I Want to Produce 5,000 Candles a Month Across 10 Fragrances — How Should I Divide Production Batches Between Bestsellers and Slower Scents?

Start from the sales split, not the scent list

At 5,000 candles of 200 g a month you are melting 1,000 kg of scented wax: 920 kg of wax and 80 kg of fragrance oil at 8% on total candle weight. With one scent that would be simple arithmetic. With ten, the question becomes how to share melter time and material between scents that sell very differently.

Take last quarter's sales and rank the scents. In most ranges the pattern is lopsided: a few scents carry the business and a long tail sells steadily but slowly. The example below uses ten invented scents that follow that shape. Replace the numbers with your own; the method stays the same.

The hidden cost of rounding every scent up

If you treated the month as one blended total, 5,000 ÷ 48 is 104.2, so 105 loads would do. Split across ten scents, each one rounds up separately and the total climbs to 110 loads: 1,012 kg of wax and 88 kg of oil. Those loads make 110 × 48, which is 5,280 good candles.

The extra 280 candles are not spread evenly. Scent 1 needs 1,000 and gets 1,008, a surplus of under 1%. Scent 10 needs 150 and gets 192, a surplus of 42 candles, or 28% of its monthly sales. The slower the scent, the larger the share of rounding surplus it carries.

That surplus is not wasted wax, but it is stock that has to be stored, labelled and eventually sold before anyone asks for it. Across a year, the tail scents can quietly build several months of finished inventory. It also costs melter time: five extra loads a month is most of a week for a single 10 kg melter running one or two loads a day, spent making candles that were not in the plan.

Give each group its own batch rhythm

The fix is to stop asking every scent to be made every week. Each group gets a cadence that matches how fast it sells.

With the A group on a weekly slot, Scent 1's 21 loads become roughly five a week. The B group's 41 loads fall into two fortnightly blocks. The C group's 16 loads can be made in one block a month, or fewer if you switch to half loads.

Half loads for the tail

A 5 kg load at 8% is 4.6 kg of wax and 0.4 kg of oil, filling 25 candles of 200 g exactly and roughly 24 after wastage. For Scent 10, seven half loads give about 168 candles against 150 needed, cutting the surplus from 42 to about 18. The trade-off is labour: twice as many weigh-ups and melts per candle. For a scent selling 150 a month, that trade usually favours the smaller load. For Scent 4 it rarely does.

What a mixed production week looks like

Once rhythms are set, the week almost plans itself. The sequence below is one way to run it with a single 10 kg melter; adjust the days to your own measured capacity.

The sequence of scents within a day matters for more than cleaning. Residue from a strong scent in the melter wall or pitcher can carry into the next batch. Running a fixed order and cleaning between scents keeps each candle smelling like its label.

A week planned this way also makes staffing easier. The person weighing oil knows in advance which scents are coming and can prepare labelled, pre-weighed oil containers for each load the evening before. That removes one of the commonest mistakes on mixed days: picking up a similar-looking bottle of the wrong scent in the middle of a busy afternoon. Pre-weighing also shows up any shortfall in oil before the wax is melted, not after. If Scent 5 needs 0.8 kg for its load and only 0.6 kg is on the shelf, you find out the night before and move a different scent into that slot rather than stopping a hot melter.

Planning fragrance oil across ten scents

The allocation table gives you oil per scent for the month: from 16.8 kg for Scent 1 down to 3.2 kg for Scent 10. That list is your oil order, and it shows why a single reorder point for "fragrance" does not work at ten scents. The A scents need deep stock and weekly checks; the C scents need only enough for the next monthly block.

Check the published flashpoint of every oil in the range when you set up the week. Some CSI oils publish flashpoints below the melter's 100°C maximum, such as Roasted Coconut at 93°C and Gardenia at 98°C, while Sandalwood is 203°C and Jasmine 185°C. Add every oil at the wax maker's stated fragrance temperature, never at the melter's top setting, and note it on the batch sheet.

Reviewing the groups as sales move

The A, B and C labels are not permanent. A scent launched in the C group can climb within a quarter, and a former bestseller can fade after a season. Treat the grouping as a quarterly decision with a written record, so the schedule follows real demand rather than habit.

At each review, compare three numbers per scent: candles sold, candles made and finished stock on the shelf at the end of the quarter. A scent whose shelf stock keeps growing is being made too often, whatever its group label says. A scent that sells out before its next block is being made too rarely. Move it up a group, or shorten its rhythm, before customers start waiting.

Review the ranking every quarter. Scents move between groups, and a C scent that climbs into the B group should get more frequent runs before customers start waiting for it.

Where this page fits

CSI already has guides that cover parts of this question. This page takes the production-floor angle; these go deeper on the rest:

Three things to buy for this job

Frequently asked questions