My competitors charge way less — should I lower my prices?
I make hand-poured soy candles and I price them at $18–$24. I keep finding shops selling what looks like the same thing for $9–$12. My materials alone cost me $6 per candle. I know I shouldn't race to the bottom but I'm not getting many sales either. How do you compete with this without tanking your margins?
4 Replies
Those $9 candles are almost certainly made with cheap paraffin, synthetic fragrance oils, and no testing. If yours are genuinely different — pure soy, quality fragrance, proper cure time — say so explicitly in your listing. Buyers who care about quality will pay more. Those who won't were never your customer anyway. Trying to compete on price with mass producers always ends badly.
I was in the same spot with handmade soap. What changed things for me: I stopped showing only the product and started showing the process — the oils, the pours, the cure. Buyers suddenly understood why mine cost more. Your story and process are your differentiation. No $9 candle has that.
Do a real cost analysis — materials + time (at minimum wage) + Etsy fees + shipping supplies + a profit margin. If your true cost is $6 before any of that, $18 is probably already too low. Raise your prices and position yourself as premium. It sounds counterintuitive but I got MORE sales at higher prices because I looked more legitimate.
Totally agree with the others. Also — look at who's actually buying from those $9 shops. Check their reviews. A lot of the complaints are "smells fake," "melted weird," "wick was terrible." Those buyers will leave you 5 stars. Price yourself out of the bargain tier and into the "treat yourself" category.