E&3 Apothecary
When Katie Gorman and Kristen Paleczny create a new candle for E&3 Apothecary, they don’t start with a scent in mind; they start with a story. Their stories (some historical, others humorous) are all a nod to Haddonfield, NJ, the town they love and call home.
“Our ‘Library Point’ candle is a great example. It has old paper, leather, and floral scents. Haddonfield’s library sits on Library Point, which was given to the town by the Nicholson Sisters. They donated the land with the stipulation that it should be a library because they loved reading. They were also avid gardeners. We tried to paint the story of sitting candleside at the library, breathing in the lovely floral aromas from the Nicholson sisters. Typically, you wouldn’t think that leather, paper, and floral scents would make a good combination. But it works, and the story really resonates with people. We tend to create what we call complex blends. You’re not getting a singular citrus candle. You’re always going to get something that has multiple notes within it that make it interesting.”
Kristen and Katie’s own stories had nothing to do with candles until 2020. Kristen, a 16-year resident of Haddonfield, has an educational background as a registered nurse and works full-time. Katie’s career was in technology marketing research. But they both strongly identify with the creative side of themselves that was being unfulfilled in their day jobs. “Something that bonded us over the years has been that creative itch - needing to do something a little more creative, a little more fun.”
Katie and Kristen (and Karen, who together make up the “3” in E&3 - more on Karen later!) met when their children were in kindergarten together. “Katie was the social coordinator of the entire grade. It was a really great group of moms. It got us through those tough times of navigating young kids in school. We’ve just been having fun ever since.”
In 2020, Kristen convinced Katie and Karen to train with her for the Broad Street Run. “I had been doing it for a few years, and I thought it would be really fun to do together. We were running and training for hours, and it can get monotonous, so we would just talk about everything and anything. We’d joke and say, “Oh, we should start something fun. What does this town need?’ It was right around COVID time when everyone was establishing a lot of homestead businesses. There was the balloon lady. The yard sign lady. Everybody seemed to have a thing. There was a cheeseboard lady. We thought, ‘Well, why can’t we do something?’”
For Christmas the previous year, Kristen had received a candle as a gift. She didn’t typically buy candles for herself, but something about this one stood out to her. “It was a great gift from a small business in Syracuse. What really struck me was that they have a jar return program. I don’t know what it was about that candle… maybe the smell of it and the cool story of returning it and getting a little coupon to continue the cycle. But I thought, ‘We can make candles.’” The only problem was, none of them had any experience candle making. “We knew absolutely nothing about making candles. We decided to make candles, having never really made a candle.”
“Thank goodness for the internet. It was during COVID, so we had to look a lot up online. Kristen started where she shines, which is doing the research and the background work.” There were many aspects of the candle making process they had to consider. What type of wax did they want to use? What do you contain the candles in? They opted for glass, because it’s recyclable, and they wanted to also have a jar return program. From there, they started attending online workshops for candle making.
One major aspect of their process was deciding that they wanted to develop candles that were a tribute to their home of Haddonfield. They thought, “What would that look like, and what would we try to memorialize? What’s fun or interesting about this town?” Katie shares that Kristen is “a history nerd. I say that with love. She knows so much about all genres of history including local history. It’s amazing. So we came up with this idea of a candle line that’s a love letter to Haddonfield and seeped in history. We look at current events as well. We like to say we pour a story into every candle.”
Katie and Kristen’s oldest inspiration is Hadrosaurus. “How unique is it that this 300-year-old colonial town has a prehistoric significance as well?” The description of their Hadrosaurus candle says, “Mossy, amber, leathery, bubbles. Scent of a beast trapped in marl with a touch of celebration because cheers! you discovered a dino in your backyard.” (All of their candle descriptions will make you smile.)
One of the first candles they created is called Brew House, which is a nod to Elizabeth Haddon, Haddonfield’s founder. “She’s the E to our E&3. Her amazing-looking brew house is still standing on Wood Lane. She is one of the first female brewers in New Jersey.” The Brew House candle has eight separate scents in it, including “beer notes and whiskey” as well as herbs, to honor the medicinal tinctures she concocted, and a “smoky leather element as well.”
“Then we have our Crows Woods candle. We giggle the most when we make that because anyone who has kids in this town knows the hardships of soccer season and how many times it gets canceled with the rain. So initially you're like, well, what does the soccer field smell like? Fresh cut grass, obviously. We have a woodsy element, trees. But also, when we think of soccer, we always think of orange slices that the kids have during halftime because that’s exactly what they need. So there’s some orange blossom in there. We need to remind people that it’s a fresh and clean feeling, which is the opposite of Crows Woods.”
A few more humorous Haddonfield-themed candles? The “Town Crier”, described as “juicy, spicy, and bitter” (“When you want to light your online parent community page on fire, light me instead”), the “Victorian Home” (“Springtide in vibrant Haddonfield rudely disrupted by creaky floors, constant maintenance, and endless cleaning”), and “Mountwell Pool” (“Like a crisp dip in Mountwell Woods, now deserted much like Haddonfield driveways in summertime”).
In a somewhat last-minute decision, thanks to Karen’s organizing, Kristen and Katie set up a booth at a small business market on Thanksgiving morning. By the end of the day, nearly everything had sold. And, even more excitingly, they had received two requests from local, small businesses to make custom candles for their companies. “I think that's when we first felt like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is a company.’ We realized this was something more than just us coming up with fun ideas, which we continue to do. But the backbone of our business from day one has been partnering with local business owners and creating custom products for them for gifting, retail, or for event marketing.”
One of their first major supporters was JFK Living, a local real estate company. “They were there on the first day, and they probably bought more of our candles than anybody else. They said, ‘Can we have 300 candles of our own by January?’” Katie laughs. “Kristen was shaking her head no, thinking, ‘That’s impossible; we just spent a year making 24.’ And I’m nodding my head yes, like, ‘I don’t know how we’re going to do this, but we’re going to do it. We’re going to figure it out.’” For both of them, it was a good lesson in how to navigate growth in their budding business. “We’re just honest with whomever we work with. We say, ‘Hey, we’ve never done that before, but we’re going to give it everything we’ve got to make that happen for you. Please be patient with us along the way in case we fall short.’ But,” says Katie, “I can proudly say we have never fallen short.”
Katie and Kristen are also careful with what projects they say yes to and what they turn down. “We’ve learned when to say no over the years, which is a powerful thing. It’s easy to keep saying yes and get overwhelmed. I think anybody with a business or family or any obligation can relate to that.”
E&3’s retail partners include Maxwell James, Sparrows, Beato Salon, and Edelman Fossil Park & Museum. “It’s so great seeing our items in other stores. It doesn't get old; it doesn’t. It’s the best feeling.” During the winter holidays, they have had a pop up shop at Lisa Wolschina & Associates office on King’s Highway. And they have a special relationship with Meraki Market. “We had a few years under our belt when a friend of ours said, ‘I was just at Maraki and they mentioned they were looking for a candle vendor. I gave them your name.’ We went the next day with a proposal of what our offerings look like, and now we're going into two years of being their candle maker. They wholesale with national brands, but anything that is a Meraki Market candle is made by us for their shelves. It’s been a super special relationship. It’s another creative outlet for us. We have our brand. It has a very specific feel. It’s colonial Haddonfield, it’s an apothecary vibe. Then we get requests from them that are just the opposite of what we’ve done to date. It’s an honor to be part of their team.”
When putting together a candle for E&3, Katie and Kristen pull on the history of the story they’re telling or what makes them laugh. But when working with Meraki or JFK or any other small business looking to make a custom candle, they start by bringing all of their fragrance jars and “they just sniff and decide what direction they want to go in. Then we come up with a sample. They burn it, they smell it, and then they come back with feedback.” Kristen is the “head chandler. She’s the chief nose of E&3. She’s the one who does all of the scent design, and rightfully, because she’s good at it. There’s a lot of science and math to candle making with measuring weight and heat and temperatures of the wax. But there’s an art to deciding the blends, and hers smell really good.”
Kristen and Katie divided their roles early on in the development of their business. While Kristen does the fragrance, Katie handles the packaging. When they sit down with a client, “whether it’s someone looking for a small candle for a birthday celebration or a larger program with our custom clients, Katie works on sourcing the candle vessel, designing the label, and figuring out packaging.” They come up with a lookbook to help their clients decide the direction they want to go in. The hardest part of the process is landing on a vision and product. Once they can get to work making it, “that part can fly.”
Kristen still works full-time outside of E&3. Katie left her last consulting job over a year ago, as it involved a contract that was ending. Before looking for another job, she thought, “Well, let’s see if we can make E&3 grow.” She spent the last year working hard on expanding their brand, and “now I feel like we’re definitely launching.” Kristen adds, “Because Katie works her butt off.”
Katie says she has had to learn “things I had no business learning, like graphic design and bookkeeping. As most small businesses know, you come in with a dream, but then you have to wear all of the hats.” Many days she will think, “Well, I didn’t know I was going to be an accountant today,” or “I didn’t know I was going to be learning this new program on Adobe Illustrator,” but she says, “I love the challenge and I’m up for it. I am also the social media manager. All of that at the same time that I’m making candles.”
They also organized their own jar return program. “We decided from the start that we didn't want to create waste. We wanted to ensure that we were making a high quality product while not creating more trash. So we started our jar return program. Once you’ve finished your jar, you send us a message, and we clean them out and reuse them.”
Finally, it was also important to Katie and Kristen to give back to their local community. “We try to contribute to community events and fundraising initiatives as best we can. We are utilizing the namesake and history of Haddonfield, so it’s only appropriate to give back to the town that inspired us so much.”
Sharing their journey with Story Beyond The Storefront could not have come at a better time for E&3 Apothecary, as they have been excited to announce that new and big changes are happening for them on March 1. “We are at max capacity working out of both of our homes. We have no more space in our basements and attics and closets any longer; it’s been holding us back. It’s been holding us back for a while now, but I think we finally just reached our breaking point where we realized… this is real. This is continuing to grow. We love it. Let’s give it its proper space.”
E&3 is formally opening a workshop! “It’s a space where all of our materials can be in one place. We won’t have to set up and then quickly break down because we need somewhere to eat dinner. It’s a workshop space, and it’s largely due to all of the love and support that we get from our loyal customers and shops and real estate agents that come to us again and again for products; we have outgrown our current space, and now it’s time to grow into our own space.
While this new space is not a storefront, solely a workshop, they are thinking of the possibility of holding candle making classes there in the future. “The request kept coming to us, so we said yes. We’ve held trial classes and they’ve gone really well.” They are also open to the possibility of hiring employees in the future, and they hope to add new custom partners. “We are teeing up a branding and packaging refresh. We also want to launch new product types. We’re looking at room sprays and reed diffusers; all in the home fragrance category. We are talking about adding quarterly subscription boxes. So once we get into the space, we’re hoping to be launching all of these new fun products under the E&3 brand. The logo will stay!” “But as much as I’ve tried,” Katie says, “I need some professional graphic design help. I’m treating myself to outsourcing.”
So what happened to Karen? Katie and Kristen laugh. “The number one question we get asked is about the 3rd person in E&3.” They briefly debate making up a funny story about what happened to her - clearly they are still good friends. “When we started brainstorming what a fun idea this would be, we did it during COVID to relieve stress. It was a distraction. We were working towards something when you couldn’t really do anything else.” After their initial experience at the small business market, when they realized, “Wow, there’s something to this, maybe we should make it official,” they pursued an LLC. “Karen graciously and intelligently asked us not to put her on the business. She said, ‘I will always support you. I will give you anything you need.’ But she’s a full-time employee with four children, a side hustle, and maybe even a second side hustle on top of that. She knew she would feel guilty if she wasn’t able to give this the attention we would want. It was right of her.”
“I would say she’s our number one cheerleader, but that sounds corny. She brings us a lot of business. She’s very social. She brings us friends all the time. She is always helping us; she’s always talking us up. We just had dinner together last week to celebrate another great year of E&3.” At first, they debated changing their name to E&2, but it just didn’t have the same ring to it. Plus, “She is very much a founder and an OG E&3 girl. We are a female owned business; women supporting women. It’s a tribute to female friendship and doing what you love together.”