Yaneek Page| Turning Candles and Home Fragrances into Cash

Question: Hi, Yan. I have been following your career for a long time and commend you on the great work you’ve done. I’m also reaching out for advice about a new venture, which is a scented candle and home-fragrance business. I lost my job from 2020 and haven’t found anything since. I did some freelance work for a company, but that was neither enough nor consistent to pay my bills. A friend in the US introduced me to a particular home- candle business, which she has been doing since she lost her job, too. She is doing very well, and so now, I’m about to sign up with her as her downline, and the cost to start is only US$100. Can you please take a look at the opportunity and tell me if you would start this kind of business and if you think it would be good for Jamaica?

– Trudi-Ann, St James

BUSINESSWISE: Thank you for your commendation! To answer your first question, I must emphasise that the decision to become an entrepreneur, and the type of business you choose to start, is a personal one and in many ways, unique to each of us. People usually have varying priorities, tastes, preferences, values, backgrounds, experiences, and truths etc. While you might have a passion for home fragrance and scented candles, I may not. Similarly, I may have a passion for justice, creating TV shows, business content, writing articles, global business training, and coaching as a career, and you may not.

Ideally, the best businesses for us to start as individuals are those where the opportunity aligns closely with our unique characteristics, strengths, and passion. That’s where the magic of profitable self-actualisation unfolds. Your evaluation of this opportunity is, therefore, the perfect time to reflect on whether you have a passion for providing home- fragrance solutions. Don’t just consider if this can make money. It is also at this junction that we create customers by serving their needs and offering value to a market that appreciates and rewards us while enjoying a deep sense of fulfilment from being paid to do what we love.

With that said, though this opportunity may not align with what I’m most passionate about, and, therefore, may not be one I would invest in, it doesn’t mean it’s not right for you.

To answer your second question -whether this opportunity will do well in Jamaica - I simply don’t have enough information to make that determination. If we’re to assess the candle and home-fragrance offerings in the retail market, such as supermarkets, pharmacies, stores etc, it would appear that we have demand. However, you would need more research to estimate the current size, growth potential, current and future monetary value, and other such data, which would help you in your decision-making.

Understanding the space, direct-to-consumer as opposed to business-to-consumer, and the current and potential players should be your priority. Also critical to your assessment is doing a deep dive into the competitor analysis by examining each of the options available to your potential customers.

Don’t just focus on how they price, but carefully examine the products, their characteristics, branding, packaging, any unique value propositions, also promotions in the trade, and especially pay attention to how they merchandise and sell the products. The information you gather will supplement your own product testing among your target audience, including, hopefully, several focus group discussions. You are likely to need lots of samples for this, so be prepared. In your focus groups, be sure to investigate existing and prospective purchase patterns. In other words, how many products are they likely to buy, how often, and what is their preferred way to make those purchases and receive products.

A key consideration is that the company you intend to join as an independent member is a multilevel marketing company that thrives on personal selling and recruitment of other people to enter the business. I strongly suggest that you do an online search for the pros and cons of multilevel marketing companies generally, and the company you are considering specifically. There were several red flags I noted, including a few complaints about the company’s member-recruitment strategy. Please take special care here. I also noted that there is a minimum monthly order volume to maintain your membership privileges and discounts with the company. The market realities in the US are quite different from Jamaica, and that is before contending with shipping, customs, currency devaluation, and several other challenges with the transposed business model.

Even though your friend may be doing very well, some of the more effective selling and distribution methods she employs aren’t readily available or even culturally acceptable locally. In researching the company and its member-success stories, I delved deep into the personal social media accounts of their top independent sales gurus and the marketing & distribution sweet-spots. Most rely heavily on home fragrance parties, home fragrance consultations, next day mail-out orders, monthly mail-out samples, and holiday/special occasion promotions, most of which may not be affordable, or even possible, in Jamaica.

This is not to say you can’t find strategies that can work. Once the financials make sense, you are likely to be able to. These are the details you need to plan for, budget and include in your financial projections to really determine if you can cash in on candles and home fragrances in Jamaica.

One love.

- Yaneek Page is the programme lead for Market Entry USA and a certified trainer in entrepreneurship. She’s also the creator & executive producer of The Innovators and Let’s Make Peace TV series.