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Candle making
All Containers›Shop by use case›Candle making›Tools and directories›When it pays for itselfShop all candles →
Tools and directories

When it pays for itself

By Dwight Davis, Founder

Updated

On this page5

Breakeven here is dominated by packaging minimums and by a cost makers often leave out entirely.

Two kinds of cost

Fixed: equipment, insurance, label artwork, the minimum order quantities you were forced to buy, and the test candles.

Variable: the per-candle cost of components, materials and labor.

Contribution is price minus variable cost. Breakeven is fixed divided by contribution.

The arithmetic

Suppose fixed costs of 3,000, equipment, insurance, artwork, first vessel and label minimums, and the testing, and a contribution of 12 a candle at direct retail.

That is 250 candles to break even.

At wholesale, with a contribution nearer 4, the same fixed cost needs 750. The channel changes the answer threefold, which is why it is calculated per channel.

What the number says

Usually that a market business breaks even within a season and a wholesale business takes longer and scales further.

And that each additional fragrance carries its own fixed cost, its own label minimum and its own testing, so a range of nine does not break even three times faster than a range of three.

The testing line

This is the one to insist on including. Thirty-six test candles for a small range, materials and vessels and wicks, all burned to nothing.

Leaving it out understates the cost of a range and makes adding a fragrance look free, which is exactly the decision the number should be informing.

References

No published source. This page is written from practice rather than from published guidance. No extension service or agency publishes on this question for candles, so nothing here is cited, and it should be weighed as experience and not as a standard.
Written from the federal regulation, the CPSC material and the published scope of the ASTM candle standards. The standards themselves are copyrighted documents that must be bought; what is described here is their scope and requirements as published, not their text. Your own burn testing against your own vessel and wick is what establishes whether a candle you made is safe.