We recently connected with Sakiya Lockett and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Sakiya thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

My mission and goals are to be a Household Home Fragrance Brand across the world. I started this business looking to supplement my income as the pandemic hit. My son was a senior in High School about to leave for college and reality hit no longer would it be he and I. With leaving one of my other jobs and needing to supplement my income I knew whatever I did had to be something I wanted and loved doing, not just something I had to do. Here we are 2 years later with Luxurious Essentials Candles and Oils, LLC.

Sakiya, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Let’s see, I currently handmake all of my products myself. I make 100% Soy wax candles and wax melts, Car, Linen and Room Sprays, Car Fresheners, Carpet Deodorizer, Car Fresheners, Reed Diffusers and working on some new home fragrance products to come very soon. I am a full-time business owner with over 20 years of business administration experience. It was not an easy decision to leave my full-time job of 13 years but it was best for myself, my business, my peace and my mind. Is being a full-time business owner always easy no but it’s definitely worth every bit of the hard work and sacrifice it takes to build my brand.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

I put together the initial capital by taking what little funds I had and people from my village (my support system) donating. From there I did a one day prelaunch of my products to assist with raising more capital and to get my products out there before the official launch. Since then, I’ve taken all funds made and invested them right back into the business. Has it been easy? No. Especially with the cost of products increasing during the pandemic, but my dream is worth every penny spent and every sacrifice made.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

About nine months into running Luxurious Essentials Candles and Oils, LLC I was excited and trying different collections. I decided that in the summer of 2021 I would launch four different collections within a month not knowing that the summer would be a slow season for me. I created a collection called the Fruit Market and didn’t sell one candle until it had been out for several weeks. Even then, it was just a few. Sales did not pick up until I discounted them. That situation did not discourage me from launching multiple collections, but it did help to develop an understanding for the home fragrance market and knowing that during the summer, sales are slower. This could have easily been detrimental for Luxurious Essentials Candles and Oils, LLC because financially as a business I suffered tremendously being an independent company. However, this situation showed me that making home fragrance products was more than a financial gain for me and I’d finally found my purpose on this journey. I knew at that moment that God had my back.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://luxecandleandoil.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/luxecandlesandoilsllc/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/luxecandlesandoils/

Image Credits
Photos by: Trevis Bailey and Clyde Crews Jr.