Indie Author Spotlight

We love indie authors at Briarwick!

We have been working on this plan for a while and it's finally time to unveil it! We hope to feature a few indie authors each month for limited time scent collections beginning later this year.

Our goals for this project:

• We want to feature a wide range of authors and stories in the fantasy & romance genres.

• These LTO scents will (of course) be officially licensed! We have a standard in-house licensing agreement that we will send over for your review.

A bit about Briarwick:

We are a bookish small business that has been open since 2017 and has grown from a one-woman show in our owner Kate’s kitchen to a team of five in our warehouse studio in Simi Valley, CA! We are a team of book lovers and have been voracious romance & fantasy readers since we were kids. We now read and champion both indie and trad works across our social media pages and are committed to promoting a diverse range of stories through our scents.

Each candle that we create is crafted by the team from start to finish: scent creation, pouring, packaging, and shipping! Our candles are hand poured in small batches to ensure the highest quality, and we use soy wax derived from US grown soy beans, all natural cotton wicks, and Phthalate-free fragrance oils. All of the story-specific products in our shop are officially licensed or made with permission, and we have several years of experience with licensing. We have a proven track record of providing exceptional products and customer service and have over 30,000 five star reviews across all of our distribution channels. Our customers frequently reach out to tell us how much they love that our candles bring them closer to their favorite bookish worlds and stories.

Please note:

• We do not use any form of generative AI, nor will we work with authors who use generative AI in their works.

• Filling out this form does not guarantee a spot in this project. If you are not chosen for this first round, we will reach out to you and let you know when we reopen for the next batch of applications.

• We reserve the right to cancel or not go forward with a collection at any time for any reason. Briarwick does not tolerate any form of bigotry, hate speech, or bullying from our partners.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: How does this project work?

A: If you’re one of the selected authors, we will work with you to determine the scent, color, design and name of the candles and sell them in our shop for one month as an officially licensed collection. If you’re in the LA area, you can even come to our studio and help us craft the candles! We are also planning to spotlight your books & candles on our social media and website for the duration of this collection.

Q: What does officially licensed mean?

A: It means we pay the authors a portion of each candle we sell. We’ll send over our standard license agreement for you to review before hand, and answer any questions you might have. We know a lot of indie authors are new to licensing in general, so we want to make sure you’re comfortable with what you sign. Our agreement is very clear that this is a non-exclusive license and you retain all rights to your work.

Q: Who can apply?

A: Any and all indie authors who write romance and fantasy! We are romance readers at heart here at Briarwick, so any romantic fantasy or contemporary romance or dark romance, etc will fit in perfectly!

Q: Does it cost money?

A: NO! We will not ask you for any money to participate in the Indie Author Spotlight Program! If you’re selected as one of our authors, the only potential cost would be that we’d offer you the ability to purchase your candles at cost plus shipping. Our goal with this program is to create long term partnerships and support the indie author community.

Q: What is the timeline?

A: We plan to keep our interest form open until the end of August, and then choose the selected authors by the end of September. Everyone who applied will be receive an email one way or the other!

Q: Is this my only chance to have candles with Briarwick?

A: Nope! We want to see how this program does, but our plan right now is to open it again later next year. Also, we offer the ability to order single custom candles on our website all year, and our bulk custom candles are always open to order for things like PR boxes, Kickstarters, ARC promos, etc. Please reach out to us at custom@briarwickcandles.com if you’d be interested in bulk custom candles as well! Our order minimums start as low as 10 candles.

THE INTEREST FORM IS CURRENTLY CLOSED.