Best online company to order supplies from? I am new.

[creepshow]

Hey everyone!

I am brand new to the forum and to candle making. Since I am a complete rookie, I was wondering what online sites would be best to order supplies from? I am looking to make soy votive scented candles (to start). I have been looking at Candles & Supplies, and Nature's Garden so far. I am looking to make a lot of Halloween/Autumn/spooky scented candles and these sites have a lot of the scents I would interested in using. Do you know if they are reliable sites with quality products? Any tips or advice would greatly appreciated. Thanks so much!

 

[dixiedragon]

Where are you located?

Tennessee Candle is going out of business and a lot of stuff is on deep discount. Might be worth checking out.

 

[creepshow]

Hi! I am on the east coast of Canada. I would like to find a company that I can consistently order from so, once I get my scents/recipes down, I can keep ordering exactly the same ingredients and wax for consistency in the candles. I found a Canadian company, Canwax, but they don't have much in the way for the scents I am looking for. It will cost more, but it looks like I will have to order from a US company to get what I want. Thanks for the tip, though!

 

[shunt2011]

I use Nature's Garden but haven't use their fragrance in wax. However, I've heard great things regarding them in wax. As with any company, you're not likely to find just one company that has every fragrance you may want and that works in your product. I personally use 4-5 different suppliers, maybe more.

 

[shimmersoap]

Nature's Garden is the BEST! Their fragrance oils are simply spectacular. fast shipping too! 3-4 days from ordering i received my stuff.

 

[creepshow]

Thanks guys, that's good to know! I did see more scents that I was interested in on the Candles & Supplies site, though. I wonder what the quality of their stuff is like? Also, with Nature's Garden, have you guys used their soy wax? Is it good quality? Or is their a better place to order it from?

 

[Stacyspy]

For my soy wax and tart Fragrance oils I use vacandlesupply. they have a website, and are on ebay also. They have decent prices, excellent customer service, and I've been pleased with their products.

 

[creepshow]

Sounds like my best bet would be to do a few small orders from a few different places at first to see which site has the best materials for what I want to do. Thanks for the tips, everyone! I will definitely try those sites. Any other advice/info is welcome, too. Thanks!

 

[Cindy2428]

Which part of the country are you from? You will soon find shipping is a major variable in your supplies purchases.

 

[shunt2011]

Which part of the country are you from? You will soon find shipping is a major variable in your supplies purchases.

East Coast of Canada......per his post. I missed it the first time I posted too.

 

[creepshow]

Hey everyone! Thanks for the input. I am putting together a smallish order from Nature's Garden now.

10lbs. of Golden Foods soy wax 464
Stainless Votive Molds
Votive Wick Pins
1 Pouring Pot
Various Dyes
Various Fragrance Oils
CD5 CD Candle Wicks (votive)

Has anyone used and/or had any problems with any of these? They seem to get good reviews. Yes, the shipping to Canada is going to be a bit pricey. We'll see how it goes. *fingers crossed* Thanks so much, everyone!

 

[Obsidian]

I buy fragrance and lotion supplies/oils from natures garden. Always good quality items, never had any issues with the company at all. In fact, they are my go to company for soap/lotion stuff.

 

[HappyGoNaturally]

Hey everyone! Thanks for the input. I am putting together a smallish order from Nature's Garden now.

10lbs. of Golden Foods soy wax 464
Stainless Votive Molds
Votive Wick Pins
1 Pouring Pot
Various Dyes
Various Fragrance Oils
CD5 CD Candle Wicks (votive)

Has anyone used and/or had any problems with any of these? They seem to get good reviews. Yes, the shipping to Canada is going to be a bit pricey. We'll see how it goes. *fingers crossed* Thanks so much, everyone!

I'm curious ... will you be mixing your soy container wax with a paraffin wax?

 

[TBandCW]

Good luck! Candle making is fun, we had a lot of trial and errors before we came up with our recipes so don't get discouraged. Soy is very finicky but people love soy!

 

[HappyGoNaturally]

Where votives are concerned ... how are people getting these out of the molds nicely if they are 100% soy? I'd love to be able to do that! I make soy containers and have tried pouring excess wax into votive mold with a wick pin ... the pin sticks, the candle sticks -- if put in frig, it gets weird looking and crackly. I think for votives that you have to harden the wax to make it work or use a tear-away Dixie cup mold ...? I'm not a votive maker, but this has been my experience. I use Golden Wax 444. Maybe this works better without a wick pin? I'm still thinking it needs to be a harder wax, maybe soy-paraffin, or maybe some stearic acid would work ...?

 

[creepshow]

I'm curious ... will you be mixing your soy container wax with a paraffin wax?

I was actually wondering about that. Do any of you mix a bit of something else in with your soy wax? I've read that 100% soy wax can be difficult to remove from the molds. Yet they sell the wax as 100% pure (I assume). Would a bit of paraffin wax help with that?

 

[tricia819]

Tennessee Candle is going out of business and a lot of stuff is on deep discount. Might be worth checking out.

Thanks for this tip! I went right over there and spent too much and bought the last they had of two different fragrances!! One was something that a customer has been asking me to make for the last month or more! Love this forum!

 

[HappyGoNaturally]

I was actually wondering about that. Do any of you mix a bit of something else in with your soy wax? I've read that 100% soy wax can be difficult to remove from the molds. Yet they sell the wax as 100% pure (I assume). Would a bit of paraffin wax help with that?

I think it would be safest if you find a "Pillar Blend" wax for your votives. Although I haven't gone in the direction of making votives as a project, I think if I wanted to make a bunch of them, I might try something like EcoSoya PB ... it's still a soy wax, but it's been designed to use in pillars and votives.

Regarding the use of wick pins, it's really a personal preference, I prefer to place my wicks in the candle from the start, or when the wax is setting up.

Also, I wanted to mention that higher flashpoint scents seem to do better in soy candles, so you may wish to see if you can get scents with a FP of 175 degrees F. or higher -- then, you can add it while the wax is still hot, some say it binds to the soy wax better.

 

[creepshow]

I think it would be safest if you find a "Pillar Blend" wax for your votives. Although I haven't gone in the direction of making votives as a project, I think if I wanted to make a bunch of them, I might try something like EcoSoya PB ... it's still a soy wax, but it's been designed to use in pillars and votives.

Regarding the use of wick pins, it's really a personal preference, I prefer to place my wicks in the candle from the start, or when the wax is setting up.

Also, I wanted to mention that higher flashpoint scents seem to do better in soy candles, so you may wish to see if you can get scents with a FP of 175 degrees F. or higher -- then, you can add it while the wax is still hot, some say it binds to the soy wax better.

I was just looking at the EcoSoya PB on The Flaming Candle. It definitely gets good reviews! So, you think that would be easier to work with than the stuff from Nature's Garden for votives?

 

[HappyGoNaturally]

From some reading I've done, it seems that the EcoSoyaPB is probably a nice wax, and you can scent it up to 12%, so that should make for nice votives! They say to add scent at no less than 145dF (61.1°C). It might be nice to start with about five pounds (or less?) just to try it out and see. Plus, a smaller order to Canada could probably ship in a Flat Rate Int'l box, so that might save you some money.

Note: for air shipments, you'd have to select scents with a greater than 200dF.

On another note, I hadn't visited the site you mentioned until now (Flaming) and see that if you make any changes to your order, it costs you $3.50 -- and, the FP's (flashpoints) of their oils aren't easily seen on the page ... you may also wish to take a visit to www.cierracandles.com as they display which scents can be shipped by air (over 200dF.), but you'd have to ask them if they ship to Canada, probably so. There may be some other suppliers that are good for putting starter kits together too, I just mentioned this one, as I have ordered from them in the past and I see that they also offer this wax in smaller quantities.