We here at Pit Liquor love fragrance and deodorant a whole lot, but why not explore a secondary medium for fragrance. The mighty candle!
So why are we making candles (again)?
Three reasons! (1) we are not sure why we stopped, silly Canadians. (2) The team wanted to make sure we could produce them cleanly and consistently. (3) Reduce our companies potential waste.
Who wanted to make candles and why?
Holly, you all know Holly right! Holly used to make them for Pit Liquor. She consistently asked if we were going to make them again for customers. In 2024, she sent us her recipe asking for us to check it out. In 2025, she sent us a few homemade candles to test and compare to other candles. The Pit Liquor beeswax candles she made came out great. But with Holly in Colorado, we needed a product champion, someone who loved candles so much they could do the work to decide on equipment, wax, molds, scents, size, and candle style.
We were fortunate to already have someone in house who loves candles, Chloe in operations and social media. Chloe loves candles. She wanted to make them here at Pit Liquor. Chloe decided she like the look of the 16oz pillar candle and wanted to 4 fragrance options including an unscented, but may drop some surprises now and again.
There is an theory about needing to make 84 candles before you start selling candles. We jumped in with both feet and started R&D with 200 pounds of local beeswax, a lot coconut oil, and some Pit Liquor. That's around 400 candles! We tried the double boiler and heat gun method and made only a few candles a day before quickly graduating to a 35L electric boiler. The great thing about mistakes and learning through making candles is you can always pull the wick out and try again!
Sustainability
As you may know we make our own coconut spirit for our Coconut Lime deodorant (To learn more click here) That process involves Fat-Washing our high proof spirit until it gains some oil content from the organic coconut oil as well as the residual coconut fragrance. Every 20 Gallon batch of Coconut Lime uses about 30 pounds of organic coconut oil. Once that oil has been used 1-2 times, we have been setting it aside to upcycle it. We thought about natural soaps, lotions, or bath bombs, but that requires significant more processing, packaging and synthetics. Where as candles are just the wax of your choice, coconut oil, fragrance, and a candle mold. We chose Beeswax as our wax of choice and think others making candles should too!
Why Beeswax over other waxes?
Beeswax candles are natural, biodegradable, non-toxic, and burn cleaner and longer than paraffin or soy candles. They produce less soot and some suggest they release negative ions that can help purify the air. We purchase our 100% beeswax from local apiaries as a way to reduce both our carbon footprint and support our local bee populations in the PNW.
If Beeswax is so great why aren't all candles made from beeswax?
Simply put, it comes down to the high price and availability of Beeswax. Beeswax is more expensive and less available than other waxes like paraffin or soy which makes soy and parraffin more popular for mass-market candles. However, paraffin wax is a byproduct of the petroleum industry and is generally 60-80% cheaper than 100% beeswax per pound. As to availability, we in the PNW are fortunate to be surrounded by many great local apiaries to provide us beeswax ethically and locally.
How are we making candles?
We bought some local 100% beeswax, wax boilers, wicks, molds, oils and started testing. Our first thought, could we use your favorite Pit Liquor scents as the fragrance or essential oil component of the candle recipe? Yes, but the gorgeous honey smell from the beeswax overpowered some of the Pit Liquor scents. So we just bumped up the oils. Our recipe is quite simple, 50% beeswax, 40% Coconut Oil, 10% Pit Liquor and essential oils.
How many candles and scents are we making?
Our goal is to make 1 honey candle (beeswax, coconut oil, simply unscented) and 3 unique, rotating, and distinctive scents. This will include candle for each limited edition drop in 2026. We would expect to have each candle scent on until they sell out.
Our first candle is inspired by Simply Unscented. A simple beeswax candle with our simply unscented deodorant.
Our second candle is inspired by New Limited Edition Roses in Champagne. A pink candle with a fresh rose fragrance.
Our third candle is inspired by past Limited Edition Gingham. A Blue candle with a green apple and woody fragrance.
Our fourth candle is inspired by past Limited Edition Glamping. An orange candle with spicy notes of cardamom, sage and vetiver.