Guest
This video has been sponsored by StartEngine. Join 1.7 Million potential investors and be united with a thriving investment community: Sisters Jen and Jocelyn have grown their candle business from a side-hustle to a $500,000 a year revenue—and it all started with about a hundred bucks! We’ll learn how they did it in this interview. Jocelyn first started making candles as a hobby and a way to give unique gifts to coworkers. She brought her sister Jen on board when she started selling her handcrafted candles at farmers markets. After a successful Kickstarter campaign, Jocelyn took the leap to focus on her business full-time, and then Jen followed soon after. One great thing about a candle store is it doesn’t take a ton of money to get started. Jen and Jocelyn reinvested all the profits from their farmers market sales into the business. In the episode, Jen explains the best things to invest that money into to grow a business quickly, and her advice for someone who wants to start a handmade candle business with no money. While they started with a farmers market booth, most of RxLA’s sales today are online. Jen shares how they built their online store and why sending email newsletters has been so impactful in growing their candle sales and revenue. Jen and Jocelyn bootstrapped their business and were doing everything themselves when they started. Jen will share when they hired their first employees and how that’s fueled their growth. One way they tried to scale during Covid was through a brick-and-mortar store, which turned out to be their biggest setback. We’ll learn about the challenges of opening a physical retail space and what Jen and Jocelyn would do differently if they were starting it again. If you liked this episode, make sure you check out some of our past interviews with business owners selling handcrafted goods: A Day in the Life of a Candle Business Owner ► How Blacktail Studio Makes $15K/Month Woodworking ► Resources - Find out more about RxLA candles on their website - Listen to our podcast interview with Jen and Jocelyn (episode 80) - Take UpFlip’s courses for step-by-step blueprints to start a business Timestamps: 00:00 - START 00:34 - Meeting Jen 01:21 - Startup budget 01:47 - Recovering from failure 03:14 - Early mistakes 04:22 - Taking the leap of faith 05:58 - Starting with $0 07:02 - Expenses to focus on 07:49 - Kickstarter 08:27 - Biggest challenge 08:51 - Pouring candles 09:31 - What they’d do different 12:17 - Fan Blitz 14:41 - Time to profit 15:31 - Employee2 16:22 - Connecting with customers 18:11 - First customer 19:25 - Selling online vs. in-person 20:33 - Newsletter content 21:06 - Best advice 21:49 - Building a new business 22:55 - Challenges with a brick and mortar 23:59 - Gathering customer feedback 25:28 - Smartest business move 26:08 - Outro #candlebusiness #candlemaking #candlemakingbusiness
