Fresh From the Market

At an industrial building on upper Meeting Street, you’ll find an Astroturf-covered front door emitting sweet fragrances from the waxy warehouse within. Home to Charleston-based Rewined Candles, the place is filled with the smell of their popular wine-scented wares along with music and laughter from 40-plus employees.

Since launching the business out of owner Adam Fetsch’s garage in 2009, Rewined has gone from selling its handmade products at the City Market and Charleston Farmers Market to being carried in more than 1,000 stores worldwide, including 60 international locations. “In the last two years, it’s been a crazy amount of growth,” says creative director Beau Burdette.

This spring, the company grew even more with a new brand—Produce Candles—inspired by area farmers markets’ offerings. The seven core fragrances include sweet, earthy, and spicy scents such as carrot, kale, and radish. Three additional scents will be offered each season: snap pea and cilantro in the spring, corn and peach in summer, for example.

The challenge was staying true to each produce item while still creating a fragrance you’d want in your home, says Burdette, who’s heading up the new brand. “Making a corn and a mushroom candle—the big guys would say, ‘You’re crazy.’ Yes we are—candle crazy,” he notes. “That’s why we’re so passionate about it: we can be a little crazy, go out on a limb and do things differently.”

Take a look at some of the intriguing business practices behind this candle-maker’s success:

To create Rewined candles, the crew recycles about 1,000 champagne bottles a week from local restaurants.

Six crops representing Produce Candles fragrances are currently growing in the candle-making warehouse’s rooftop garden, with more on the way.

With 42 employees, including many disabled locals hired through South Carolina Vocational Rehab, Rewined was awarded South Carolina Small Employer of the Year in 2013.

The candle crew visited 17 farms, farmers markets, and farming organizations to help develop Produce Candles and learn more about the lifestyle and culture.

To enter to win one of the new Produce Candles, click here.

To learn more about—and shop for—Produce Candles, click here.

For a look at what’s going on around town this weekend, click here.