Trip to Target Inspires Aromatic Hustle

This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.

Hello, and welcome to Side Hustle School. My name is Chris Guillebeau, your host. One of my favorite stories from Book Tour, I wrote a book called Side Hustle and went out to about 40 cities. One of my favorite stories, one of the ones that I keep going back to that I tell when people are asking for examples or I go and talk to the media, is about the guy who learned to make candles by watching YouTube. That was also a very popular episode.

It was episode 80, 8-0 of Side Hustle School. In that case, he was from South Carolina. I believe he was traveling in Austin, Texas and realized how expensive candles can cost. Goes back home and says, "Well, I want to sell expensive candles," and then basically figures out how to do it. Well, today's story features another candle seller, not a butcher or baker or candlestick maker. That's another episode. Just the candles themselves. In this

case, it's about a social worker who takes a trip to Target, then goes away with the eliminating inspiration to start an aromatic side hustle. And just like that previous episode, this one also offers a bit of a lesson in branding because there are a lot of candles in the world. If you're going to start a candle line, why should someone care about yours? Well, stay tuned to find out. That story is coming right up.

Tae Watts is a full-time social worker in Los Angeles and a part-time seller of candles. But this story doesn't actually start with candles, it starts with soap. You see, Tae's first product line was aromatic soaps she made at home. She did that for a few years and enjoyed it, but it eventually lost its luster, so she washed her hands of that idea and moved on. Still, the idea of earning money apart from her job was appealing. As a mother

of two, Tae often went to Target to get things for her family. When she did, she found herself stopping by one aisle in particular. This was an aisle of peace and solace. It was also known as the candle aisle. In this sweetly scented world, the stresses of motherhood and diapers dissipated, and she found herself enveloped in calming lavender, sweet vanilla, and earthy eucalyptus. On a whim, Tae began experimenting with scents and making her own

candles. She already knew a bit about how to do it. She had made a few before for family gifts, and the knowledge from the soap-making venture helped her estimate costs and work with different materials. She wanted to launch her candle brand with at least four scents, and the inspiration from those initial scents came from things she already loved—books, tea, and women's empowerment. The R&D phase was all about capturing feeling—the feeling of wonder and comfort at the smell of a good book, the assertive, go-get-it attitude of women hustlers, and the sophisticated, calming presence of a cup of tea. After some experiments,

Tae had her first four candles, and she put some thought into the names. She called them Boss Girl Magic, Dear Book Hoarder, Big Cozy Sweater, and Carpe Diem in Coffee. That last one is my favorite. Seize the day, but don't forget the coffee. Great idea. She built out

her store using the platform BigCommerce and launched the brand, which she called Posh Candle Co., on December 27, 2016. Then she immediately began to reach out to influencers on Instagram. She targeted accounts with 5,000 to 10,000 followers and sent off about 20 pitches asking about exchanging a product for a styled shot. Over the next month, she received about 10 responses and sent off 10 candles. So 20 pitches, 10 responses, pretty good conversion rate. Many followers of those influencers ended up reposting their images,

which began a trickle of word-of-mouth marketing. Between the initial candle materials, web hosting, and influencer gifts, Tae's startup costs were just over $350. Her first order came in a couple weeks after launch on January 6, 2017. She was ecstatic. Although she also can't remember if she did anything to celebrate because she was so busy with the rest of her life. Speaking of that, Tae is not shy about the challenges she's faced. Working in mental

health can be draining, not to mention caring for two young kids. In her words, "There's no balance when having a hustle and two children because they're constantly in the middle of everything I do." In fact, Tae was so busy those first few months that she can't remember when she made her first $1,000, which is normally a big milestone for people. She does know for certain, however, that she broke $10,000 in sales that June, just six months after launching. Several months in, Tae switched from BigCommerce to Shopify. The theme options were better for her brand, and there was a much larger online community for support.

These days, she's excited to partner with other women entrepreneurs to create personal scents. She's also looking for ways to finally move her business out of her house so that she can have people over on the weekends without it being a minefield of soy and wax. The journey is still in its early stages, but she has lit up with enthusiasm about her decision to get started. So the trick with having a successful candle line, or something similar where there are already a lot of options out there, the trick to being successful with it is not so much in the making of the candle. I don't want to say it's easy to make candles. I don't

know. I've never tried to do it. But I don't know if Tae's candles or the other guy's candles that we talked about are, you know, the best candles in the world in terms of their quality and craftsmanship. Perhaps they are, but my sense from looking at it from the outside is that the trick with it, the reason why they're successful is the branding. Like, yes, of course, you have to have a good product. That's first and foremost. But there are probably

a lot of people with good candles who aren't selling a lot of them. I think the trick really is branding, like the emphasis of like, you know, why these candles? Who are they for? What's different about them? What's unusual? How can your candles become somewhat of a

statement piece? And in making those decisions, that's also going to determine your market. And if I take a look at Tae's site, poshcandleco.com, which of course we'll link up in the show notes, you can see all of her products there. And they are well-designed and packaged, as I would expect. She's got some good photos of them. And even the names of some of her candles

kind of give an indication about her market. So she's got a candle called Blog Like a Boss. All right, you're not going to buy the Blog Like a Boss candle if you're not a blogger. You're not going to give it to someone as a gift who's not a blogger or writer. She's got one called Boss Girl Magic. She's got one called Black Girl Magic. Neither of those

would probably make sense on my desk. But on the other hand, Carpe Diem and Coffee, like I would love to have that. Sign me up. So making a good product first, like let's not leave that out because that is important. But then clearly thinking about the brand and the market. And then in her case, being really specific about the market by going

out to these people on Instagram with five to ten thousand followers, which is a decent amount of followers, but it's not huge. I think that's smart too, because if you go to someone with 200,000 followers, they're probably not just going to post your product for free. All right. And lastly, a reminder, if you're bored with something, move on. So in this story, Tay could have kept making soap. That was her previous side hustle, but she was

bored with it. So, you know, she washed her hands and moved on. And I think that's totally okay. In fact, I think that's the right thing to do. I don't know the details of that business, but I'm guessing it wasn't making a million dollars. If your side hustle is particularly

lucrative or, you know, it's otherwise a huge success, then it might be more complicated to make that decision. I still think in the long term, you shouldn't do something you're not excited about. But assuming it was just, you know, a regular kind of side hustle, making some money, but not a ton of it. Well, in that case, if you're bored, you should definitely move on because there's all kinds of things that you could do. You might as well put your energy and attention and limited resources, especially for someone like Tay with two kids and full time job as a social worker. Like your time is limited. So do something that

you want. Do something that matters to you and build something for your future, which is exactly what side hustle school is all about. So congrats to her. Be sure to check out her photos on Instagram or check out that shop, which of course we'll link up. Don't forget, inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is so much better. Today's show notes are at sidehustleschool.com slash 516.

That is five one six. Thank you for listening today. I'll be back tomorrow with more. My name is Chris Guillebeau for side hustle school.