Akron mom creates life-like candles, wax melts of popcorn, champagne, cinnamon rolls, more
Magic is being made in Akron.
More specifically, Kimberly Ochsenbein is making gourmet candles in her North Hill home.
Starbucks’ Pink Drink, banana cream pie, cereal in milk, pumpkin pie slices, strawberry banana milkshakes – Ochsenbein creates near identical candle look-alikes of them all and more. If her candle-making process wasn’t so popular on TikTok, one might just believe she used magic to make them.
While Ochsenbein had always loved candles, she started creating and selling her own in January 2021 to bring in additional income while staying home with her daughter. The mom knew that to succeed she needed to make her candles stand out from the crowd, so she made them look like anything other than candles.
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“You can’t go to Walmart and find a candle that looks like Mountain Dew,” Ochsenbein said. “You can’t go to Walmart and find a candle that looks like iced coffee or so on. That is what keeps me going, is trying to figure out what things are popular, what people like, and then recreating that.”
Her candles are also made of soy wax and don’t contain the paraffins often found in candles from large-scale candle companies.
The next thing to figure out was the company name, which was heavily influenced by Ochsenbein’s love for her hometown.
“I’ve never lived anywhere but Akron – best city ever,” Ochsenbein said. “I was born and raised here. I knew that I wanted the name Akron to be a part of my business name and that’s where ‘Akron Lights’ came [from].”
Trendy candles from Akron Lights Candle Co.
Iced coffee is by far Ochsenbein’s most popular candle in both sales and social media. The jiggly clear wax used for ice cubes seems to fascinate people. The satisfaction of seeing the coffee-scented “drink” portion of the candle poured into a glass full of the “ice” doesn’t hurt either.
Next in popularity is her recreation of Starbucks’ Pink Drink and following that is a candle made to emulate chocolate chip cookies being dunked into milk.
“I’ve had so many people, thousands probably at this point, tell me ‘Oh that’s too pretty, I would never burn that,” and my response to those comments are ‘Well that’s why you buy two – you burn one and enjoy the other,'” Ochsenbein said.
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While Akron Light Candle Co.’s iced coffee and Pink Drink candles are always available, its candles of the month are made in limited quantities. Once they’ve been sold, it’s lights out for that candle – no matter how many emails she receives begging her to make more. Therefore, Ochsenbein suggests customers purchase a candle of the month subscription, which guarantees that they’ll receive that month’s featured candle.
What’s next for Akron Lights Candle Co.?
Ochsenbein recently collaborated with Pav’s Creamery, which now sells Akron Lights Candle Co.’s candles of their strawberry boba shakes in all their locations. She has also featured on New Day Cleveland in September. The mom hopes to team up with more local businesses in the future.
While she can’t reveal March’s candle of the month quite yet, she did hint that it is based off a recipe that popped up as a recommendation on her Facebook. Is it pot roast? A Shirley temple? Garlic naan dipped in chicken tikka masala?
Whatever the creation, Ochsenbein’s number one rule is still in effect – do not eat the candle, no matter how delicious it looks!
Contact Beacon Journal reporter Tawney Beans at tbeans@gannett.com and on Twitter @TawneyBeans.
This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Akron Lights Candle Co. sells gourmet candles, wax melts
