6 Ways To Enjoy Luxury Candles For Less Money, According To Real Candle Lovers

If there’s one thing I’m good at in this life, it’s buying candles. Giant candles. Tiny candles. Candles to light while I’m in the bathtub. Candles to light while I’m doing housework. Fall candles. Christmas candles. Halloween candles. If a candle is put in front of me and it smells good, I usually want to buy it. However, that doesn’t mean I can always afford it.

Even though they seem simple enough, great candles are not cheap. Even just OK candles can get kind of pricey sometimes if you don’t know where to look. Luckily, though, once you start talking about how much you love candles, you find very quickly that you’re not alone. There’s a whole community of people obsessed with candles, wax, and wicks—thousands of people who just want to talk about how to properly trim a wick or achieve the correct flame height and wax melt. And all of them have tips and tricks for how to find the very best deals when it comes to candles. Here are some of the best.

This one is my tip, and it never fails to help me find some gems. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve found expensive, giant candles at thrift or secondhand stores that have never been lit even once. While it’s hard for a true candle lover to imagine leaving a perfectly good candle at the bottom of a box full of donations, it does happen. People store away holiday gifts or decorations without realizing it, and next thing you know you’re finding a Diptyque candle at Goodwill. Sure, this may seem nuts if you know candles, but if you don’t know Diptyque is expensive AF, then it probably just seems like any other fragrant candle. If you don’t have time to leave the house, platforms like Poshmark also have secondhand homegoods sections that offer affordable candles.

Say you finally invested in that giant, glorious candle you’ve always wanted. You want to enjoy it, but you don’t want it to disappear too quickly. One candle lovers tip? Buy a candle warmer. (This one is just $6!) Alekza Latte tells me that if she buys “an expensive candle, say a big Volcano one, and want it to smell amazing but last a long time” that she buys a candle warmer: Instead of lighting the candle to enjoy the scent, the candle warmer warms it from below to unlock those fragrant vibes, using up less wax in the process.

One helpful candle lover told me on Instagram that some of Mason Louise Marie’s candles are a dupe for Diptyque. And Into the Gloss reports specifically that Mason Louise Marie’s Bois de Blaincourt scent (try saying that one three times fast) is “the best cheap candle” and also a dupe for the popular Le Labo Santal 26. Yet another person told me that the SAND + FOG’s California Citron scent is a perfect Anthropologie Volcano dupe. If you do have a very favorite, super fancy candle brand, try going to stores like Marshalls or TJ Maxx until you find one that smells similarly. It may not last or burn the same way that a fancy, expensive candle will, but hey, it’ll still smell good—and that’s what really counts.

If you haven’t been on Facebook in a while, then you should know it’s a virtual treasure trove for shopping. And I’m not just talking Facebook Marketplace, though you can find some real gems on there as well. If you have a specific interest in an item—pretty much any item, but in this case candles—then odds are there’s a group of people on Facebook who have that same interest, too. And trust me, they want to talk to you about it. Facebook groups like For The Love Of Candles bring people together to talk about their favorite candles, but more importantly share deals and coupons on candles frequently. They also are the first people to know about big sales on popular candle brands like Yankee Candle or Bath & Body Works, so you can make sure to make the most of a sale. Even if you don’t want to chat with other members, just lurking can sometimes lead to steals and deals on your favorite scents.

If you aren’t into the candle warmer idea because you’re set on actually lighting the candle, but still want to make the candle last for as long as possible, the next best option in my experience is a WoodWick candle. As someone who works from home and has a habit of leaving a candle burning all day long, it can be easy for me to totally forget about a candle while I’m in another room of the house. This means I burn through candles really fast, and don’t get to enjoy them a lot of the time they’re burning. WoodWick candles mean I never forget its burning, though, because the wick crackles and pops. Not only is the sound soothing (fall vibes are a definite added bonus), but I never leave the candle burning for longer than I want—meaning it lasts that much longer, and I get that much more bang for my buck.

Usually afraid of Black Friday? Not afraid it’ll live up to the hype? If you’re a true candle lover, it might be time to stop ignoring this sales day. One candle lover tells me that the sales for the Bath & Body Works White Barn Shop in particular are amazing. “Last year on Black Friday I bought 18 candles and I think I spent like $60,” she tells me. That’s a lot of candles, my friends.

True candle lovers think a lot about how a candle burns—and that means considering things like the “throw” of it (how far the scent stretches into a space), how much soot it produces, and wick quality. Nick Rabuchin, founder of Vancouver Candle Co, knows a lot about candles, and suggests to truly get the most for your money to make sure your maximizing your candle’s burn. “A general rule is to burn your candle for one hour for each inch of the diameter of the vessel. Ensure the melt pool reaches the edge of the jar before extinguishing the flame.” Rabuchin also says to always trim your wick to 1/4” before burning to prevent sooting and smoking.