Briefing a private label candle order: what to fix in writing

A private label candle brief is a written sheet that locks size, wax, fragrance, jar, wick, lid, artwork and packaging before anything starts. Wholesale pricing begins at 300 units per jar size, from AED 70 per unit excluding VAT, and every line on that sheet decides what the unit finally costs.

Most of the delay on a first branded order comes from a decision nobody wrote down. The buyer remembers one jar finish, the person who approves artwork remembers another, and the file that arrives has the logo sitting where print cannot go. Our private label candle programme runs off a single approved sheet for that reason. Once it is signed, nothing on it moves without a new approval, and both sides know what they are looking at when the goods arrive.

What a private label candle brief prevents

The expensive part of a missing line is rarely the wax. It is the calendar.

Swap the fragrance, the wax or the jar after a sample has been signed off and the project goes back to the sample stage. You pay for another sample, you wait for it to reach your office, and whoever approved the first one has to approve the second. The order does not move while that happens.

Direct print on the jar runs 10 to 14 working days after the design is approved. Sticker labels run about a week. Those are the published windows, and a printed jar cannot be re-printed inside the same window. When the date is fixed by a conference, a store opening or the start of Ramadan, the brief is the only place where that date is protected.

Artwork is the third repeat offender. A label drawn without the printable area in front of the designer comes back cropped, or with type running across the part of the glass where print cannot sit. That means a new file, a new approval, and a new sample if one was already printed.

Size, wax and fragrance

Jars are quoted in 100, 200 and 300 ml, with roughly 25, 35 and 45 hours of burn time. Base prices start at AED 70, AED 90 and AED 110 per unit excluding VAT at 300 units per size. Each includes the jar, a standard wick, soy wax, a lid in bamboo or silver or gold metal, and one base fragrance. Your real per-unit number moves with fragrance, jar, print and packaging, so treat those three figures as the floor rather than the quote.

The 300-unit minimum sits on the jar size, not on the order. If your line runs 200 ml for retail and 300 ml for gifting, that is two lines of 300 each, not 600 units you split as you like later. Decide the size split in the brief, because it also sets your retail price and your shelf.

Soy wax is the standard fill. Write that into the sheet in plain words, because a buyer or a compliance reviewer downstream will eventually ask what is in the jar, and "soy wax" with a safety data sheet and a technical data sheet behind it answers the question in one email. Both documents are available on request.

One base fragrance is in the price. Put its exact name in the brief, spelled the way it will appear on the label and in your own system, and name one person on your side who owns that choice. Fragrance generates more internal disagreement and more late changes than anything else on the sheet, because everyone in the room has an opinion and nobody has smelled the actual jar yet. Judge it on the sample, not on the description.

Jar, wick and lid

Three finishes are available now. Clear glass comes in all three sizes. Matte black and frosted white come in 200 and 300 ml. At 100 ml the jar is clear only.

That last line matters more than it looks. A gift set of three 100 ml candles is clear glass, so a design built around a dark jar has to be redrawn for the small size or the set has to move up to 200 ml. Painted glass in other colours is not something we can offer, so an amber or green jar in a mood board is a design problem to solve now rather than a question to raise after approval.

The standard wick is in the base price. A wooden wick is AED 15 per unit, which is a visible and audible difference your customer notices, and at a thousand units it is a real line in the budget. Decide it before you set a retail price, not after.

Lids come in bamboo or metal in silver or gold, included in the base price. Write down which lid goes with which size. It changes how the candle photographs for a catalogue and how the boxed unit looks when someone opens it, and it is the sort of detail that gets assumed rather than agreed.

Artwork, print area and label copy

A sticker label is AED 5 per unit, and direct print on the jar in one colour is AED 15 per unit with a printed design needing 300 units. Different fragrances can share one printed design, which is the single most useful fact for a multi-fragrance line: one printed jar, one design, several scents, and the 300 units spread across them. We cover the trade-off between the two routes in more detail in our comparison of printed candle jars and sticker labels.

What the brief needs on the artwork line:

• Format. Vector artwork where the logo allows it, CMYK rather than RGB, raster elements at 300 dpi at final printed size, fonts outlined so nothing substitutes itself, and bleed added.
• Print area. Confirm the printable zone and the zone where print cannot go for your exact jar and size before the designer starts, not after the first proof.
• Language. English, Arabic or both. If the label carries Arabic, the layout has to be built around it from the start rather than dropped into an English box at the end.
• Required copy. Your own compliance and legal reviewers decide what has to appear. Ask us for the ingredient list to put on your label, and for the fragrance safety data sheets, the IFRA conformity certificates that fragrance suppliers issue for candles under IFRA Category 12, and a copy of our trade licence. All of it goes out over WhatsApp on request.
• Version control. One file name, one date, one approver. "Final" is not a version number.

Fix the colour reference too. A one-colour print is one colour, and that colour needs to be named in the brief rather than described. Approve it on the paid sample and keep the sample.

Packaging and gift assembly

Packaging prices sit per unit on top of the candle. A kraft box is AED 5. A kraft box with a sticker on it is AED 10. A branded printed box is AED 15. A fabric pouch is AED 3. Development of the packaging design itself is quoted to your brief, separately from the per-unit cost.

The box sticker is the cheapest honest branding on a box, and for a first run it often does the same job as print. Printed boxes earn their place when the box is the thing the recipient sees first and the volume justifies a print setup.

A boxed set is priced the same way as everything else on the sheet: the candles at their per-unit price, plus the packaging per unit, with the design of the box itself quoted against what you send us. Put the configuration in the brief rather than the word "set", because a three-candle box is a different piece of cardboard for every brand that orders one.

One practical note for the brief: a boxed unit occupies more space than a bare jar. Confirm the packed configuration before you plan warehouse space, a courier run to several stores, or a stand at an exhibition where someone has to carry the cartons in.

Quantity, lead time and delivery

Wholesale pricing starts at 300 units per jar size. Volume discounts are published: 5 percent from 1,000 units, 7.5 percent from 3,000, 10 percent from 5,000, and individual terms from 10,000. Capacity runs to 15,000 candles a month, with more by agreement. The current figures sit on the pricing section of our site.

Lead times start when the design is approved, not when the conversation starts. Sticker orders take about a week. Direct print on the jar takes 10 to 14 working days. Faster turnarounds can be arranged by agreement, which is a conversation to have before you commit to a date rather than during the week you need the pallet. Our guide to candle production lead times walks through an order end to end, stage by stage.

Payment is 50 percent to start and 50 percent before dispatch. Delivery within Dubai is included on every order. Delivery across the rest of the UAE is free from 1,000 units and costs extra below that. Saudi Arabia and the other GCC countries are quoted on request.

The line to write down is the approval date, worked backwards from the date the goods have to be in your hands. If the gifts go out on the first day of an exhibition, the approval date is a deadline with a published lead time attached to it, not a preference to revisit later.

Acceptance: the reference, the checks and the signature

The paid sample is the reference. A sticker-label sample is AED 100, a printed-jar sample is AED 250, both paid up front and credited in full against an order of 300 units or more. Keep the approved sample in your office rather than passing it around, because at goods-in it is the only object both sides agreed on. Our article on candle samples and what to test covers what to look at while the sample is in front of you.

At goods-in, check against that sample rather than against the artwork file: label position and alignment on the glass, print colour, jar finish against the finish you ordered, lid type, fragrance name per carton, and unit count per carton.

Tolerances deserve a separate line, and an honest one. We do not publish a quantity or fill tolerance, and no buyer should assume an industry number on a supplier's behalf. If your own goods-in process needs a tolerance on quantity, fill level or print registration, agree it with your supplier in writing before the order goes in. A number you negotiated is worth something. A number you assumed is worth nothing at the moment it matters.

Last line on the sheet: one named approver on your side, with authority to sign artwork and the sample. A committee cannot approve a candle. One person with a deadline can.

Send us the sheet and we will quote against it, or ask for what is missing. Request a quote or message us on WhatsApp at +971 55 281 9889, and ask for the catalogue with prices, the ingredient list or the compliance documents in the same message.

FAQ

What has to be in writing before a private label candle order starts?

Jar size and quantity per size, jar finish, wick type, lid, the exact fragrance name, the branding route with its approved artwork file, the packaging configuration, the approval date and the delivery date, and the name of the person on your side who signs off. Everything on that list carries a price or a deadline, which is why it belongs on paper rather than in a chat thread.

Can different fragrances share one printed jar design?

Yes. A printed design needs 300 units, and those units can be spread across several fragrances, so one printed jar can carry a whole line. The fragrance then gets identified by a sticker, by the box, or by the packaging insert, which keeps print costs on one design instead of several.

What happens if we change the fragrance after the sample is approved?

The project returns to the sample stage. A new fragrance, a different wax or a different jar means a new paid sample and a new approval before the order moves, and the published lead time starts again from that approval. If a date is already fixed, that change is the most expensive one available.

Which jar finishes are available at each size?

Clear glass in 100, 200 and 300 ml. Matte black and frosted white in 200 and 300 ml. At 100 ml the jar is clear only, so any design that depends on a dark jar needs a clear version for the small size. Finishes beyond those three are not available, and any colour reference in a mood board is confirmed against the actual sample before it goes into the brief.

How long does the order take after approval, and what is included in delivery?

Sticker-label orders take about a week after approval. Direct print on the jar takes 10 to 14 working days, with faster turnarounds by agreement. Delivery within Dubai is included on every order, delivery to the rest of the UAE is free from 1,000 units and chargeable below that, and Saudi Arabia and the other GCC countries are quoted on request.