I Need 100 Candles at 6% Fragrance Load — How Much Fragrance Oil Will I Need Compared with Producing the Same Candles at 8%?

The two formulas side by side

Your title gives the candle count and the two loads but not the candle weight, so this page uses 200 g as a labelled working figure — CSI's default candle throughout this series. If yours is different, every number below scales in proportion. Fragrance load is a share of the finished candle, the convention CSI uses on every page: oil = candle weight × load, wax = candle weight − oil. At 6% a 200 g candle holds 12 g of oil and 188 g of wax; at 8% it holds 16 g of oil and 184 g of wax. The candle weighs the same either way. The difference moves from one ingredient to the other.

The one line people remember is the third: 8% needs a third more fragrance oil than 6% — 1,600 g against 1,200 g, which is 33.3% more, not "2% more". The two-point gap is measured on the candle; on the oil bottle it is a 33% jump. The line people forget is the fourth: the 6% candle needs 400 g more wax for the same 100 candles. A lower load is not a smaller order. It is a cheaper ingredient doing more of the work.

The allowance stack, applied once at each load

The net requirement is what the candles hold. What you buy is more, because some candles are poured to test, some come out wrong, and some wax and oil stay in the jug. This series applies those allowances in one fixed order so nothing is counted twice: test candles first as whole candles, then a reject allowance on the production candles, then pour loss on wax and oil only, then breakage on glass only, and only then rounding to real packs. The figures below — 4 test candles, 3% rejects, 5% pour loss, 2% glass breakage and 4 spare wicks — are labelled working assumptions. Replace them with your own records as soon as you have them.

Load changes only two lines in that stack: wax and oil. Jars, wicks and stickers are identical at 6% and 8%, because a candle is still one jar and one wick whatever is in it. That matters for planning: the glass, the wicks and the wax can all be bought before you have decided the load, and the oil is the only material whose quantity depends on the decision. The 105-or-110 post argues the size of each allowance; here they are held constant so that the only thing moving is the load.

Rounding each load to real CSI oil and wax packs

Japanese Cherry Blossom Fragrance Oil is listed in all five sizes and all are in stock on the 4 October 2026 re-check: 15 g ₹104.00, 50 g ₹270.00, 100 g ₹500.00, 500 g ₹2,500.00 and 1 kg ₹4,842.00. Per gram that is ₹6.93, ₹5.40, ₹5.00, ₹5.00 and ₹4.84. So this oil has one real step down at 50 g, a flat stretch from 100 g to 500 g, and a small saving at 1 kg. Rounding below uses the cheapest combination of 50 g and larger bottles; the 15 g is kept for sampling.

The third row is worth a sentence. Swapping the 50 g bottle for a 15 g one gives 1,815 g for ₹8,946.00 — ₹166.00 cheaper — but it leaves only 0.6 g above the allowance. That is a bet that your pour loss really is 5% or less. If you have weighed your loss on a few batches and it is lower, take the tighter option; if this is your first 100, the 50 g bottle is cheap insurance.

Wax rounds the other way. Luxury Soy Wax CSI 464 is ₹507.40 a kilo at 1 kg, 5 kg and 10 kg (₹260.00 for 500 g, which is ₹520.00 a kilo), so there is no bulk saving to chase — only the number of bags. At 6% the stack asks for 21,319.2 g: 2 × 10 kg + 1 × 1 kg + 1 × 500 g = 21,500 g for ₹10,915.40, leaving 180.8 g. At 8% it asks for 20,865.6 g: 2 × 10 kg + 1 × 1 kg = 21,000 g for ₹10,655.40, leaving 134.4 g. The lower load needs one more 500 g bag, ₹260.00 more wax.

The full ₹ difference on one shopping list

Here are both orders in full, priced with listed, in-stock CSI packs. Jars are White Matte Glass Jar — CSI does not publish its fill weight, so weigh a test pour and confirm that your 200 g sits where you want it before ordering 115. Wicks are Eco Candle Wicks Thin C1 as the example wick (CSI publishes no wick size per jar diameter; the size must pass your burn test), with one wick sticker per wick.

So the honest answer to "how much more does 8% cost than 6% on 100 candles" is ₹2,010.00 on this order, or ₹20.10 a saleable candle — not the ₹2,270.00 the oil line alone suggests, because the 6% order needs an extra 500 g bag of wax. Leave out allowances and pack rounding and the per-candle difference at pack rates is ₹17.34 (4 g more oil at ₹4.84/g minus 4 g less wax at ₹0.51/g). The rounded figure is a little different because bottles and bags come in steps.

The same question with ten other CSI oils

The gap between 6% and 8% is almost entirely the price of the oil, so it changes a great deal from one fragrance to another. The table reruns the oil line for ten in-stock CSI oils, each rounded to its own cheapest 50 g-and-up bottles at both loads with the same allowance stack. Wax, jars and wicks are the same as above for all of them.

Across those ten oils the extra for 8% runs from ₹1,290.00 (Citrus Lemon) to ₹10,827.00 (Club De Nuit Intense Inspired). That spread is why no supplier can tell you whether 8% is "worth it" in general. In a cheaper oil the step from 6% to 8% costs little more than a few labels; in an inspired fine-fragrance oil it is a meaningful share of your margin. If you are pricing a whole range, the 10%-versus-8% post runs the next step up, and the minimum-leftover post shows how to choose bottles when the rounding leaves an awkward remainder.

Decide the load on six candles before buying the oil

The cheapest way to settle 6% against 8% is to pour both before the production oil is bought. Three candles at each load, same wax, same wick, same jar, same pour day, compared blind at the same cure age. CSI 464's page states a fragrance load of up to 10%, so both loads sit inside the wax maker's ceiling with headroom. The stage-one kit below is priced from small listed packs.

The four leftover jars from the pack of 10 and the twelve or so unused wicks carry straight into production, so stage one is not wasted spend. The burn-test budget post covers how many extra jars, wicks, wax and oil a full test programme takes; the wick sample-ladder post covers the case where the wick is not decided either.

The CSI products in this order

Where this fits in the 50–100 candle shopping lists

This page owns one question: what changing the load from 6% to 8% does to a 100-candle order. Its neighbours own the rest. The 100 × 200 g lavender order is the full worked list for one oil; 50 vanilla candles at 8% runs the half-size batch; 100 oud candles at 10% shows how not to overfill the formula; first 100 candles: bulk or small sorts every material into bulk and test quantities; and the 100-candle shopping-list template turns all of it into one copyable sheet.

Frequently asked questions