We were lucky to catch up with Akiyah Tenorio recently and have shared our conversation below.

Akiyah, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today So, naming is such a challenge. How did you come up with the name of your brand?

We went back and forth on a name for the business, Kiy’s Kandles, Janine’s Candles, J’s Candles. Every time we thought we found a name, we found a reason not to pick it. Either it was taken on Etsy, or we didn’t want our name in the title or it just didn’t sound right. Finally, my grandmother said, “What about Kensington Candles?” and when I searched for it on Etsy and Google I had missed spelt candles, so it was spelt with a K instead. When nothing came up, we were so excited! This was our legacy, honoring our history! My grandmother and her mother were both born in New Kensington, Pennsylvania, and she has always tried to name something after her beloved city. Pair it with the logo I made later that day and she was smitten!

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

We make soy wax candles and wax melts as well as goat’s milk soap bars and oatmeal soap bars. We prefer to use natural soy wax in all of our candles and wax melts, because soy wax to better for the environment as well as being better for the human body than synthetic paraffin wax. Each of our candles have at least 10% fragrance, which means our candles and wax melts are very strong. As for our soap bars we use about 1% fragrance, meaning very little.
We started making the candles to bring my grandmother joy but when making the soap bars we thought of my mom, who has sensitive oily skin and my boyfriend, who has eczema; we wanted to find a recipe that could help them both. Goat’s milk, manuka honey, and oats; it worked for both of them and the lather felt amazing! I’m so happy that it worked for them and we even made a lotion bar for them and it worked even better than we expected!
Honestly, I’m not the origin of Kensington Kandles. This all started as my grandmother’s idea, she loved candles and would go through one a day. She was always trying to keep busy after she retired and when I showed her how to make a candle, it kind of snowballed from there. She said that she wanted my family to have something after she was gone, she wanted us to have a legacy. So, we started making a lot of candles and soap bars, giving them out as gifts to family and friends and simply asking for feedback in return.

How’d you think through whether to sell directly on your own site or through a platform like Amazon, Etsy, Cratejoy, etc.

We sell on Etsy as ‘KensingtonKandles,’ Online selling platforms can be very useful and helpful to get started, although I’d much prefer to have my own website since many platforms take a small chunk out of the proceeds. I like Etsy because they help with marketing, advertisements, inventory, and listings, but that payment every month can get a little tricky when business is slow.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

Before starting this candle company, I tried building a sewing company or a fashion line. It didn’t turn out so well. I started making custom dresses in 2019 but when the pandemic hit, I pivoted and started making surgical masks and caps for the medical workers who needed them. By 2021, I closed my Etsy account since I hadn’t sold anything in six months at that time.
Two years later, I pivoted again and started making candles with my grandmother. We’ve been going to market almost every weekend, and having a blast!!

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kensingtonkandles.us/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61559506461071
• Other: https://www.etsy.com/shop/KensingtonKandles?ref=shop-header-name&listing_id=1787238996&from_page=listing

Image Credits

Akiyah Tenorio, Tanya Thaxton-Murphy, Tynika Nelson, Anthony Lucero