Scented Heaven (Yankee Candle in General)

Member Name: lemontiger

Product:	Yankee Candle in General
Date:	30/04/09 (128 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great scents and great range

Disadvantages: A bit pricey, annoying if they get rid of your favourite scent!

Yankee Candle is an American brand of candle and having visited a few times, it is fair to say that they are one of, if not the biggest brand out there. They are fast becoming popular here with both online and offline shops dedicated wholly to them.

***What do they sell?***
You can buy many types of candles including wax tarts (use similarly to a burner oil, but without the need for water), votive candles (the tiny stubby ones), tealights, pillar candles and small, med, large jars. They also sell cardboard car freshners (car jars), gel car freshners, plug-ins (importantly with refils), fragranced oil and reeds, scented sachets, pot pourri, body lotions, shower gels and liquid soaps.

***What scents do they have?***
They typically sell around 95-115 scents at any one time. These vary from fruits, flowers, bakery, herbs and other type. These are some of my favourite currently available:
Fruity- Sweet Strawberry
Flowery- Sweet Honeysuckle, Sheer Gardenia
Bakery- Vanilla Cupcake
Herbs- Lavender Sage
Other- Clean Cotton, Harvest

***How accurate are the scents?***
The scents are very potent, something that Yankee pride themselves on. If possible, get to a shop and smell them all. If not and you're ordering online, literally choose the ones you like the sound of. They smell so like the real thing that if you like strawberry and buy the strawberry candle then you're bound to like it. With things like clean cotton and harvest, you have to think about what they might smell like. I find they tend to smell how I imagine, even if that's quite random!

***Prices and quality***
Yankee candles are reasonably expensive with tarts around £1, votives around £1.40, small jars around £7.50 and large jars around £17. In my opinion, two products are particularly good value and they are the wax tarts and the large jars. I have found a wax tart can be melted around three times for four or five hours each time before the scent is lost (although it is a bit less potent each time). Burn time for a large jar is listed as 100-150 hours, but I have found this to be much longer. With the jars, the scent is burned out of the wax (unlike the tarts) so the wax at the bottom is as potent as the wax at the top. I have a small house, so I find one tart or one candle will scent the entirety of my ground or upper floor and the whole hallway too. To me this represents great value for money as I often light one of the large jars every day for an hour or two and can do this for several months before the level reaches low. As all jars come with a lid, it helps keep the wax highly scented too.

***Anything not so good***
I will say that I find the gel candles very poor value for money. My dad bought one and not only was the smell very light, but it burned a core down the middle and the gel on the outside remained, so around 1/3rd of the gel did not burn. He contacted Yankee to complain but they said this was right and what was meant to happen so that is still looked pretty. What's the point? It's a waste of candle in my opinion, so I'd suggest avoiding these.

***Offers***
Every month Yankee have a couple of 'Scent of the Month' for which everything has a percentage reduced. Depending on where you get your candles from, this tends to be around 25% off. The only other reductions I have seen, apart from Christmas sales, were in America. If you do go to America, they often have Yankee stores at outlet villages (just like ours here) and just like other outlets they sell out of season products and also damaged products. However, I found that Yankee's idea of a damaged product is where a jar has been slightly over or underfilled! The prices were very low with small jars $5, medium jars $8 and large jars $11. Just be wary of your baggage allowance though! I haven't seen such things in the UK yet, but if you do, let me know!!!

***Love Yankee, see more***
We were lucky enough to be in Massachussets during our stay in America and went to the Yankee Candle Village near Deerfield (I know, I am very sad). It was quite surreal as it had room after room of Yankee candles (although no better range than here apart from their new Summer 2008 products at the time, which wouldn't be in the UK for another 2/3 months), a sale room (hooray), a Christmas land (it was May!), a show for kids, a candle history room and a cafe. It was huge though and we kept getting lost. Very odd but if you're ever near there anyway (I know, the chances are tiny, but hey!), do pay it a visit.

***Retired Scents***
There is big business on somewhere like ebay with 'retired' scents which are no longer widely available. These can sell for a lot of money, maybe 4x what someone originally paid. My favourites are Rainbow's End and Fireside. Sometimes however, Yankee re-release old retired scents as they have done very recently with Plumeria which is a lovely flowery scent.

***In summary***
My experience of the candles is that they are the best quality I have ever used and I am always a bit disappointed when I get bought a different candle because I know I might never get round to using it. I do love Yankee and would highly recommend them to anyone. They make gorgeous gifts and lovely self-presents!

***Where to buy***
If you have a local shop (I'm aware only of one at Trentham Gardens, Stoke which is solely Yankee) then of course you might start there. Our Hallmark card shop has a small range of around 20 scents. This might be a good opportunity for starting to find out about the Yankee range as you can give them all a sniff and they are normally priced. However, you're unlikely to find good offers there. You might look at ebay for certain scents, especially rare ones. However, there are two online retailers I've found to be particularly good which are www.yankeedoodle.co.uk and www.justcandles.net . I've found doodle better overall as they tend to have more offers and the postage tends to be cheaper, especially on smaller items, but price compare to see what might be best for you.

I'd say don't get carried away, but it's far too late for me! Just enjoy!!!

Summary: A lovely smell