We were lucky to catch up with Larissa Schot recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Larissa, thanks for joining us today. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

I was living in Houston with my family during COVID and finishing up my last year of university. I applied to many jobs, primarily based in LA, during this time. In hopes to move back to LA, but for every job I applied to, I was constantly rejected. I wasn’t modeling much during this time since everything was shut down. I had no clue how I would return to the city I loved. I have always desired to be my own boss, but never knew what I truly wanted to do. I’ve always been an arts and crafts gal – as a kid, I would make my jewelry and soaps, selling them to friends or setting up a small stand in my neighborhood. I thought the whole creative process was fun, not realizing my middle school self was already on her way to being a little business owner. During covid, I noticed I would purchase a new candle every two weeks, so I thought, “Why not make my own luxury candles with a scent that’s not too overwhelming and actually clean?” Candles soon became an avenue by which I found passion and drive to pursue my ambitions. I came up with the brand name (KĀ ÄS), pronounced chaos, reflecting my life’s journey. I created the brand to inspire anyone fearing rejection to believe in themselves because it is up to you to become the person you want to become. As the brand grew, my candles became known as that signature candle for anyone wishing to set the mood. I believe candles should be known more than something to light for self-care or special occasions. Candles are all about setting the atmosphere. Whether you are getting ready for work, pondering about life, or having an intimate moment with someone.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My name is Larissa Schot, and I am currently based in LA. I lived in Singapore for seven years, New York for two years, and Hong Kong, Taipei, Tokyo, and Paris for three months. I attended an international school in Singapore called Singapore American School. After graduating high school, I jumped into modeling, while most of my peers went to college. I chose to take a massive risk in pursuing professional modeling, and I have not regretted it for a second; It was an experience I will never forget. Being exposed to so many cultures and parts of the world at such a young age was unforgettable; it molded me into the tenacious entrepreneur that I am today.

After taking a two-year gap, I decided to begin university at LIM in NYC, graduating with a Fashion Marketing degree. After college, I had yet to decide what I wanted to do, and since this was the COVID era, it was a very competitive job market with little to offer someone in my situation. Rather than applying to thousands of places for 6+ months, I took the route of immediate entrepreneurial risk and bet on myself once again. Back home in Houston, this journey showed up in the form of a candle business. Thus, it was the beginning of my brand (KĀ ÄS). (KĀ ÄS) Candles is a hand-poured luxury clean candle company. Each candle is made from scratch with high-quality ingredients. Our candles are made from coconut, soy, beeswax, fragrance oil, and 100% cotton wicks. Each is poured individually, one by one, into a reusable glass vessel, packaged in a beautiful sleek gift box and matches.

A year after creating my candle company, I moved back to LA and began growing my brand. It’s been a rollercoaster of a ride, trying to manage work, freelance work, my business, and a social life. Growing a company has been my biggest challenge yet, and I love it. I love how my candles are unlike any other candle; they are all about setting the mood, and most of my buyers are men, eliminating the classic notion that candles are too “taboo” for men to purchase. Everyone who bought a candle has returned to me saying how outstanding and high quality they are. They burn evenly and aren’t too strong like most paraffin-made candles.

I take pride and ensure that each candle is as perfect as possible before being shipped off. I want nothing more than for my customers to enjoy, appreciate, and love the candle they purchased.

We’d really appreciate if you could talk to us about how you figured out the manufacturing process.

I first started purchasing different waxes, scents, and wicks, thinking it would be simple to make a candle. My first candle attempt could have been better; I just threw all the ingredients in the pot, thinking my candle would come out superb. It was like baking. I needed to find the perfect recipe for the candle to smell like the scent and burn evenly. I found my project exciting since my mom, who also loves arts and crafts, began to help me create the perfect candle formula. We began to do a ton of research. It was a cute mother-daughter covid project. I was even more shocked once I realized many different types of waxes and wicks burned entirely differently. My mom and I made over 100 candles in our kitchen, trying to find the perfect formula. In the beginning, almost every candle was off. We experimented for months, but the candles would either smell bad, not smell at all or even tunnel; we had a whole collection of defective candles on our kitchen table. We were frustrated, thinking we would never figure out the candle formula. As you can imagine, Dad was wondering when this fun arts and crafts project would come to an end with the amount of candles and boxes of ingredients lying around the house. Six months later, we found the candle formula, and a year later, it was perfected! We were excitedly jumping up and down when that one candle burned beautifully. I then began to take over and create a company out of it entirely- I realized the entire process made me so happy. I thought to myself, wow, did I find my calling? Once I had the candle formula down, I started creating mood boards about how I imagined my brand to look like, drawing out the box I wanted for my candle, and researching box companies around China and the US to find the best price for them to create the package I desired. I called company after company to find the best place to manufacture the boxes I was looking for. I’ve always heard starting a company would be challenging, but after experiencing it firsthand, I then realized why many founders would give up. It is tiring and frustrating, and for someone like me who has never started a company, I have yet to learn what to search or even look for when creating a brand.
After a while, I finally found a box company willing to work with me. I’ve never purchased anything in bulk, so seeing the smallest size I could buy was 500 boxes was crazy. My house in Houston is a little small, so figuring out where I would store all the supplies was another challenge. When the boxes arrived, so many boxes blocked my entire front door; I couldn’t see anything past all the boxes. I dragged each one inside individually, and my family’s house was filled with boxes. Their house then became my candle office and no longer a home. Before my packages were shipped, I started buying all the vessels I loved and designing my label. My label had many rounds of what I wanted- after about 60 different label designs, I went with a sleek, classic look I thought everyone would love.
Launching the business was an entire learning process; I needed to determine which website host to use. How to set up the website, take the product images with my amateur photography skills, and ensure the business’s legal side was secure. It was a ton of work, many phone calls, and many days where I felt I should give up. I returned to LA a year later and started creating and growing my company there. It’s been a dream, but we are still learning a ton and unsure exactly what we are doing. But we enjoy every bit of it and are figuring it out, which I find part of the human experience.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

I moved from Houston to Singapore at the age of 15-21. At age 21, I moved to NYC for university. A dream of mine was always to live the NYC life and model. I studied fashion marketing and modeled during that time. During my college years, I had the opportunity to live in LA, Paris, and Milan for modeling. However, there were no online classes for the degree I was taking. But, I wanted to model while finishing college, I’ve always been a resident person so I called the head of the school numerous times, asking her what I needed to do to complete my classes so I could travel and model. The school created online courses specifically for me so that I could work on my passions and graduate simultaneously. During the time of traveling and finishing college, it was a challenging time. I somehow managed to attend castings, live in a house full of 8 other girls, work, and have a social life, while making sure I completed my work in time no matter what time zone I was in. It taught me how to organize my life and stay resilient even when at times I wanted to dropout of college. t wasn’t easy, and I look back during that period, not knowing how I managed it all. But I did it; I followed my dreams while graduating with a degree.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.kaas-us.com
• Instagram: larissakleanthe
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/larissa-schot-120368135/
• Twitter: larissa_schot
• Brand IG: kaasofficial_

Image Credits
Product Shots: Sarah Shen Image with me holding pink candle: Clint