Igniting coastal experiences

Help customers relive their favorite memories with candles that tell an aromatic story of their time at the beach.

There’s something about scent that can take a person on a journey to a far away place or a past experience. Seaside retailers can help their customers enjoy this wonderful phenomenon by offering aromatic candles reminiscent of the beach and coastal scents they encounter while away from home.

A candle is one of the few souvenirs that has multiple ways of evoking past experiences. It not only triggers memories with smell, but the container that it is poured in also makes a great home accent that lasts long after the candle itself burns away. They’re also ever popular and never go out of style.

“Candles are a consistent, steady category,” says Tamara Moran, founder of gift and decor wholesale company Town Pride, Yarmouth, Maine. “There might be some seasonality to the volume you sell but they always sell.”

Handcrafted, hand-poured, U.S.-made candles are popular sellers.

Consumers depend on candles to create ambience, elicit memories and foster good feelings, she says. Carrying candles can also drive sales and encourage repeat business as they are a consumable. Town Pride’s soy candles also add that special connection to a specific locale that customers are seeking.

“In addition to them being made in the USA and hand poured soy, the thing [retailers] like the most are the customized labels and beautiful fragrances,” says Moran. “Our candles look like a curated home fragrance collection that the shopkeeper sourced just for their customers without all the work.”

A majority of candle sales — some 60% — occur from September through December, according to Moran, but she says, “Candles sell year-round, and you should always have a seasonal assortment. So many stores let their inventory dwindle after the holidays and they are leaving money on the table.”

Christina Willcox, owner of Rockport Candle Co., describes candles as “the perfect non-perishable, yet consumable product.”

Rockport’s hand-crafted touches like wooden lids and hand-stamped labels make them unique. A big selling point is the fact that the candles are handmade in Rockport, Massachusetts, using U.S.-sourced ingredients, according to Wilcox.

Connecting with the coast

“I have a unique collection of experiences to pull from. Every few years, we must pick up our lives and make a new home wherever my husband is needed. We have to find new friends and new communities to call our own, all while striving to keep a connection to the people and places we left behind through the years,” she explains.

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“People who come to visit your locations want to bring a piece of the seaside life home with them,” explains Dotstry. “Our sense of smell is the strongest connection to memories we hold dear. Being able to provide your customers with something that smells specifically like the beach or the salty ocean air will keep not only your store in their minds, but the city where they found you will be a place they will never forget.”

It was evoking memories with the senses that prompted Dune Jewelry and Co. Founder and CEO Holly Daniels Christensen launch a line of Experiential candles.

Spending so much time at home during the pandemic had her cooking more and dreaming of coastal travel destinations and far-off places. She and her young daughters would cook meals from specific regions and talk about the special aspects of those spots.

“One night as I was lighting a candle after we pretended we were eating dinner in Positano, Italy, the idea hit me. Why not create a fragrance that can transport you?”

Available in seven scents, Amalfi Coast, Bermuda, Cape Cod, Outer Banks, The Bahamas, Lake Michigan and Sedona, each fragrance is reminiscent of its namesake.

“The layers all come together perfectly to create a very luxurious experience that will take you straight to Bermuda, Hawaii or the Amalfi Coast [or other location] without ever leaving your home,” says Christensen.

Making memories

And they’re not just for the customer to enjoy, candles are also great gifts and have versatile uses. “Candles make a very thoughtful gift to share with others, letting them know you are thinking of them,” says Tatum.

Dune’s new candle line includes seven experiential scents.

Her coconut wax candles come in tins and are named with the beach and coast in mind: Sunset Savannah, Midnight Coast and Ocean Driftwood are just a few of the scents that take customers to faraway destinations from the comfort of their living rooms. The wide-based wooden wicks provide an even burn and that special crackle sound that adds to the ambiance.

Maya Blue’s candles and products bring the essences of the ocean and all its beauty to the room, but go a step further.

“The Original Shark Tooth Candle comes with four fossilized shark teeth. All scents are made from essential oils, and when the candle runs out you can add soil to the empty vessel and grow wildflowers right out of the jar using the seeded duster each candle comes with,” describes Mason Silvia, CEO and founder. “Most of our retailers can't keep them in stock, especially during the season.”

Versatile vessels

Soiree Candles’ iridescent jars in its Soiree @ the Beach collection are designed to be a keepsake after the wax has melted away, according to founder and chief creative officer Alyssa Caverley.

The candles, made with coconut wax, are available in four colorful, beachy scents, Dawn Patrol, Sun-kissed, Mermaid Hair and Hawaiian Lu’au, “The four candles all complement each other perfectly and look beautiful on display at the store,” according to Caverley.

Unique vessels are a specialty of Northern Lights. Its Windward Collection features a unique hand-blown vessel with an artisan-rolled rim, and the sculpted, sand vessel on Northern Lights’ Canyon Dune candles are created by pouring wax into colored sand.

If the name doesn’t give it away, Straight-up Coconut uses real coconut shells imported from Vietnam as the vessel for its candles. The soy wax is combined with a blend of essential oils that co-owner Colleen Condon Finnigan says smells like surf wax. Each candle is handpoured in the U.S. and comes in a little cotton draw string bag.

“We try our hardest to be sustainable and good to the earth,” she says. “We don’t package in plastic. We reuse all the boxes that we get our supplies in to ship. We deliver to our nearby customers in wooden crates.”

Like Maya Blue, the company carries dust covers made of seed paper so when the candle is finished burning wildflowers can be grown.

The coconut shells can also be personalized with laser engraved-logo, and the company provides a handmade, hand-painted stand as part of the order.

Old Whaling Co.’s variety of sea-inspired signature scents are all packed in bright, striped packaging with a whale logo that fits with the theme of many seaside retailers, according to Noelle Cork, wholesale accounts manager.

She adds that candles are a great gift option that can range in price points as well as scents “so they can truly be a gift for anyone on your list and for any occasion.”

More than wax

“Our seaside retailers love that Seawicks is so much more than wax. All our candles have different labels allowing for our retailers to freshen up their decor by changing scent. This is a great feature for the change of seasons.”

Kimber Smith, owner of The Outer Banks Candle Co., Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, hand pours all of her coastal-inspired soy candles. The fragrances, with names like Think Citrus Ocean, Beachy Peachy, Vanilla Vacation and Lavender Seas also emit a aromas inside the store, enticing customers to stop and smell them up close.

“There’s nothing better than going shopping and smelling all the candles, and our retailers love that their customers can bring a slice of paradise home with them that will always remind them of their trip,” says Smith.

Bon Secour Candle Co.’s wholesale customers can create private labels with their own logo giving that retailer’s customers “a great souvenir of their trip to our beautiful Gulf Coast,” says Tara Giffort, owner.

“Some of our scents are named for specific places,” she says. “Gulf Shores smells like suntan lotion. Orange Beach smells like sun and sand.”

Store owners increasingly are looking closer to home and to handmade artisan products to fill their shelves. Candles are filling that need nicely.

“Candles make great gifts and you can never have too many of them,” says Dotstry. “Being able to have something in your store that you know people will get behind and keep coming back for is crucial not only for your business but for candle makers as well.”