Scented-Candle Making: Turn Your Hobby into Profit

For all you scented-candle lovers out there, did you know you can turn your passion into a scented-candle-making business? Just imagine: Instead of purchasing your candles online or at a local craft store, you can save money and make money making your own scented candles! Maybe making candles was already a hobby of yours, this article will show you how to turn that hobby into profit very easily.

Candle making is one of the easier businesses to get involved with and the least expensive. You can actually start a candle business for under $200. This includes the materials needed to make the candles as well as marketing the business. For those of you who are already enjoying the craft of making candles, then it should be easier for you to get started, however, learning how to make candles is very simple and there are plenty of books and other resources out there to get you going.

Let us break down what some of the essential tools you will need in your scented candle making business. There are three popular waxes to choose from which are beeswax, soy wax and the most common, paraffin wax. Let us break them down separately so you can decide for yourself which you would prefer to use.

* Beeswax - Beeswax candles are smokeless. They do not drip like other wax and they burn much longer than paraffin candles do. This wax is a bit more expensive, but it pays in the long run to use this wax because they burn longer. The wax is also much healthier than paraffin because it is made from all natural ingredients where as paraffin is made from petroleum.

* Soy Wax - Soy wax is also naturally made, and is made from soy beans. It also burns up to 50% longer than paraffin wax and is very easy to clean up with soap and water if spilled.

* Paraffin Wax - This is the most commonly used wax. Most of the benefits of using this wax is the fact that it is much cheaper than the other waxes. It is also easy to make candles with paraffin wax.

Once you have decided which wax you are going to use in your scented candle making, you will need some other tools in order to start your business. To get started making candles, you will also need your molds, wicks, your dye and scents. You will also need a pan to melt your wax (unless you are using beeswax as there is no need to melt this wax). These are just the basic tools for making the candles. Other tools you will need are candle making how to books (only if you do not already know how to make candles), a computer (if you want to sell your candles online) and/or gift baskets, wax paper, wrapping paper or packaging. How you decide to market and sell your scented candles is going to determine what tools and materials you will need.

Some ideas on selling your candles are starting your own online candle business. This is probably the easiest and fastest route to go when starting off. You can find some cheap hosting or even free hosting to build your website and sell your candles this way. You might want to invest in a digital camera if going this route to take pictures of your candles to display on your website, although this is not necessary because you can get rights to public domain candle pictures that are already on the internet and are for your free use. Just make sure they are public domain images and not copyrighted or you will get yourself in trouble if you use them on your website.

You can also sell your candles on a wholesale basis to retail stores or consignment shops. You can sell them through fleamarkets, tagsales and craft kiosk booths. There are so many options out there in getting the word out on your scented candles. You can also make gift baskets and sell them that way.

If scented candle making is not for you, there still is another alternative to profit from this business and that is through affiliate programs. Many big companies such as Yankee Candle offer an affiliate program where they will pay you to market their scented candles. You will get a percentage of the cost of each candle in the form of commission. Just do a search on the internet under "candles affiliate programs" or something similar to that to find places. No matter how you choose to sell candles, just have fun with it.