The Inciting Incident: Why TCVD Exists

Or, 67.9 Million Reasons To Love This Site

Every great story begins with The Inciting Incident, an often-chaotic event that upsets the protaganist’s life and sets everything into motion. Mine was September 2021.

After bumbling along with my business for most of the year, I found myself nearly out of inventory after a couple of great Summer markets. With the holidays right around the corner, I’d need to order right away to have time to formulate, cure, and test before the seasonal rush. No problem. Easy peasy.

Except it’s now full swing into CANDLE SEASON and my regular supplier is backordered because we’re all working on holiday stock.

The supply chain is borked and there is no firm restock date.

There’s an alternate supplier across the country with vessels in stock but they’re more expensive.

And, hey, the shipping companies just kicked in their seasonal upcharge so now my COG is going to go up more than 30%.

I had little time and money to spare so I did what anyone would do in that situation and I summoned my business BFF, Google. “Where can I find candle supplies near me?”

The response: Oh, hey buddy, here are 67,900,000 results. 67,899,980 of them probably won’t help you. Good luck 🫡

I eventually found vessels and was able to restock in time for the holiday sales season but it took hours and hours of searching for vendors, trying to figure out shipping costs, comparing prices and shipping times. It was STRESSFUL not because of lack of resources but because the information is so spread out and often at the mercy of pay-for-play search engine algorithms.

I needed a better way to find vendors so I created it. And now you’re here. 🥰

The purpose of The Candlemakers Vendor Directory (TCVD) is to help make the lives of my fellow candlemakers easier. This handy list can help you find local-ish suppliers to help you save on shipping costs. Or you can search for companies that have a showroom so you can check out their products in person. Maybe you’re on the hunt for new fragrances or different wicks or better equipment to elevate your candles? Your search just got easier, faster, relevant, and more efficient. Even better? You don’t have to search through 67 million unhelpful results to get what you need. What’s not to love?

These pages are the result of hundreds of hours of research, coding, formatting, and data entry. I hope you find value here and enjoy it as much as I’ve enjoyed creating it.

xo, Zoe