Commemorative Candles

The Yandina-Eumundi RSL would like share with you an opportunity to be a part of making some unique commemorative candles that we can add to our memorabilia offerings .  Beautiful soy candles that are created specifically for the RSL by the Sub-branches and Auxiliaries.

It would great to get expressions of interest from other like-minded branches that may be keen to pursue this too.

How did we get started?

We were approached by a business offering candles for Anzac Day at $20 cost will an suggested RRP of $30-$35. Although we were interested in trying a different sort of product which may appeal to a different market that would not generally be purchasing our existing Anzac Day memorabilia, there was a disconnect from without having a connection back to the RSL. These candles had a poppy, which of course is synonymous with Remembrance day, not Anzac day and there was nothing that felt like it was RSL memorabilia to us.

We were interested in the idea though so we started working with the business to incorporate the RSL centenary logo and our sub-branch name, and get it approved,  but unfortunately we could not get them made in time for our Anzac day stalls.

Disappointed that we could not source the candles we wanted in time, we wondered what we may be able to create that would be unique to our RSL for the 100 year commemoration of Anzac Day and the RSL.

Our Commemorative candle

Fortunately, despite the short notice we were able to put together our own Anzac Day commemorative candle, with locally sourced quality soy candles and a unique label with a beautiful image of a bugler at Anzac Cove at sunrise that we had created for ourselves.

The label also incorporated the ODE, the RSL logo, with our sub-branch name, The label was able to be printed on clear vinyl so as the candle burns it lights up the sky in the Anzac Bay image.

It was important to us to follow the RSL Branding guidelines and get the necessary approvals through the District office so we could sell our product with confidence.

This was an opportunity for us to test the market on a small scale to ensure that we could create interest and actually sell the candles.

Candle success!

Our RSL operates stalls at IGA Yandina and the Nambour Hospital. We got a great reaction from from many people at the stalls. We were delayed getting the candles to the stalls by a couple of days although we still sold approximately 3 dozen candles. This showed us this was a viable product for us.

We sold the candles for $30 in a gift bag and charged an extra $2 if they wanted the candle gift boxed.

Local suppliers

The local candle supplier provides (wholesale) quality candles to numerous business including major/5 star hotels – the candles are made here on the Sunshine Coast.

The large soy candles we selected have a burn rate of 70 hours. (There were smaller sizes available though)

We chose a couple of their most popular fragrances as we thought that was less risk in something that was already selling well, but there are a number of nice fragrances to chose from

The  butterscotch colour candle was selected as it looked good with the label. We can choose the wax colour to suit. This supplier provides (wholesale) quality candles to numerous business including major/5 star hotels.

The printer is a local family owned business too,

Both of the suppliers are great, really flexible, committed to helping and they are interested in supporting with any future projects and are willing to give a 5% donation back to the RSL on the invoice cost.

The cost

We had a few additional costs with the design/setup of the candles and transport which added a couple dollars to the total cost, the total cost was still just under $20 (Box excluded).

Based on the original costings we believe that we can get the price to no more than $20 with the box and budget a little out of each for marketing so we can make sure that the anyone searching for candles can find them.

Why are we telling you?

As part of the RSL we know that we are really all part if the same team and we are working to the same purpose. Particularly with the fundraising and the Auxiliaries that its always great to share ideas that work.

We know that if we can work together with this we can achieve more. There are some ideas that we have about getting publicity through the newspapers and hopefully TV…we can make sure that people looking online can find the closest RSL they can buy from.

We believe that it would make a great story that people would warm to (and buy the candles) and the press would pick up.

There is a beautiful image that we love! It was taken in Anzac Cove in 2015 by an award winning  photographer from Australia. We believe that this would significantly increase the sales as it such an identifiable image.

The image is owned by Newscorp and so we would need to pay a licence fee to use it.

The minimum number that we could use this licence for would be 1,000 label that MUST be printed on a single print run. This would be about 50 cents per candle.

Whilst we are optimistic we think its unlikely that we can commit to the 1,000 labels on our own, as we are quite a small sub-branch.

Collectively though, with a few of us pooling together, 50 here, 100 there we are sure we can make this happen.

(it would be possible to buy the labels in a bulk lot and put them aside and buy the candles as required if budget was an issue)

This is the image we are looking at….

Where to from here?

It would be great to get expressions of interest so we know if this is a viable project.

We can then work out the details, make a plan and confirm costings and firm up commitments.

Other opportunities?

We believe that we can make this work for other important days like Remembrance day. Potentially we could sell these all year round…

We can come up with some images that we can all use or you are welcome to create your own.

Expressions of Interest, Feedback or Questions?

Awesome! We’d love to hear from you 🙂

Please contact Carole Buckley, our Citizens Auxiliary President on [email protected]