Granville Island Soy Candle Company Blog

We will be attending the Alberta Gift show in Edmonton August 15 – 18.  Please join us at booth 2236.

We look forward to meeting many of you for the first time, and seeing old friends again.

**Please note that our customer service department will be open during the show, however, our service manager, and lead candle maker will be at the show.  As such some customer service issues may be delayed until we return.  We will also have limited production during this time for the same reason.  Full customer service and production will resume on Friday August 20th.

Our annual summer shutdown is fast approaching.

All departments, including customer service and production will be closed from August 1st until August 15th.  You will be able to place orders by fax, email or online during the shutdown, however, the orders will not processed until we return.  Orders received during the closure will be processed in the order that they are received and confirmed with you when we reopen.  Please allow a few days for the order to be confirmed as we may have a large number of orders to process.

We are currently in the process of completely redesigning our soap product and hope to announce its new release in August.  Our new product will be larger and more economical.

Additionally, the packaging is being completely redeveloped and will have a real sharp and professional look that will work in any display situation.

As part of this redesign we are planning to launch with 3 or 4 different fragrances, made completely out of natural oils.  We would appreciate your suggestions for soap fragrances and will take all suggestions into consideration.

So if you have recently seen a soap product in a blend that you really liked please drop us a line or leave a comment and we will add it to the list.

Thanks!

We are extremely please to announce that Granville Island Candle Company is now an authorized distributor for EcoSoya Waxes from Nature’s Gifts International!  We have received many requests over the years for EcoSoya in addition to the Enchanted Lites Wax that we already carry.  Each brand of wax has its own unique characteristics and we feel that by providing both we offer complimenting products.

As of today we now have three EcoSoya Waxes in Stock.  We currently have CB-Advanced, PB Pillar, and the New CB-Xcel.

We encourage you to try the CB-Xcel.  It is 100% Soy, and is extremely easy to work with.  It resist frosting and rarely forms wet spots (air bubbles).

All three waxes are now available on our bulk supplies order system at bulk.granvilleislandcandles.com .

We look forward to providing you with this excellent product in addition to all of our existing products and services.

Many of you may have noticed that our Frosted Votive Holder (item 2283) has not been available for a couple of days, and has now been marked as discontinued.  We tried to prevent this from happening however, our old source for the product is no longer available and we were unable to find a new source at an appropriate price or quantity level.  As of today we have no stock left in this product, and it is officially discontinued.

We have however, located a replacement product (item 2285) which will be available in the next couple of days.  The new frosted holder is a little larger, but candles still burn beautifully within this new container.  A new bonus is that the new product ships in a case of 15 with a simple black retail ready display tray.  The price will be little higher than our old product, but hopefully not by much.  We will be posting the price when the product becomes available.

You may have also noticed that the VC and VC-100 polycarbonate cup products have been unavailable in the clear colour for a couple of weeks.  Unfortunately, the manufacturer had an issue with the production equipment and was unable to send new stock.  However, this issue has now been resolved and new stock has been loaded onto a truck and is expected late next week.  As soon as they arrive they will be marked as available again on the website.

Have a great first weekend in May!

In honor of Earth Day on April 22 2009 we are offering an special discount of 2% on orders over $500 and 5% on orders over $1000.  Orders must be placed online with our wholesale order system at http://shop.granvilleislandcandles.com .  The discount will be applied offline by our staff.  For full details please go to this page.

Have a great Earth Day everyone!

We apologize that it took a little longer than anticipated to get our new Wholesale Order System online and running.  It is now active and ready for use.  Please note that unlike the old system which used a user name and password the new system uses email addresses and passwords.  Your old user name is no longer applicable.  Please use the email address that you have on file to log in.

A special note on passwords!!  Due to differences in the encryption methods used in the old and new systems some passwords may no longer work.  If your password does not appear to work please use the Forgotten Password link and enter your email address.  Your password will then be reset and a new password emailed to you immediately.  After you have logged in with your new password you may change it to another password of your choosing by Clicking on My Account at the top of any page.

If you can still not log in please give us a call and we would be happy to assist you.

Also while we have extensively tested the new system there is bound to be a bug or two so please bear with us and let us know of any problems that you encounter so that we can correct them as soon as possible.

Give the new system a try and place an order today!

shop.granvilleislandcandles.com

We have received many compliments, suggestions, and complaints about our websites over the last number of years.  We have worked hard and managed to implement most of the suggestions or fix the problems that the complaints related to.  However, there are still a number of issues with our Wholesale Ordering System (found at shop.granvilleislandcandles.com ) that we have not yet been able to rectify.  They are mostly small issues and a matter of convenience or ease of use.

We felt that these issues were less important than the overhaul of our main corporate site (www.granvilleislandcandles.com) and the launch of a separate website for the purchase of bulk supplies (one of the most common complaints was that having both candles and supplies on the same site made things to complicated).  However, now both of those projects are complete and we will be proceeding to completely replace the current wholesale ordering system.

This new system will be easier to use and read.  It will provide more ease in tracking your orders and allow you to reorder items that you have ordered in the past.  All user names and passwords should be transferred from the old to the new, however, it is possible that a few accounts may have issues after the transition.  If you find that you can not log into the new site please just give us a call or drop us an email and we will manually correct the issue.  We will attempt to identify these accounts before you log in, but it is possible that we will not spot a problem.  Most issues would relate to user names that use special characters that were acceptable in the old system but not in the new.

We plan on making the actual switch over the Easter Break.  As such our wholesale order system will be unavailable from approximately Thursday April 1 until Tuesday April 6th.  We apologize in advance for any inconvenience that this may cause but we must disable access to the data base server while the transfer process in happening in order to transfer the price lists, user accounts, and other important information.  After the transfer is complete our developers must review every product for proper pricing, and reprogram the fragrance selection options for each.  This will hopefully only take a day or two.

We make another post this blog when the upgrade is complete.

Have a happy Easter!

We would like to wish everyone a happy Easter holiday.

Wholesale clients will receive a 25% discount on all Votive boxes ordered from now until the end of April!

If yo use our online order system the discount will be applied offline after you have submitted your order.

Outside of questions about our products the most common topic that we are questioned about is freight.  Common questions are:

• Do you offer free shipping?
• Can I use a different shipping company?
• Who do you use to ship my order?
• How long will it take to arrive?
• Do you guarantee a delivery date?
• Do you offer express shipping?

Those are just a short sample of the many questions that often receive, but they comprise the most important questions and I will now spend some time providing the answers to each of them.

Free Shipping

What is the real cost of free shipping?  Answer: Usually, much more than the cost of actually shipping the product.  We do not offer free shipping on wholesale orders or bulk supplies because it hides the actual cost of the shipping .  There really is no such thing as free shipping since the cost of shipping is just included into the price of a product.  For the vendor to ensure that they do not loose money on shipping the cost of shipping included in the product price is usually marked up from the actual cost.  Ultimately, you are paying more for shipping but it is not billed separately, and you have no way of knowing what the real cost was.

You may also want to talk to your accountant since in many jurisdictions the cost of shipping products is considered a business expense and can be claimed for tax credits.  If the cost of shipping is included in the price of the product you can not claim this expense.

We offer our products at the lowest price that we can and do NOT include any markup for shipping.  This allows you to determine the true cost of the product and the shipping, while still offering you the best price possible.

Shipping Companies

We have negotiated premium discounted rates with Canpar.  In most cases you will find that the rates that we offer are significantly lower than any other courier.  It is important to note that our discount rates are dependent on maintaining minimum yearly volumes and if we ship to many packages with alternate carriers our overall rates will increase.

However, if you request we can arrange to have your shipment delivered by an alternate carrier.  A handling fee will be applied to your invoice.  This fee varies depending on the courier and the amount of extra work required.  Since we use an automated system with Canpar, using other couriers often results in in 30 – 60 minutes additional processing time to have the paperwork manually prepared.  This fee will be waived if your shipment is destined for a location to which Canpar does NOT provide service.

For service to the USA we use DHL Ground.  If you would like an alternate courier the same fee as above will apply.

The exception to this policy is for shipping to the Maritime Provinces (NB, NS, PEI, NF).  We will ship DHL to these provinces with no additional charge only because we have negotiated rates with DHL to these provinces only that are often half as much as Canpar.  If Canpar is still the most economical option then the normal policy applies.

Delivery Timeframe

Delivery to the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, is about 2 days.  To Edmonton and Calgary delivery is usually 2 -3 days.  For all other locations please call or email us and we can look up the transit time.  For faster service please go to Canpar’s website and enter our postal code (V1X7Y5) and your postal code and you will be given the estimated delivery time.  Please use the GROUND estimate and not the Select estimate.  Select service is not available from Kelowna.

However, please note the following two important facts about delivery times.  FIRST, this is the time that it will take to arrive AFTER it has left our warehouse.  If we ship on Monday then you start counting on Tuesday.  So a 2 day delivery that leaves on Monday should be delivered on Wednesday.  This has nothing to do with our Factory Production Time.  Production time varies from 1 or 2 days to 2 or 3 weeks depending on the time of year and the type of order.  SECONDLY, please remember that Ground transportation times are NOT GUARANTEED.  While 90% or more of shipments arrive on time or even early, please plan on it taking a couple of extra days.

Express Shipping

Express shipping can be arranged.  Please contact us for specific details for your situation.  Please note that due to the heavy weight usually associated with shipments of candles express shipping can be extremely expensive and is not generally economical.  Handling fees may apply to express shipments depending on the circumstances, carrier, and time frame required.  Again please note that express shipping starts after your order is produced.  We generally can not rush orders through production due to our busy factory schedule.  The best way to ensure that you receive your order in time is to place it well in advance.  We are more than happy to take an order as many as 60 days in advance and pre-shedule a shipping date so that you can have it shipped and billed at a time that suits you.

I hope that this blog has answered some of your questions about shipping.