beans or tomatoes and you’ll have the right idea. They will burn for around 30 hours when burn instructions are followed. Small tins weigh around 115g and are 64mm diameter and 45mm tall. They will burn for around 20 hours when burn instructions are followed. Our wax melts come in a box of six, with each melt being the same size as a small ice cube and are entirely plastic free. We find that each melt throws fragrance for the duration of 3-4 tealights, depending on the fragrance ordered. Our reed diffusers are around 100ml with 9 reeds and each lasts for over a year (unless you place it too close to a heat source or in a sunny position).
It’s my surname so it’s easy for me to remember and I didn’t fancy punning. That gets on my wick.
Mostly, Harper’s Candles is a business that makes and sells terrific home fragrance. However, because what it does is so personal to some pretty longstanding beliefs, it reflects my personal values and I won’t own a company that supports animal cruelty. Not only that, but the way Harper’s Candles is run and the way we who work in it live our lives means that a love of animals and an absolute support for rescue animals lies pretty much at the centre of everything we do. The company logo is Flora, my rescue Jack Russell, so it would be odd to not think about ethics with her on all of our labels. There was always a big comfy dog bed for her next to my desk by the big ass printer (where it is always warm) with lots of fluffy blankets because got very is old. Heartbreakingly she died in May 2021. Bandit is my rescue hound (about the size of a reasonable foal with scruffy hair never mind how often I brush it which is only one reason why I relate to him so much) and he predominantly sleeps under my desk so I can’t reach my keyboard properly. I let him. It’s my fault. This business happily states that we don’t just state that we are a cruelty free business that is against animal testing and we insist that our suppliers only send us products that are vegan friendly too (they are all animal lovers too!). Why do we not believe in animal testing? Because we’re not worth it and it’s about time that more companies raised the profile of ethical mainstream products.
Two reasons, really. We were registered with the Vegan Society for around seven years but gradually two things happened. Firstly, costs have done nothing but go up since we started in 2012 but we have never put our prices up. This came to a head during coronavirus as costs spiralled and wholesale sales dipped for us. We will never compromise on quality, we won’t stop the monthly standing orders to our charities and we don’t want to increase our prices – so something had to give. One of those was to look at all costs that the business didn’t need to have and that included registering as being vegan. Secondly, this business has grown and there is only Victoria in the unit making it all happen at the rock face. With such an enormous and flexible range it was becoming impossible to keep up with all the paperwork associated with the business and make it all happen on top. The important part is that Harper’s Candles IS vegan friendly. It always has been and it always will be. It was before it was registered and it will continue to be so now it is not. It doesn’t make a jot of difference to us because these are our ethics and we do not compromise on ethics. Animal testing and animal cruelty is WRONG and we don’t want anything to do with it. No nice smell is worth that.
Harper’s Candles is a mainstream business that happens to be vegan. We are firm in the knowledge that everything with the Harper’s name on it can more than hold it’s own against any other fragranced product whether it be similarly ethical or three steps away from selling it’s grandmother to a circus. It’s simply that ethics dictate that there is no reason why this business should not be cruelty free and promote awareness about looking for similar branding in other products across the board to promote being animal friendly and maybe going to a rescue for a dog rather than buying one of those designer puppies (seriously y’all – they’re mongrels *coughs “Emperor’s new clothes”*). I digress… We at Harper’s don’t expect all of our customers to be vegan but it’s lovely to think that some might start buying non-animal tested shampoo or washing powder and definitely get a rescue dog instead of buying a puppy when they’re looking for a family pet as a result of meeting and chatting with the non-scary animal friendly candle folk who weren’t wearing hemp or attempting to beat them over the head with banners. We eat chips quite a lot. Seriously, we already have things in common. We use some of the profits from Harper’s Candles to support ethical charities and we promote and own rescue animals. The Harper’s Candles unit is vegan friendly, from the candle supplies to the cleaning products. Basically, we make awesome products and while we’re at it we’re just plain nice.
I don’t want someone wearing real fur to also be carrying a bag with the Harper’s Candles logo on it. That’s my dog and that’s my name. It would imply that I think it’s ok. None of us at Harper’s think it’s ok. I’m good that the lady at the NEC in November 2018 pointed me out to her friend as having been rude because I had just quietly suggested that she might like to go and buy candles elsewhere because she had something dead wrapped round her head. No need to fall out about it. We enjoy telling people who wear fur that we don’t think it’s ok. We don’t enjoy that in this day and age we still have to.
Fish don’t really like candles. They’re tricky to light under water… Seriously though, we get asked this due to some of the labelling we are obliged to carry. Nothing that we use is animal tested and is cruelty free from source. The fragrance in our candles is bad for fish and aquatic life so you have to make sure that they don’t get into waterways. This can be done by disposing of the tins thoughtfully and not trying to give them to your fish as gifts or adorn their tanks with them. Fish are not big on mood lighting either. It does not mean that we are bad, bad people and hate fish and tadpoles. It simply means that what we use isn’t very good for them and their watery kin. This is the same as chocolate is bad for dogs. Lots of chocolate is vegan despite this. People just know not to feed chocolate to dogs. Now you know not to give candles to fish. Same thing. Salt is very vegan (we know as we put in on chips all the time) but it’s harmful to frogs and salmon alike. Please do not email us and tell us that we are bad, bad people and ask for a refund and return at our expense. We are not bad, bad people. We are nice people. Some things just belong in their rightful place.
This depends what smells they like… As with all home fragrance, keep them away from animals. Definitely don’t let them eat them if you have one of those dogs who eats anything and everything and thankfully I don’t, but then I don’t own a Labrador! I have my dogs with me at the unit and use candles, melts and reed diffusers at home every day where I have cats too and my car literally reeks of Let Sleeping Kittens Lie because I have a mud-hound. I’ve never had an issue. Our reed diffusers go out with a warning to keep them away from pets because I once saw something where a diffuser had spilled on a cat and it effectively burned its coat and skin. It’s just not worth hurting your pet if you can’t keep reed diffusers away from them – and alternatively I put some of mine in hurricane vases. Cats are not agile. They are not graceful. Don’t tell them because they think they are but mine sometimes jump and land with the judgement and grace of a Boeing 747 without it’s wheels down. The only problem I have with candles and pets is Bandit’s tail because he has no idea what its doing half the time and he regularly clears a coffee table with it because everything makes him happy including hearing the words “Bandit nooooooo….!!! Mind your tail…!!” as we lunge to save iPhones, beer bottles, coffee cups and the odd cat. We don’t put candles on coffee tables. We don’t put coffee on coffee tables. Or windowsills. Or anywhere a dog tail can reach and Bandit is the size of a small foal. There’s an awesome Facebook post a friend of mine once shared saying candles were bad for dogs. I read it, rolled my eyes and ignored it. I know you need to be careful with tropical fish and reptiles so I used to keep my lizard in my son’s bedroom and she lived to be about 700 years old. My goldfish lived in my kitchen where I started this business and they were fine too until they outgrew their tank and had to have a large pond dug for them instead. Some companies sell candles specifically for dogs and the shampoos you use for them are all fragranced, as is your washing up liquid, your floor cleaner, your body sprays and perfumes, bubble bath blah blah blah… So you’ll make your own decisions about home fragrance and pets but I’ve had both for years and never had a problem so long as they’re out of immediate harms way and this is the best advice I can give.
This is something we get asked a lot and without getting into the complexities of having them returned to us and being able to manage the deliveries, like most businesses, we do not have the facilities to refill tins and our insurance wouldn’t cover them being reused. We also produce thousands of candles every year and the thought of having to try to clean hundreds of tins back to a pristine condition on top makes us want to hide under the nearest bed and only come out for coffee when the coast is clear. This business is pretty much a one woman handmade candle machine from start to finish and as nice as the thought is, it just isn’t something we will ever be able to consider. What we can do and make sure we do is ensure that we produce candles and home fragrances in the most ethical way possible using containers that are able to be popped into a recycle bin along with other tins and glass from your home. The other thing is that finished candles and home fragrances still smell. Try removing the lids and popping them in sink cupboards or behind the blind in a downstairs loo and they will still release fragrance for you before you recycle them. Other people clean them up and use them to store useful things like screws and nails or those useful bits of fastenings that fall off kitchen cupboards that don’t seem to fit anything again even when you look but you still don’t throw them away. Just dispose of them thoughtfully and they can be reused and could possibly come back as part of a spaceship. How cool would that be?
Plastic is a real problem and businesses that use it create this problem. All of the wicks are set using thermo-plastic and we are unable to change that for safety reasons. All of the tape on our boxes is paper. The only plastic box fill that we use is being recycled using that which has been sent to us from our suppliers. We do not buy plastic box fill, polystyrene and we do not buy bubble wrap. Our wax melts are all plastic free and come in cardboard boxes having noticed the single use clamshells we use to use and just plain didn’t realise until pondering the display at the NEC in February 2020. Yup. Pretty stupid. We are now plastic free (apart from the thermo-plastic thing) since Spring 2021.
This is a busy business and we do run out of certain candles from time to time, but they are usually listed again within a few days. If you join the waitlist of the candle, melt or diffuser you’re after then the website will let you know as soon as we list it as being back in stock. Other fragrances are seasonal. Our Autumn/Winter range is available from August until February whilst stocks last. Christmas fragrances are available from October to December inclusive. If you can’t see the candle you want at all, then it’s likely we stopped making it to give us some room for new, shiny ones.
We offer four subscription boxes. One is for people who only really use melts and yes, the picture on the website isn’t up to date but its plastic free boxes now and I will get round to changing it one day but then it gets to Friday evening all of a sudden and it’s a busy business and I’m tired and beer… We are guessing that this question is for people choosing between the Just Candles and Extra Special boxes. We figure most people will want a Just Candles subscription box which gives you enough to have a candle on the go for a few evenings a week over a couple of months. The Extra Special box pretty much doubles that and puts a cherry on top. So we reckon that if you don’t know where to start then start with the Just Candles box and see how you get on. If you’re extra cautious or don’t use that many candles (odd) or want to buy your regular smells on top then go for the Single Candle option. The Extra Special box is for hardcore candle addicts who need to breathe into a brown paper bag if they don’t have a candle on the go most nights regardless of the time of year, or hide under their beds and hyperventilate if they (horrors!!) run out of candles. That’s us, by the way. We are those people. Well balanced mortals will be fine with the Just Candles box – but if you find you subscribe to that and you evolve into a candle addict and that’s simply not enough any longer, then we will actively support you to upgrade (or point you in the direction of a reputable brown paper bag supplier). We won’t tell. We never judge.
You instantly become ours and we own you and all of your pets… Joke. No seriously we don’t but we understand how scary commitment can be. So honestly the real answer is “Yay! Congratulations!!” and we are sure that you are going to love the experience! Firstly we need you to answer a few questions on the purchase page so that we can personalise your subscription and do our best to make sure you love every box (but we also believe it’s good to try different candles if we think you’ll like them). Once you have subscribed, you will receive the next subscription box that is shipped from us. We dispatch in the first week of the month during February, April, June, August, October and December.
We ask you four very simple questions. What is your favourite candle that we do, what is your best sort of smell, which smell can you live without and what name would you like on your labels. Please keep it simple! We do our best to make sure you love what we send but do bear in mind that this is a discovery box, full of variety and one of the best things is that you get to try things you would never normally buy for yourself and don’t know what will be in a box until you open it. I speak as someone who didn’t give Let Sleeping Kittens Lie the time of day at first and now lots of the candle trials I run uses it and my car is ingrained with it (so much nicer than “muddy pond” a.k.a. Bandit on his way home from a walk because goodness knows he’s a mud-hound). If you know that you have specific fragrance allergies or that your loathing of sandalwood and lemons and anything floral knows no bounds then we encourage you to stick with what you know and continue to order your tried and trusted favourites. Discovery subscription boxes may not be for you!
We know that quite a few of you would like to share your subscription boxes with a friend or within your household and we do understand that spreading the candle happy is a great idea! However, we do have to limit it to one name per subscription. Quite simply, we can’t fit more than one name on a label and we can’t have more than one name per subscription because we don’t know who will like which one once you receive your box! We will always try a workaround for you but in our experience the labels are only so big and we can only fit so much on them. Sometimes for ease of purposes if you don’t want a box to be geared towards one individual it’s best to let us know and we can put ‘us’ or ‘ours’ in the appropriate places so that everyone is happy.
You are always in control of your money and any subscriptions with us. The majority of our subscriptions run through PayPal and we never have access to your PayPal account – so we can’t do it for you! Simply sign into your PayPal account (from a laptop is best), click the gear icon at the top right corner of the page, select Payments in the blue bar at the top of the screen, click Manage Pre-Approved Payments, select the payment you want to cancel and click Cancel. The next payment, as well as all subsequent payments, will be cancelled. For those who pay through their bank on a standing order, this can be cancelled in branch or using your online banking service. We will be sorry to see you go but understand that life changes.
All diffusers in the UK underwent a change in legislation in 2022 and there’s no fascinating way of putting it. Because some fragrance oils can be a skin irritant and because there is a chance you could get diffuser oils on your hands, it was moved into what is called Article 10B which gave new guidelines about what can be used and in what quantities. That meant that something like Bakewell Tart could only use around 5% and to make it smell I need to use at least 20% pure fragrance. I’m not about to sell you a Bakewell Tart diffuser that smells like your neighbour four miles down the road may or may not have been baking so I don’t make it any more. I can only make what can be done with enough pure fragrance to make it worth putting my name on it. It’s as simple as that really. Sorry : (
Sure can. Royal Mail dispatches go at around 8am every day and DHL at around 8.30am. Royal Mail charges around £3.00 for Second Class and the price goes up if you choose First Class. We use DHL for anything over 2kgs and they charge £7.97 +VAT. Our boxes cost an average of 43p +VAT each plus the packaging material we use. We don’t make money on deliveries and vary the price as they go up and down for us from our courier. Delivery times are always written on our Delivery page as per Royal Mail and DHL. They use the word “normally” delivered within 1 day etc. as a get out clause for when they’re late which is why we can no longer guarantee delivery on a certain day.
Our reed diffusers last a very, very long time. Some of ours at home have been on the go for over a year now. We think it’s a bit hinky to have a Christmas reed diffuser doing its stuff in August… so basically it’s because we’re a little bit OCD and we’re saving you from yourselves.
These can sometimes happen and is caused by natural shrinkage and air bubbles that occur as the wax is cooling inside the container – creating something of an optical illusion. Part of the wax pulls away from the glassware and sticks to the container, giving it this particular look and is part of candle making – particularly handmade. This is common, even in expensive candle lines, and in no way affects the burnability of the candle.
Pop one or two of the wax melt hearts, or one of our deli-pot melts (broken in half or whole depending on the size of your melter), into the top dish of your warmer. Do not add water or oil. Or bubble bath. Or ketchup. In fact don’t add anything. Just the melt. Moving on….
To begin using your fragranced wax melts pop a tealight into your warmer or turn your wax warmer on if it is an electrical one. Always place warmers on a level surface away from drafts, curtains etc and anything flammable (following general candles safety instructions is best!). The wax will now begin to melt and your room will be filled with lovely smells. Turn off your melter or blow out the tealight after around 4 hours (again, like the candle safety instructions).
Melted wax does not evaporate. After a few uses (the number depends on the fragrance you choose and your preference on how strong you like your rooms to be fragranced) the fragrance just dissipates and leaves plain but used wax that needs to be cleaned out. Don’t worry. This is the work of seconds.
Once the wax has cooled, you will either need to scrape the wax out of your melting dish (we use plastic utensils for this to avoid damaging our ceramic melters) or warm it as normal for just a couple of minutes to loosen the base layer a little and gently nudge it to pop the wax out. Do not discard used wax down a drain.
I can sometimes make this happen (drop me an email and I’ll let you know – unless it’s Christmas because at Christmas mostly I hold on to my sanity and enjoy the rollercoaster of a seasonal business) but as a general rule of thumb, an experiment is just that. As it says on the side of the tin, make the most of the one you have!
If you’re a lucky blighter then you’re reading this because you are a proud possessor of a voucher code. We love voucher codes. We love money off anything! Simply pop whatever you want into your shopping basket and checkout as usual. On the checkout screen select the Coupon box, write the code in it and click on Apply Coupon. Voila!
(Incidentally, the website calls them coupons but we call them vouchers. Why? Because we are unable to say the word coupon without sounding like the lawyer in Jurassic Park who says “coupon” like it’s the dirtiest word in the book. Haven’t seen Jurassic Park…? Really…?? You guys still exist??!)
Yes – absolutely. This business is a lean, mean fragrance machine but it’s all done in house. The candles are all handmade in small batches. The designs, drawings, sayings, leaflets and labels… it’s all entirely done by us and it always has been. Everything is printed in our office and that’s where we run all the admin side of Harper’s Candles too. The labels are printed and cut up by us and we even stick them on the tins. The stall that we use at markets was made by us even the bunting on it is hand stitched, although sewing is not a strong point and I looked like I self-harmed by the end of it. This website… well I’m writing this into it so I guess that this sort of counts too. As businesses go, this is about as handmade as we can get it.
The short answer is no for a number of reasons, mostly to do with our insurance. Also, making our candles is enormously time consuming so unless you’re actually doing the fun hands on bit it’s potentially one of the dullest days that you could ever, ever have. Think “watching paint dry” and substitute it for “watching candles set” and then stand up all day until your feet hurt while you’re doing it. Secondly, I invested a lot of time and money in Harper’s Candles to create the right fragrance blends and the right finished products. In order to protect this little business, it’s wise to keep our secrets under our hats!
This little business carries a Registered Trademark, is subject to copyright and I fully understand my rights. I love my business, I’ve worked incredibly hard for it and it pays my mortgage. I defend it with the same laid back attitude as a mother lion does her cubs.
Oh how we hate being asked this because it’s just awkward. No. Make it stop.
Candles are like anything – they’re easy when you know how. They can be tricky little blighters, need a lot of space, a significant amount of safety awareness, it’s definitely messy (I consider that last one to be a plus) and you can expect to get it mostly wrong before it starts going right. You also need to be prepared to deal with waste in an environmentally sound and respectful way. You can buy candle making kits that take away all of the guess-work on websites like Amazon and this might be the best place to start.
I’ve been running Harper’s Candles for over ten years now so I’m used to the hoops. In general only around a quarter of the working week is spent actually making candles (the fun bit). The rest is taken up with all the other stuff. You have to be ready to deal with wholesale suppliers, law and legislation, accounts, retail, marketing, websites, customers and (queue Jaws music) the tax man. It’s not a get rich quick scheme because if it was I’d be writing to you from Barbados. You also need to know that at any one time at least one area of your business will be going wrong; i.e. your container supplier has run out and won’t have any more for two months or a best selling fragrance has been discontinued or your printer is out of ink and you have 200 labels to print by tomorrow and it’s Sunday so everything’s shut. Another good one was that it was Christmas 2015 (the busiest time where sleep is a memory) and for no apparent good reason the clutch and hydraulics suddenly fail in the large vehicle you used to cart your business around (in the middle of a busy road where a horrid old man shouts at you from the opposite side of the road to “Get out and push it yourself”, testing everything nice that you think about yourself) and then three days later you get man-flu on top. All part of the rock and roll lifestyle. The best piece of advice I was ever given was that going into business for yourself involves eating a sh*t sandwich at least twice a day and having to smile while you chew (thanks dad). I love it but if it was easy I’d be rich.
Ok, bear with me because this is going to get wordy!
The Classification, Labelling and Packaging Regulation (EC) No. 1272/2008 is the EU’s implementation of the UN’s Globally Harmonised System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (GHS). It applies directly across the EU without being transposed into national law as from any new products made after June 1st 2015 and applies to non-cosmetic products containing hazardous chemicals, such as perfumes or essential oils. Our candles are a combination of an article (the wick, which functions as a carrier material) and a substance/mixture (the wax (non-hazardous and not included in CLP) and smell (around 8-10% of the finished candle)). Therefore, our candles are now in scope of the CLP Regulation.
CLP has made major changes to the way chemicals are classified and labelled in the the EU/EEA. It has introduced new pictograms, warning phrases, hazard statements, and criteria, with larger and more colourful labels too. We also have Safety Data Sheets for each candle. Some chemicals and essential oils will now need labelling to include these and others with relatively mild warnings will be labelled in a much more severe way – despite their properties being unchanged.
Our candles all carry the new warnings stating that where applicable the raw fragrance can be a skin irritant and that they are hazardous to aquatic life. That’s the basics but the actual warnings will all be on the candles if you want more specific information. We always buy top grade fragrance and only use registered and reputable producers with whom we have a solid and longstanding working relationship.
So that means that whilst we haven’t changed anyting that we do as from 1 June 2015, any new products that we made have been labelled in accordance with CLP law and applies to our products containing fragrance or essential oils, such as candles, wax tarts, wax melts, diffusers etc. Please do bear in mind that despite scary looking names, some of these ingredients can be found naturally in things like strawberries so we’re not trying to use anything that could bring about the zombie apocalypse.
Most of our box fill is paper. We do buy in some packaging and all of that is recyclable, planet friendly and would probably pat kittens and make them breakfast on the way if it could. We also reuse a lot of box fill sent to us with our supplies, and that includes non-recyclable packaging and fill that we get from some of the deliveries to the business and from other businesses we know who don’t use packaging they receive so pass it on to us. Thus we recycle and re-use it. We would love it if all suppliers used recycled packaging that patted kittens and to be fair, most of them do. The bottom line is that we do the best we can in an imperfect world. Our advice is to re-use non-recyclable packaging and make it recycled from that point onward rather than ending up in a landfill.
We get asked this. We really do.
We make a Jaffa Cake candle. It is not possible to get jaffa cake essential oil – so no. We think that we get asked this because people assume that natural means safe and healthy. Lots of the warnings on fragrances are for natural products. We use a mixture of natural and top quality synthetic fragrances. Many of the fragrance oils that are used in both candles and soap are composed of a mixture of natural essential oil extracts and aroma chemicals. These blends can create hundreds and thousands of safe, unique interesting fragrances.
Firstly, I’m an introvert. Secondly I’m an introvert. Thirdly, I also have a horror of any risk I could end up being made coffee in a cup that is dark on the inside or be around children wearing nappies holding a cheese straw. Seriously, I live down a dead end, single track lane in the middle of nowhere in the least populated county in England. I love y’all just the way we are right now 🙂
Go to Amazon, search “Game Of Thrones Entire Box Sets”, put in basket, checkout and wait. Shop for snacks and beer like there’s going to be an apocalypse. Heck we’ve got coronavirus so we’re halfway there! When the box sets arrive tell your work your zoom camera is bust. Load dvd’s into player. Stay inside for a month surviving on snacks and beer with the curtains closed. Do not sleep. Do not email me about Season Eight. I wish it had been made three times as long and not ruined character arcs but that’s the ending we got and I’m ok with it. I even liked Episode Three. It was my favourite. Please feel free to email me to discuss it at length. I watch it every year while I’m labelling candles during the Christmas Candle Labelling Marathon so I think I know my stuff. Now you are one of us. Problem solved.
No. This is a business.
Please see above.
Well…. the whole worldwide pandemic stopped us going to events and to be completely honest the thought of giving up weekends again isn’t something I want to do. I want to still be wearing my pyjamas at lunchtime on rainy Saturdays, lying on the sofa watching Star Wars and feeding Doritos to my dog. Like a normal person.
We do, but we limit them to one shop per area and don’t want to be in any outlet that sells real fur, animal tested products or any produce that compromises our ethics (fois gras – seriously bleurgh!). We love working with independents because we are one. Please click on the retail form at the bottom of the website and fill out the form.
Candles are fairly simple things and it’s pretty hard to break one. If they crack, they re-seal on the first burn. All of our candles are made using the same process and the same products, always in the same quantities. As each fragrance is made in small batches it would usually become clear if we had done something wrong because other customers would contact us with the same issue. Follow the safety and burn instructions that we give you in all of our leaflets, on this website and written on our packaging. DO NOT HOARD OUR CANDLES! These are a handmade, natural based product and they won’t appreciate being stored for months on end. Obviously, if we have got it wrong and sold you a faulty product please let us know so that we can apologise profusely and assure you that we have a refund or replace policy firmly in place – because happy customers are the only sort we want.
Check out our social media and count the number of pictures posted by customers that follow safety instructions with the same vehemence that my cats follow my insistence that they shouldn’t chase birds. My personal favourite is either the one where a young child is holding up her mum’s lit candle to the camera IN HER HAND!!! and there was another with a candle burning on a pillow. I didn’t know whether to cry or… just cry really. The clue is in the word “safety”. We need our customers to have as much information about how to burn candles safely and it is ALL in the leaflets that we give out and send with every purchase. We obsess about heat proof surfaces because it’s terrifying to us that so many candle users do not. How can a nation of people who obsess about putting coffee cups on coasters not follow the same thought process when it comes to candles? We just want you guy to be safe. Please PLEASE read our information and use it! Let’s work together to lead this horse to water and make sure it has a good, long drink.
Seriously..? No, they are metal and metal conducts heat. Where were you in science class?? Never use one of our tin lids to stand your candle on. Not even a bit. Even if you didn’t know before and you’ve been doing it for years. We use glass and ceramic tiles.
If you follow the candle safety instructions on our containers, on this website, on the leaflets you will have received with your candle purchase and if you listened when you met us at a market while we were talking (because we do talk about candle safety with pretty much every customer we see) then achieving any of the above will be fairly difficult, although it could get you a nomination for the Darwin Awards. The candle safety warnings are there for a reason.
Would you put a hot cup of coffee on your mantelpiece/table without a coaster…? Seriously. You HAVE to follow safety instructions even if you have used candles your entire life from birth and got away with it so far. Change your habits. You’ve just been lucky and need to use proper heat proof surfaces and follow the instructions. No discussion. I personally put pictures on our safety information and I put one in every box that goes out even when I’ve seen your name a zillion times and you order from us every month. I try to make them quirky and as friendly and non-lecturey as possible. I even wrote the darned ones we send out alternately in pink and grey so they’re pretty but you still didn’t read them..? We run competitions and write lovely info-social-media-thingies… I want to cry now. What more can we do…? It’s so easy to follow them and not have an issue. Let’s all do that, huh? That saves me having to reply to your email in a way that doesn’t make me sound like I’m saying your furniture is ruined and it’s your own fault. Which it is. It makes me feel really awkward and I’ll already be feeling bad for you but…
No – people are dangerous. Please see above.
It wasn’t a customer and it wasn’t to us but it was very normal at events to see some guy being dragged around by his girlfriend wishing he was anywhere else instead. Preferably somewhere involving beer and not shopping and definitely not homeware things like candles. One particular girl spotted our stand and said “Oooooo! Candles..!” in the same way I say “Oooooo! Kittens..!” and started to make a beeline. The problem was that she was holding his hand and without a glance in our direction he marched her past saying “They’re all the same at these places. They’re just Yankee candles melted down.” and we’ve dined out on that one for years.
Yes. Absolutely. This business has done little but prove to us that the majority of people are nothing but funny, kind and nice. We get buckets of animal pictures, lovely emails, awesome chats and laughs at our stand when we are out and about. We see some posts on social media and in blogs about what we make that have us messaging one another saying how touched we are followed by lots of hearts, kisses and smileys. We have people who we see all the time at our stands who just quietly smell, choose what they want and don’t want to chat too much, but just enjoy what we do. We love you guys too. We work so hard to make sure that what we make for y’all is the best that it can be and you truly warm the cockles of our hearts. Without you there would be no us. Sincerely. Thank you.
Number of customers since April 1st 2012: Literally tens of thousands.
Number of rude customers since April 1st 2012: 7 (Updated May 2021)
Safety Instructions:
Don’t leave candles burning longer than 4 hours at a time or where you can’t see them. Make sure they’re on a stable flat and fire resistant/heat proof surface. Neither should you leave candles where they can be reached by children or pets. Keep them away from drafts and anything flammable. Keep wicks trimmed to around 5mm and don’t let any foreign materials, such as pieces of wick, fall into the wax. Do not get wet. Do not eat.
General Instructions:
* ALWAYS follow the candle safety instructions.
* Store candles at room temperature in dry places, out of the cold or direct sunlight, and away from extremes of heat.
* Burning candles for too long can cause wick damage, the wick to turn back on itself into the wax pool and is generally unsafe.
* Avoid burning container candles down to the very bottom. This can cause scorching. Leave the last half an inch of wax.
* Always light both wicks in our two wick candles.
* Fragrance is carried from the melted wax, not the flame. If you don’t burn candles long enough to create a full wax pool they won’t burn properly. Candles have memories. Once a candle has started down a bad burn route, it will continue.
* As a general rule of thumb, for each inch across a candle, divide by the number of wicks and that’s the number of hours you should burn a candle for to get a full wax pool.
* Keep your wicks trimmed to around 5mm. The majority of the soot comes from not keeping wicks trimmed!
* Don’t let the flames get too high. This can cause too much heat and your candle will burn down much faster. Tall flames can also be a hazard, stress containers and cause glass to shatter.
* If your candle is not burning properly, if it flickers or smokes, extinguish it, let it cool and then trim wicks before re-lighting.
* Take good care of glass. Be aware that tiny imperfections will occur in used glassware and this can cause shattering.
* Place all burning candles at least 4 inches apart.
* Soot is inevitable as it comes from burning the wick. We use high quality cotton wicks, but there will still be soot. Black marks on containers can be wiped off with a paper towel and not placing candles close to walls helps prevent soot marks on your paintwork.
* It is normal for a pure soy wax candle to release a little fragrance oil if exposed to large changes in temperature. Wipe off any excess oil with a tissue, wash hands and burn as usual. It won’t happen again after the first burn.