CandleWorks began in 1993 when Melissa Bartholomew, a then Mother of two, was searching for a way to earn money to help care for her family. She’d always loved the way candles warmed up a home, and how a great candle could instantly lift your mood and instantly transport you back to special memories of your Grandmother’s kitchen, or your favorite Thanksgiving.

New to the art of candle-making, Melissa set out to learn everything she could to create her own special candles. She spent hours and hours at the local library pouring over books and taking notes, and even more hours in her kitchen testing more and more ways to create a long-burning, great smelling, candle.
The road to the ideal candle was long and filled with months and months of trial and error, but when finally she discovered that perfect partnership of a long-burning candle with a rich, long-lasting scent, she knew she had a winner.

CandleWorks was born.

From that first little kitchen, Melissa began selling candles to friends and neighbors who were simply blown away by the quality of her products. They couldn’t believe how much richer, and delicious smelling her candles were as compared to those they were buying in stores.

Word spread, and before she knew it, schools, churches, daycares and all sorts of community organizations were contacting Melissa to supply candles for their fundraisers. When she was able to give her kids an amazing Christmas, all from the sale of her candles, she couldn’t have been more proud than if she were the CEO of a Fortune 500 company.

Melissa is no longer making candles in that little kitchen, but she is still very much hands on. You can catch her just about any day of the week in her white lab coat, testing new scent combinations and still hand-pouring each and every candle. In fact, other than moving away from using dye to color her wax, little has changed over the years.

But one thing has never changed – the memory of how she felt that long ago Christmas morning when she saw the joy on her children’s faces.

It is the memory of that day that has inspired Melissa to offer others the very same opportunity she had – to create a better life for themselves and for their families through the sale of the finest, premium, candles.