Have A Holiday Mixer with Yankee® Candles!

Everyone knows that the holiday season brings with it sights, sounds, and scents! My hometown is already being dressed up with evergreen garland wrapped around each light pole and I'm thinking about which fragrance will be my signature scent of the season. In addition to my traditional favorites like Christmas Eve® and Mistletoe®, I like to mix my own recipe on occasion. I may take a little fruit, add some spice, and perhaps a touch of sweetness and voila! My home smells like my mother's did on Christmas morning! On a different day, I might combine my favorite pine (like Balsam & Cedar) with a fruit such as Macintosh and I'm reminded of strolling through Sturbridge Village or Colonial Williamsburg. These unique blends become my own custom holiday fragrances. Yankee Candle calls it Fragrance Mixology, but I call it my little secret - the finishing touch that makes an ordinary event truly extraordinary!

Think about your own favorite holiday traditions: a big holiday meal, a day to bake your favorite treats, a hike in the woods to collect pinecones and boughs? Experiment with two or three different Yankee Candle scents to produce an aroma that reminds you of this special time. If you use Tarts® wax potpourri, you can break them into pieces and add a little of each into the bowl of the warmer until you get the aroma that you like. (Be careful not to add too many pieces, you don’t want melted wax to drip out of the warmer!) If you use Samplers® votive candles, you can either use several holders throughout your entertaining space or you can buy a unique clover shaped holder for just $7.99 at www.yankeecandle.com that will allow you to burn 3 votives together. Once you're a master mixologist, you could even try blending scents with non-candle forms such as warming oils, or even using a candle in one fragrance and a reed in another. The scents will mix as they waft through the air.

Here are a few ideas to get you started:

• Frosty Air™ + Early Sunrise™ = Winter Solstice
  
• Winter Wonderland + Buttercream® + Christmas Cupcake = Marshmallow World
• Christmas At The Beach™ + Sun & Sand + Vanilla Lime® = Christmas in Key West
  

You can see that the possibilities are endless – truly limited only by your own imagination. Have fun and let me know what custom scent you create for the holiday season!

Yankee Candle Scents & Nonsense

Not too long ago my family and I visited the home of Ben & Jerry's ice cream in Vermont. In their typical tongue-in-cheek fashion, the Ben & Jerry's marketers have decided to acknowledge the flavors that did not quite make the grade by displaying them on tombstones in a faux flavor graveyard. This got me to thinking about the Yankee Candle hits and misses over the years. What products and fragrances had real glow and which were no more than a pool of melted wax? In no one’s opinion but my own, here are the top 3 hits and misses in my Yankee Candle history:

Wax On

MacIntosh & Sage & Citrus – When introduced in 1998, MacIntosh and Sage & Citrus were enormously popular right from the first sniff. We’d had other scents that struck chords with our fans over the years, but these two were so uniquely wonderful that they led the way for other signature scents like Midsummer’s Night®, Clean Cotton®, and Mistletoe™.

Car Jars® - It’s been a decade since the launch of our candle-shaped auto fragrancers and boy has the Yankee Candle fan’s life changed since. This was our first non-candle product and since then fragrance fanatics the world over have been able to enjoy Yankee Candle scents in room sprays, potpourri, reeds, and even lip balm and anti-bac soap!

Fan Feedback – If there is one thing that changes the dynamic of everything we do, it’s hearing from and listening to all of the people who use our products. Whether we’re talking to customers face-to-face in our stores, reading what they write on facebook, or analyzing sales, our fans speak to us loud and clear!

Wax Off

Rhubarb Plum & Gooseberry Jam – These are two recent examples of when some scents can be a little too true-to-life!

Fragrant Shades of White – This out-of-the-box concept was developed on the notion that people may buy a candle if only its color didn’t clash with home décor. We poured all our best-selling fragrances in colorless wax so that if you wanted MacIntosh but detest the color red you could still enjoy the scent. Interest in these Fragrant Shades quickly faded away!

Discontinuing Storm Watch® & Fireside™ – And, I could add such other fan favorites as Eucalyptus and Patchouli. You all spoke loud and clear when these scents went away and we certainly learned an important lesson. We welcomed these favorites back into the line and you’ve welcomed them back into your homes!

New From Yankee Candle: Fragranced Figurines

I have a new way to add round-the-clock fragrance to my home and boy is it cute! No, I haven't given up on candles - not by a long shot. But there are times that I want to add scent without lighting a candle. Of course I use electric fragrancers but in my old home I don't always have a convenient outlet. That's why I was delighted to find these new fragrance diffusers from Yankee Candle®. They're pleasant to look at and pleasantly scented, adding seasonal charm wherever they are. The key is in the unglazed porcelain stem and leaf at the top of the pumpkin and apple. When you fill the vessel with MacIntosh or Spiced Pumpkin fragrance, the oil wicks up the porcelain and wafts through the room.
My home feels so warm and inviting even when the house has been empty because these darling little figurines are working overtime!

At Yankee Candle It's the Season for Leaf Peeping & Fall Festivals

All of a sudden it's fall. Saturday was one of those remarkably beautiful September days where you could feel that the change of season is coming. The air temperature was just cool enough for a sweater and yet the sun still felt warm on my face. Here in Western Massachusetts, it's the time of year when the hills are really alive. The leaves are just starting to turn and the farm stands are filled to overflowing with big round pumpkins, cornstalks and delightful scarecrows. It's no wonder that so many of our favorite Yankee Candle fragrances are inspired by this time of year! My favorite (as mentioned in previous blog posts) is Spiced Pumpkin, but other scents such as Autumn Leaves™ and our signature MacIntosh really strike a chord as well.
Whether you are in a cooler climate or whether your seasonality is a bit more subtle, Yankee Candle helps to transform your home to a quaint New England autumn inn just by lighting a candle!

A Scented Memory

Some people remember their first day on the job because they were excited or nervous or overwhelmed. I remember my first day on the job because of the way it smelled. February 16 1993 I arrived to my new job at the Yankee Candle Company and the air was filled with a mix of whatever they were making that day. I remember it being a strong floral - maybe Country Heather - with a sweet French Vanilla twist. To this day that scent will return and it will carry me back to that moment in time. The sense of smell is amazing that way. I remember in those early years when candles were poured where our store's Candle Emporium is today, I went home smelling like the fragrance that was being made. It was a good day if the scent was something like Sage & Citrus or the refreshing MacIntosh. Look out when an overpowering citronella was being made (thank goodness we now have Conceal® to ward off mosquitoes in a much more pleasant way)! On a Midsummer's Night® day, people at the local grocery store assumed I was wearing my boyfriend's clothes. When Spiced Pumpkin was on the menu I always felt like there would be something yummy waiting for me when I got home. Our factory is just down the road apiece from where it was back then and new technology allows us to keep much more of that precious scent in the wax rather than allowing it to waft away in the air. When the atmosphere is just right, though, and our candlemakers are crafting certain scents, I get a whiff of something wonderfully familiar and I feel that same first day of work excitement again. Yankee Candle, thanks for the memories!

Yankee Candle Fragrance Boosts Your Scent Appeal!

I first realized the emotional appeal of Yankee Candle fragrances when I was house hunting. When my husband and I were newly married and living in a small apartment, one of our favorite pasttimes was scouring the neighborhood for real estate open houses. We loved visiting houses of all types and styles and dreaming about our "some day" home. In those days my favorite houses were the ones that not only looked pretty, but they smelled good too. There was something about a fragrant home that made it feel happy and loved. Inevitably I would find that the source of the scent was a lit Yankee® candle in the kitchen or living room. The warm, friendly aromas of Home Sweet Home® or MacIntosh would fill the air and the house would take on a completely different feel.

On their blog "Real Estate Advice, Answers, and More" Nothnagle Real Estate references the impact of a home's scent on its market value. They write, "there is a direct connection between smell and people's moods so light fragrances can help create 'scent appeal' when used properly in the home ... A light floral fragrance can put people in a more pleasant mood while citrus scents tend to have an energizing effect. Vanilla is often found to be comforting and relaxing." And they further recommend that, "a small reed diffuser in a bathroom can keep the room smelling clean while not overpowering the space."

It makes sense, doesn't it? To make a house a home, you add curb appeal to the outside so why not add scent appeal to the inside?

Hamburger Scented Candles? Really?

When the hamburger chain White Castle debuted their hamburger-scented candles this week, it really piqued my interest. I remember when I was a child my family (lovingly) referred to me as Wimpy after Popeye's friend because I could smell hamburgers from miles around. However, a hamburger scented candle seems a bit of a novelty, don't you think? I mean food fragrances are my favorites bar none and I love when those warm and cozy spicy scents come back into season, but there are certain foods that don't lend themselves to the way in which you'd want your home to smell. Baking scents like Blueberry Scone and Vanilla Cupcake, sweet aromas like Buttercream®, and fruity fragrances like Fruit Salad™ and MacIntosh are so delicious when they fill the house. But, do you really want your home to smell like sauteed onions or fried fish? It is true, though, that over the years, Yankee Candle has fielded some unusual requests to make candles that smell like pizza or bacon or Indian food. Who knows, maybe there will be a barbecue sauce candle somewhere in our future!