Floating gardens

Theresa Valdez does not believe in idle hands. After her regular shift as a medical technologist, she would go home and fashion head bands and other accessories for selling.

Her sideline regularly changed with her interest of the moment. "There was a time when I did corporate giveaways. I approached the owner of a restaurant in our neighborhood and he suggested instead floating candles which he had seen in his travels abroad and which had a ready market in restaurants," she said.

Valdez returned home, depressed because she didn’t know how to make floating candles. Turning on the TV, she coincidentally chanced upon a "Negosyete" program on candle-making.

Encouraged, Valdez went to the Technology and Livelihood Resource Center for more know-how. "Understandably, the TLRC demonstration didn’t show me everything I needed to know because the teacher was talking to a future competitor."

It took Valdez two years of research and experimentation to get Flowering Candles moving. She started with a tulip design, using a ceramic mold instead of the cheaper plaster of paris. The restaurant owner who suggested the business bought her first batch.

NTF exhibitor

Flowering Candles is one of the participants of the National Trade Fair which opens on March 13 at the Megatrade Halls of SM Megamall.

This is the first time Flowering Candles will have its own booth. In the past years, it co-exhibited with other members of the Rizal Exporters and Manufacturers Association, Inc.

"Before they gave me a booth, the people at the Bureau of Domestic Trade Promotion looked at my gross sales and asked me to execute product samples. They also required me to attend a seminar with the Design Center of the Philippines to help improve my designs and packaging," Valdez said.

Flowering Candles has a daily production capacity of 1,000 candles. "My old buyers share a joke among themselves. Because my molds were few, they’d teasingly ask if my candles have solidified so I can take them out and start a new batch," said Valdez.

Designs are either in-house or suggested by buyers. "We respect the exclusivity of our buyers’ designs. We don’t make it for anyone else." Exclusive designs which are no longer ordered are, however, modified so they become part of the inventory of Flowering Candles. As a result, there is no minimum order requirement for orders using existing molds.

With more entrepreneurs making and selling floating candles, Flowering Candles is slowly shifting away from the decorative to the functional. One of the products it will showcase in next week’s NTF is the candle lamp which has the wax structure of the candle surrounding an electrical apparatus.

Valdez is hoping the candle lamp will catch fire and bring in new orders. – MJGrey