Listen to this articleBelow is our recent interview with Chi Pham, Owner of Chi Candle:
Q: Could you provide our readers with a brief introduction to Chi Candle?
A: Chi Candle, a candle company, owned and operated by wife and husband team, was founded by me, Chi and my husband,Luong in Menifee, a city in southwestern Riverside County, California in early 2013.
We thought of naming the business. We came up with Chi Candle! We took my first name, Chi…something like “Say cheese” …smile… :)
Recommended: Q: Chi, can you tell us your backstory? How did you get an idea for Chi Candle?
A: We love candles. Our scented journey has started from the wonderful blue jar candles, we believe that they are some of the best scented candles. We love those candles, smell so good, the blue jars are great! Now we still like those candles and still buy them sometimes. However, we dislike the way they burn, they have a problem: the candle burns down the center of the candle with so much candle waste…lots of wax stuck to the side of the jar.
We didn’t know anything about candle-making. We like that scent, and we put the leftover wax from un-burned candles and melt it on wax warmers. That’s all we did to keep enjoying that scent until we read an article about 14-year-old boy make and sell manly scented candles. This article motivates us learn about the art of candle-making and candle industry.
We started doing some research and decided to try at making our own candles. We discovered that most candles are made from paraffin wax, and paraffin wax is obtained from petroleum. On the other hand, many candles are made from soy wax, and soy candles are the healthy, natural alternative to paraffin candles, so we decided to use soy wax in our soy candles.
In 2012, we have been making candles as gifts for friends and family to gain feedback.Then everyone started expressing a lot of interest in our candles and the journey has just begun! We opened our Etsy shop in early 2013.
Q: Can you give us insights into your products? What makes them unique?
A: Anyone can pour candles, the process looked fairly simple.But it was not simple, it is not simple to make a scented candle. Our first candles had no scent throw! We tested multiple different techniques. It took us months and ruined dozens of candles. We finally have developed our unique formula and pouring process apply to our candles now. All of our candles are hand poured using domestically grown soy wax, environment-safe cotton wicks, fine fragrance oils.
Unique? Let’s face it, I think it is a challenge for all businesses, big or small. We also struggled for over 5 years to find the answer for the question “What makes your candles unique?”, what can we do to make sure our candles get noticed in a marketplace filled great products?
We spent many hours, many months thinking, looking around, trying new labels, new jars…and we finally found the answer. We renamed all products, Luong hand sketched all the labels himself on his old iPad, and, for example, our Evocative candle line, each candle’s scent is based on a state’s tree, flower, fruit, or even rivers, mountain, lakes, and named based on a certain characteristic of each state too. For example, Midnight Sun for Alaska, and Sunshine Beach for Florida. Have you ever seen a candle named ALOHA KAKAHIAKA with a hand-sketched of surfboard?
Recommended: VeriCheck (VCI) Continues To Transform The Payments Industry
Q: What’s the best way to burn Chi Candle candles?
A: Our candles are soy candles. When lighting your soy candle for the first time, and each time thereafter, allow the wax to melt all the way out to the diameter of it’s container. Don’t blow it out until the top layer of wax has melted all the way across. This ensures that your soy candle does not “tunnel” as it burns, leaving wax along the sides of the container. As a general rule, you should burn your candle 1 hour for every inch wide that the candle is. So if you have a 3 inch wide soy candle, you may need to burn it for at least 3 hours for a good melt pool. Each time you want to burn your candle, start by trimming the wick to between 1/8 and 1/4 inches long. You can use scissors or a nail clipper.
Q: What are your plans for the future?
A: Last year, we went through a big rebrand: named, hand-sketched, scents…. In the next month, we plan to add hand-sketched mugs, hand-sketched tote bags, hand-sketched wax melts…we continue our journey of making cool things and can’t wait to share them with you in our shop.
Activate Social Media:
