History

Yankee candles were created by Mike Kittredge in in 1969 when he melted down some crayons to make his mother a candle as he couldn't afford a present for her, after selling the candle he had made he bought more wax and made more candles thus creating the Yankee Candle.


The Range

There are over 100 varieties of Yankee Candle at any time with new ones frequently being released and aimed at events such as Christmas. There are numerous different sizes you can buy in Yankee Candles (information from yankee.co.uk)
Wax Tartlets - £1.20 - 8 hours burning time
Tea Lights - £6.45 for 12 - 4-6 hours burning time
Sampler - £1.75 - 15 hours burning time
Small Jars - £7.99 - 25-40 hours burning time
Medium Jars - £15.99 - 65-90 hours burning time
Large Jars - £18.99 - 110-150 hours burning time
Small Tumbler - £9.45 - 35-45 hours burning time
Medium Tumbler - £14.75 - 45-50 hours burning time
Large Tumbler - £18.25 - 70-90 hours burning time

I like the fact that the range provides for any price range so that everyone is able to join in the craze of Yankee Candles and personally like to have a lot of variety so buy the wax tartlets.

My Latest Buy

I buy my Yankee Candles from a little shop in our village which sells allsorts of pretty looking and smelling items, surprisingly for a little shop she doesn't mark the prices up and I can get a wax tartlet for £1.15 so slightly under the RRP and she often has sales on too. On my last trip I picked up three new tartlets to try one of which being Sandalwood Vanilla, I was attracted by the sweet smell of vanilla which smells more natural than other oils and candles do.


The description

From the website I found that this candle is part of the fresh collection and is described as being a rich sweet perfume of Sandalwood with Vanilla.

The Look

The wax tartlet is white in colour and the white has a pearly look to it which I found attractive and reminded me of glistening snow. The tart itself is about 2 inches in diameter of solid wax without a wick and has fluted edges just like a jam tart would have with the base having a slightly less diameter than the top. The tart is wrapped in plastic sealed at both ends and there is a little rectangular sticker on the front with the name Yankee Candle on it along with the name of the fragrance and a picture of wooden beads, a flower and some shells. I like the fact that with shiny gold accents around the picture it makes you feel this is not a cheap product but one of high quality.

On the rear of the Tartlet there is a circular white sticker which has some warnings on it but rather than in words there are 8 little pictures on the sticker the ones of which I can work out are not to use in a frying pan (that makes me laugh), don't use with a plug in burner, don't leave a naked flame, don't use near a window, keep candles 10cms apart and keep away from pets and children.

Using the Tartlet

When I first bought this Tartlet I had placed it on the windowsill and forgot it was there for a while and then a sweet smell started drifting around the room which had me confused for a while until I realised that while myself and my eleven month old had been playing she had knocked the tartlet onto the radiator and when I had boosted the heating the smell had started dispersing even though it was still wrapped. It was lovely getting the scent from the product without actually melting it although I think it may have started melting soon after if I hadn't noticed.

To use the Tartlet properly you simply place in an oil burner or similar and place a lit tealight underneath (unscented one of course) and within around ten minutes you will find a pool of wax and the smell drifts gently around whilst getting stronger over time. The pool of wax looks less pearly than it did when it was set, once the tea light was blown out the wax will again set but in the shape of the oil burner rather than it's original shape.

My opinion

I love Yankee Candles and have only found one fragrance that I wasn't so keen on (may be my next review) I like this fragrance and find that although it is sweet it isn't to a sickly point. I personally can only really smell Vanilla rather than the Sandalwood but maybe it's the mix of the two that make the smell more muted than other Vanilla fragrances I have encountered. The Tartlets do live up to the promise and easily last 8 hours if not more with some of the stronger fragrances and I love coming downstairs the morning after burning them the night before and still being able to smell the fragrance rather than the usual dog smell that greets me on a morning. I feel that these are great value and I think I will stick with buying this option as I think I would get bored of the same fragrance all the time if I bought one of the larger candles. I would recommend this fragrance and it is one that I will buy again once I have managed to try the rest of the range (may take a while).