Often it just takes the flicker of an idea to launch an ultimately successful enterprise and such was the inspiration and determination of New Yorker Nicole Eckels upon arriving in Australia 11 years ago.
Ms Eckels is a co-founder of the Sapphire Group, which has become a market leader as the manufacturer of high quality scented products for home and personal use under the Glasshouse Fragrances and Circa Home brands.
Glasshouse Fragrances boasts a range of exquisitely fragranced candles and diffusers encased in beautiful glass, along with body soaps and hand and body creams, while Circa Home focuses on natural wax candles and home fragrances.
However, it was the scarcity of quality, scented candles in the Australian marketplace that motivated Ms Eckels to fill the niche and she has since turned her entrepreneurship into a $50 million business.
“When I moved to Sydney in 2005, I basically went straight to a store to get some products that I would use every single day,” said the former SAKS Fifth Avenue make-up artist and marketing graduate.
“The scented candle industry didn’t exist here. I was a desperate consumer looking for something that I was used to buying in the US, where great scented candles had existed for decades.
“They just weren’t being made here and that is how I discovered the gap in the market.
“Candles were being imported mainly from the US and Europe and retailing for $80, $90 and $100 for elite brands. Australian companies were importing these brands and adding freight and 50 per cent margin to products that were priced to wholesale in their country of origin, and the numbers just don’t work.”
With the support of investor and co-founder Warwick Nettle, the pair spent almost a year developing their strategy and business plan to manufacture their products from a factory in suburban Gladesville.
“We didn’t even know how to make candles,” Ms Eckels said.
“We thought candle-making can’t be too hard ... melt some wax, put a wick in it, and pour it in a jar.... but it’s way more complicated than that and every fragrance has a different character and how it co- operates with the wax.
“Our first candles were awful, not the best in the world, not like what we set out to do. It took us a long time to get it right.”
The early frustrations and uncertainty that they had struck the ideal product segment led to the expansion into bath and body lotion products, fragranced soaps and hand creams. Every couple of years since, they have added new categories to their expansive range.
While only selling to independents in the gifts and homewares channels initially, the business began to have an impact with more than 35 per cent growth year upon year and word of mouth, which helped grow the brand.
Today, its products can be found in high- end retailers such as David Jones, Peter Alexander and Bed Bath N’ Table.
“We have developed as the biggest luxury candle maker in Australia by far,” Ms Eckels said.
“We have the price and quality equation right ... it’s hard to compete with that.
“People love our products here in Australia and we have a following from around the world. Our product quality is unsurpassed. We have been able to perfect the system and the art of candle-making and are clearly the best at what we do.”
After starting with a team of three and “bare bones office staff, a candle maker and people packing boxes,” the company today has more than 100 staff. Since last October it has operated from three levels with a huge factory, warehousing and distribution facilities at Rydalmere, near Parramatta.
It has representatives throughout Australia and sells its products into New Zealand, Korea and other independent retailers around the world.
“We are particularly proud that our products are created here in Australia,” Ms Eckels said.
“We have been pleased to have had a professional association with Nexia for some time, particularly with the completion of our auditing.
“Nexia has been very good to us.”
