We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Leslie Myers a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Leslie, thanks for joining us today. How did you come up with the idea for your business?
Between 2015-2016 my life took a change and not for the best, In 2016 my mom was diagnosed with pneumonia that was quickly changed to stage 4 cancer, in a blink on an eye I was loosing my mother. They told me she had 3 months to live and just like that, I took her home on hospice and lost her exactly in 3months at only 65 years old. Just 5months before we had lost her sister (My aunt) and to put the cherry on top of everything, I lost my grandmother (my mothers mom) 7 months after I lost my mom. WOW right, yeah I wish I was making this up, but its reality,. I lost my 3 angels, I am Latina and mother of 2 daughters , and in our household every Sunday was meant to go over grandmas house for yummy homemade food and quality time, we soon realized there was no more Sundays at grammas, no more hand made tortillas, we lost the 3 ladies that literally raised us. I quickly fell into a deep depression, isolated myself from everybody, all I found myself doing was crying, upset at what life had thrown at us. I looked to blame everything and everybody. I couldn’t sleep or function but I had no choice, I had to work to support my daughters. I decided to make an apt to see the Dr. myself and of course the solution was to put me on anti depressants. I was prescribed Zoloft which is a highly addictive anti depressant. I was addicted for 3 years, I could not function without my Zoloft. It soon dawned on me that this was not a healthy lifestyle, I relayed on a drug to make me happy. This is not what I wanted to show my daughters. I was at a book store one stormy night when I found a book about reiki, the more I read the more I was intrigued and interested. I picked up a book on spirituality and healing with natural elements, herbs, the power of crystals and their healing properties. I was hooked. I started to practice spirituality at home, took reiki courses, experimented with different herbs and crystals. I got closer to my spiritual side, healing my mind and body, balancing my chakras. I decided one day I had to quit the anti depressant, I wanted to heal on my own. I knew it was going to be hard but I knew that I can do it. I called my Dr. who quickly tried to convince me to stay on the drug, Eventually I would quit Zoloft. I have been off Zoloft for 4 years now.
Why am I telling you this?
Well this is when I started my Intention Candle business, In 2019 I started to make candles with crystals and herbs, stones, elements that corresponded to the intention. I started with my friends and family and slowly made my way to Etsy and Instagram. I wanted to help people heal, I wanted to show the world we do not need drugs like Zoloft to heal us,. There is a great support of people in the spiritual community that can help you find your place, once we understand death or loss, pain and anger, all feelings are valid but its how we come out of hard situations that can make or break us. By setting your intention in your candle, believing and affirming you can move mountains. in 2021 I started doing Pop Up events all throughout Southern California. When I first started my business I only started with 4 intentions, now I have over 13 intentions. In 2022 I decided to do something very different, something that nobody was doing, I decided to bring to the pop up events my famous “do your own intention candle” This is an opportunity for customers to design their own intention candle, set their intention. They choose from different candles already made, different intentions. After they choose their intention they get to design it at the event. They choose their own stones/crystals, herbs, charms. They put it together with me. Its a super fun interactive way of building a relationship with my customer and letting them set their own intention. It is fun for all ages, for everybody.
I want to believe I am helping heal one human at a time. I feel like its important to learn from life, from experiences,. Loosing my 3 angels taught me a lot. Its ok to feel, to scream, cry, all feelings are valid. I want to help you smile again, and keep the smile going.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
Lavender Moon Sisters is a representation of me and my 2 daughters. The name was born one evening when they were helping me pour some intention candles.
After loosing my mother to an aggressive cancer in 2016 I became depressed with severe anxiety. In 2019 I opened up Lavender Moon Sisters. I had learned about reiki, self healing, spiritual healing and quit all anti depressants. I started healing spiritually and I wanted people to be educated on the subject,. I wanted to help heal.
I put the whole story from start to finish on the previous question.
All my candles are made from 100% All soy wax, cotton wick, free of lead and phthalate free.
All the jars are recyclable and the labels are removable so you can use the jar for other things.
All the scents are clean and free of phthalates.
In 2022 I introduced the do it yourself intention candles and body and ritual oils, those are made from 100% coconut oil and all essential oils.
Like I had stated, I added the whole story on the question before this one.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
The journey has not been easy, with the candle business being so saturated there were many times that I would question myself and my candles. I would arrive to pop up shops to see 2 or 3 more candle vendors and questioned myself what made mine different? Why are you going to choose my candle over there’s? So what made mine different? stand out?
I hand pour each candle myself, I make my own labels and print them myself, I mix my scents to create new amazing scents, and most importantly I decorate each candle myself, from adding stones, crystals, herbs, dried flowers to finishing up with that positive affirmation and intention.
Everything is hand made.
In 2022 I created a new candle, ” Don’t F*** with my Energy”, I debuted this candle towards the end of the year, November 2022. During the holiday season in Dec 2022 that candle was the hottest thing on Etsy, it was going crazy and I had to hire friends and family to come help me pour and ship. I had my daughters build boxes, family members doing USPS runs, it was insane… and I knew that I had to keep going. People were looking for an outlet, a spiritual outlet and I was not going to let nobody down. I was shipping this candle to India, Australia, Italy, Scotland, the South Pole… I was in ahhhh OMG, and that is the moment I knew I was put on this earth to help heal one intention candle at a time.
Don’t ever quit something you love, its ok to question yourself because it will only make you stronger. You will learn from questioning yourself, you can find the answers.
There could be 1000 candle vendors all in the same space, but I know my product, I know my positive intentions and I am proud of my product,. Be proud of your work,
Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?
If you do not have social media, you better get on it now. Its very important to have a presence in social media. I like to keep my audience engaged on a daily basis,. I keep them informed of new products, sales, our next in person event. I started to grow my audience by starting with family and friends, I asked them for a follow and asked them to ask their friends and family. I then started doing giveaways on Instagram, some of the rules to enter were to give me a follow and repost the story, that helped me out a lot. Another great way is at pop up shops, I have raffle tickets I give away to customers or non customers, they get a raffle ticket to win a candle if they follow me on Instagram. This is a great way to get new in person followers.
Once you get the followers its important to keep them. Post reviews of your products, sales, discounts, fun facts. Canva will be your best friend, if you dont know what Canva is; its a website were you can build flyers, etc.. super fun and easy.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.lavendermoonsisters.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lavender_moon_sisters/?hl=en
- Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/people/Lavender-Moon-Sisters/100063592718310/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/leslie-myers-024a3a9b
- Other: TikTok- https://www.tiktok.com/discover/lavender-moon-sister Etsy- https://www.etsy.com/shop/LavenderMoonSisters