Seema Arora spent 30 years of her life managing a family with two children. A native of Agra relocated to Delhi a year after her marriage when she was 23.
As she crossed 50, she felt like doing something where she could empower her ideas and opinion. For most of her life, her work margined within the home.
COVID-19 broke most of us, but not the same case with her. Pandemic enforced lockdown gave her enough time to introspect her management skills, and she started her venture in October 2020.
She launched "Rad Living", a scented soy wax candles startup, and her son Vineet Arora joined as a co-founder.
These wax candles have premium hand-picked fragrances.
Vineet suffered a back injury during the pandemic making his covid experience worse mentally and physically.
Their Journey
Two months into the pandemic, he ordered himself an oil diffuser and was mesmerised by the aroma of the candle in the diffuser. It made him feel less vulnerable and calmed his nerves; he recalled he could spend hours beside it watching the flame.
That flame ignited the spark in him to experiment with wax candles adding different flavours, and his mother's experience with housework is all required for glowing success.
Vineet worked on finding vendors while she used her built-in understanding of flavours and fragrances to nurture their first batch.
She and her daughter Radhika took care of creating blends, while Vineet took charge of creating an online presence for their startup.
"Candle making isn't as easy as YouTube videos show. It needs precision, accuracy, and experimentation to understand the nature of the wax you're dealing with and how it blends with fragrances. Nevertheless, I found the process therapeutic. We started it as a family project, but the response was phenomenal." said Seema.
Soon after three months, they formulated the right blend for wax candles.
" Through our testing, we derived a formulation which is a blend of soy wax with other vegetable waxes and essential oils to bring it to the right melting temperatures and keep the fragrance flow consistent and pleasant," Seema added.
Their Uniqueness
The mother-son duo wanted to create an environmentally friendly brand. So they decided to make natural soy wax their core offering.
Paraffin wax makes up the majority of commercially available candles. They discovered soy wax after doing a lot of research. Today, the candle manufacturing industry uses soy widely.
They purchase soy wax from various Indian vendors. Each candle is handmade, as they don't employ machines for production.
All their hand-poured candle containers, including festive and signature collections, are reusable. By soaking it in warm water and cleaning them with a dry cloth, one can easily remove residual wax. The containers can be used again as a little flower vase, pencil holder, T-light candle holder, and many other things.
They have used upbeat scents like Cappuccino, Mixed Fruit, Hot Cocoa, Seaside, The Morning After, Mountain Trail, Forest Hike, etc., in their fragrances.
Their two signature collections are Truth Bombs and First Love Yourself, in addition to various candles.
They have a commercial space set aside for the production process within their residential complex in Noida, where they make candles. They will relocate their "workshop" to a "production facility" in Noida.
Their container candles start at Rs 699 and go up to Rs 2500, while their pillar candles begin at Rs 380 and go up to Rs 1400 for combos.
The traditional fragrance sector in India has seen a significant change in recent years, according to the Ministry of Medium and Small Enterprises (MSME).
India accounts for around $500 million of the $24.10 billion worldwide fragrance and flavour market.
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