Candle Care Tips - Candle Safety | How to Get the Most out of your Soy Candle

Candles need love and care too! Soy candles need to be cared for properly to get the cleanest and best burn possible. Dough bowl candles especially need these steps to ensure optimal and safe performance. Dough bowl candles have multiple wicks too, which means it’s very important to follow these candle care instructions.

Don’t you hate it when you get your favorite candle, and after you burn it, it starts tunneling!? (Tunneling is when it doesn’t burn all the way to the edges and there is lots of leftover wax around the center, just like a tunnel). 

There can be MANY reasons why this happens. The wick isn’t the right fit or you didn’t trim it, it’s paraffin wax (the bad stuff), the fragrance oils aren’t stirred correctly during candle making, or you didn’t burn it long enough the first time! 

Unfortunately, the first 2 reasons are something you can’t change once you have bought the candle. But rest assured, Stroud’s Simply Southern candles are 100% soy, natural cotton wicks, and natural plant based oils. Also, I have tested many wicks to get the perfect one for each jar and dough bowl candle.

So once you have the perfect candle (like Strouds Simply Southern candles), that is made naturally and properly, this next part is VERY IMPORTANT and UP TO YOU!

Before the Burn

• Always trim your wick to a 1/4 of an inch before the first burn, and keep it trimmed before every burn. This prevents soot emitting (the black stuff), uneven burning, dripping and a flame that’s too big.
• Once you burned it the first time, you can pinch it off with your fingers. The first one, you can do with scissors, or for a perfect trim, you can use a wick trimmer. 
• Avoid drafts and air currents. Always place your candle on a flat, sturdy surface out of the reach of kids and pets.

While Burning

• The FIRST time you burn your candle, make sure you let it burn until you have a full melt pool, which means the melted the wax is all the way to every edge. That means all of the wax on the top is melted, to every side of the candle! Let it burn 3-4 hours, especially the on first burn.

• Burn your candle for 3-4 hours at a time. Our soy candles emit scent even when it’s not lit, as they have a powerful hot and cold scent throw. Especially right after it’s been extinguished. Soy wax burns slower and lasts much longer than paraffin wax too, which is why you only need to be burn it for 3-4 hours and you will still smell the fragrance after you blow out your candle. 
  
  
• Soy wax has memory, so it mimics the burn before it, and will burn evenly to the edges each burn after the first one! Click here to watch the Instagram Reels about this and for a video example of what this looks like. 
  
  
• Never move a burning candle or a candle that still hasn’t cooled completely from burning. 
  
  
• Don’t burn your candle all the way down, especially dough bowl candles. Stop burning your candle when there is 1/4 of an inch of wax left, or you can see the bottom of the wick. For dough bowl candles, stop burning at 1/2 of an inch of wax left. 
  
  

When Extinguishing 

• Use a candle snuffer to extinguish a candle, if available, as it’s the safest way to prevent hot wax from splattering.
• Before leaving the room, make sure your candle is completely out and there is no glow coming from the wick ember
• Do not touch or move the candle until it has completely cooled.