Meet the Maker
Hi! I'm Allison, the maker behind Applewood Candle Co.!
I'm a natural born entrepreneur - and love every minute of it!
When I was 12, I started my own bath and body company, Glambitious. While on summer break, my Mom received a "Better Homes and Gardens" magazine, and inside was a recipe for bath soaks. She bought me all of the 'ingredients' and I spent my entire day making tons of salts. I loved mixing different scents with different colors... it was SO much fun! My Mom is a minimalist, and insisted that I pass some of my new bath products out to friends, family and neighbors - because there was no way I would use it all. A few weeks later, I had family and neighbors asking if I could make other bath and body products, because they would make great gifts. With a bit too much confidence, I said "absolutely!" and then found myself at the local library checking out every single book on natural beauty.
You see, my Mom had one rule... every single ingredient I used had to be edible. I'm a bit messy, and my Mom was sure that if I used any ingredients that weren't edible, I would poison our family (at the time - this small hobby of mine was funded by my allowance, so there wasn't money for separate utensils and bowls, so I was using all of my parent's kitchenware). So instead of using hot pink colorant and cotton candy fragrances (like you may think a 12 year old girl would use), I used essential oils and dried flower petals for my fragrances and colorants, because they were safe to eat (in the case I didn't wash the bowl out perfectly).
But remember, this was back in 2005, and 'all natural skincare' was barely recognized. I remember setting up a table at local craft shows and selling my products. I was constantly asked by shoppers "But don't you have anything that smells like bubble gum? You're a young girl, what are you doing with lavender? Lavender is for old ladies!" I would then explain that those ingredients were artificial (not to mention toxic, but we didn't quite know that yet!), and I wasn't allowed to use them in our kitchen. Then the shoppers would chuckle and walk on, mentioning something about how natural products don't work anyways.
A few years passed and I went off to college to major in Entrepreneurship. It was a dream come true being surrounded by other young entrepreneurs who had a vision that they wanted to turn into reality! I thought Glambitious would be my future... little did I know, I would graduate and bring home a pup that would turn my entire world (and business!) in a direction that I didn't ever see coming!