In today's episode of Building Texas Business, we have an inspiring discussion with Tram Nguyen, the passionate founder of Living Good Candle Company.

She shares her journey of launching a natural candle company and the power of her dedicated team. Tram describes the challenges of breaking into retailers like Amazon and Walmart and her three-month struggle that led to reinstating her Amazon account.

We discuss her unique empathy-driven leadership approach and strategies for understanding the market.

In wrapping up, Tram shares advice for aspiring entrepreneurs and her future plans. Additionally, we hear about her growth habits, first job at Chick-fil-A, and love of Texas barbecue.

Show Notes

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Tram: Thank you, Chris. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to be in this podcast. It's a really great to be here today.

Chris: So tell us, you started a company on your own and it's a candle company. Tell us about Living Good Candle.

Tram: Is that it? Yes, tell us about that. So I'm actually starting out my career as a chemical engineer. So I'm making many difficult products for lives, from plastic to car material, and now I'm making composite for airplane. So I've been making, producing so many useful products, and then suddenly, when I am a person that's really into candles I've burned a lot of candles throughout my whole life and then I got really bad headache from it and then I have to take a stop from burning any candle completely, and during that time I take a step back doing more research about what's going on in the candle industry and find out a lot of misconception or misunderstanding about different time material going to candles. And that's the reason why I decided to start a candle company that only make candles with be wires and only, and we make our own oil too. So we control everything into a product and we transparent about that to our customer, because I wanted the customer, when they burn the candle, not only feel good, but they know that they're not putting their health at risk.

Chris: So your passion for candles is what kind of led you to start the company?

Tram: Yeah, exactly.

Chris: So you mentioned that. So what are the things that got you to? I guess you sound like you control the product mix so that it's more natural than having, I guess, bad chemicals in there.

Tram: Yeah, it's 100% natural. Everything you make with be wires and we have the lab in Houston that make our custom oil. So I will come to the lab, I test all of them, reading or I smell them, go, improve all of the things going through with it and then approve them before we, you know, with them in the candle. So we also send our candle to the lab to test them to make sure no suit, no emission, no elegance, and because I have really bad allergy too. So that's the reason why I want a product that you know would my my at peace, knowing that it's not bringing bad chemical to my house.

Chris: That's impressive. So when did you start the company?

Tram: I started in last year. It took me a while to figure out the recipe. Seeing be wise a little bit difficult to handle, so I spent a lot of time testing it and work with a lot of vendor. So now all of our be was up from not Carolina and we have built trust with our vendor. And then you know, yeah, we've been around for a year and a half now.

Chris: Okay, so your candles are all beeswax, and so what did you do to get the company started? Is it self funded?

Tram: Yeah, it's actually self funded. So I spent all of my money from my night to five job with them all into the business. I work day and night, like weekend, no day off, and then, you know, put some of my seven on it. But as my plan for next year, we're working on some fund it. We're working towards some bank try to get the business fund it so we can spend them, because right now we focus on Amazon and Walmart, but my next year will be roll into the retail, so we will need a little bit more fun for that.

Chris: Okay, so right now, the products excuse me are on. You find them at Walmart or Amazon yeah. What has that been like, dealing with those two to try to get into their system, and you know the logistics of having to be a vendor for Amazon and Walmart.

Tram: You know what funny actually use the world for Amazon report. I use the world for Amazon. I used to be their operation manager, so I managed their warehouse and logistics, so I understand how it's work. That's why when I start the company, the first thing I do is I want my company as e-commerce because you know, I don't want to ship our product by myself, and the process again to Amazon is a hustle. You have to.

You have to do everything right from day one with Amazon and we improve out the year, a year and a half. We get a lot of customers from all over the country. We do have some customers even from outside the country, but just our candle on Amazon and our Amazon sell it from 87% of previous customers. That's mean we build really big, you know, portfolio on our Amazon and then from there, when we're getting the profit from Amazon, we come back and talk to Walmart. Walmart will be a little bit harder to get in because they will require you to be at a certain revenue. So we come back, talk to them, convince them and now we like Walmart. Yeah, it's a lot of challenge dealing with, you know, those two big e-commerce website, because you have to do everything right and make sure that you know you don't get your company suspended and stuff.

Chris: Very good. So let's kind of go back to this. Last year, or maybe even before you started business, you were doing a bunch of research. You said Talk to us about you know if there's entrepreneurs out there maybe that have just started what you're doing or thinking about it. What are some of the lessons that you learned? Maybe some bumps in the road that you encountered and how you got past those in starting this company.

Tram: I think I make a lot of mistakes. I do think like that. The first thing I make mistake about is, you know, the lack of understanding of the market research Like even though I'm really good at production testing product but you know the lack of understanding of why people are looking forward. First Challenge Gina. For like three, four months we wasn't able to really push the sale up to where I wanted to be when I get started. So you know, if any intravenous want to start a side business or a business, the first thing to do we understand the market, understand your customer, and then the second thing will be understand your.

You know the power of being in a team. I used to do everything by myself. I used to do candle pouring, production, packing, marketing, everything and then at one point I got burned out and that's the reason why I always say you cannot start a business by yourself. It's always needs help, you know from your teammate. And that's when we started bringing in more people, because my sale, my family and even my boyfriend got burned out. Everybody got burned out from helping me and that's why I'm like, okay, this is time for me to hire more people, and then I take in time, interview people and bring in some people to the team.

Chris: So that's a great segue, so it does take a good team right at any company. So let's now talk about what were some of the things you did through, say, the interview process, to make sure you were hiring the right people to join your team.

Tram: That's a hard question. Actually, I make a lot of bad hire at first because of the rushing feeling you know you got burned out and then I'm like, oh my god, I need help, I need help, and then we just take whatever. But then it's actually creating more problems down the line because I don't understand who I work with. And since I have my night to fight, I do looking for somebody that independent and can be at a warehouse by themselves. So in the interview I have conversation with them, I'm making sure that they okay.

Working with the warehouse setting you know where it can hit can be a little bit of problem and it's you just have to look around for until you find a right one. So I, when I'm making so many bad hire, I take a step back. I say I'm not hiring more people. I try to do it by myself. I'm taking my time looking for a right person and then from there you know you just have to take your time talking to people, try to understand the goal. And one of my thing is I love hiring students because you know I used to be a student and working part-time, so I hiring them at part-time and right now we only have part-time worker. We didn't have anybody full-time yet. But you know I start with students because I like the curiosity of them and you know they want, they want to do the best.

Chris: The young energy.

Tram: I think so too.

Chris: Well, I think you mentioned something that's true, I think, when you, when you're hiring out of what I'll call desperation, right, yeah you tend to overlook some things, and that yeah tends to lead to maybe bad hiring decisions as opposed to taking your time yeah and and really digging in to get to know someone and make sure they fit. You know the fundamental priorities of your company yeah, it's important it's very important. You only, you only figure that out if you slow down.

Tram: I think so too. Yeah, you need to slow down to go far. This is what I take. Yeah, you need to slow down, take one step at a time so you can go for it.

Chris: So let's talk a little bit about your process, I guess, and making your product. Do you, do you feel like what you're doing? It kind of in the candle manufacturing space is somewhat innovative.

Tram: When I first started, it's actually was really manual. I actually took it out, like you know wasn't really innovative or efficient, and I'd good love it to be. But you know, of course, that I have to do everything by hand so I can figure out where I can twist stuff around. And the thing is I really listen to my teammate. So I talk to my candle maker almost every day and we ask you know, how was the process? Anything we can make them better. And then you know, from there I start looking more into automation stuff and my goal for next year is so right now we're working on the design not a machine, but a machine. But this can help us to pull the candles, so it can help us to minimize the mistake. But you know, when I first started it wasn't really innovative. It's really manual hand pull everything. But you know, one step at a time, and I always say we look into the process, talk to our people and see what we can improve.

Chris: Well, I think at some level, just the fact that you're making such a clean candle is somewhat innovative as well like different than what your competition is.

Tram: Of course, yeah, but it costs a lot of problem too because when they so natural, you cannot, you cannot control a lot of them. But then we, I always tell my customer, you know there will be some. The candle can cracking. So that's the biggest issue of BWAS. It cracked really bad and we have to do everything to control our temperature, but it still happened. And I always tell my, I tried to educate my customer that this is a clean product. We didn't put anything else. So there may be some imperfection, but you know it put you at peace.

Chris: Yeah, what would have been some of the challenges on that kind of marketing this new product? Yeah, what are some of those challenges and how are you trying to overcome them?

Tram: That's the tough question. Yeah, it is. It's a lot of maybe a lot of education for customers because you know you can just go to Walmart and buy some candle that I can never commit with them, you know, but I always tell people you know breathing is so important. You breathe in your air every day, so make sure you rent something clean to your house and it takes a lot of time for customers to get used to the product, understand some of the issues that might happen to be what and accept it.

And the thing we do is, whenever a customer feel like you know the candle wasn't looked at, it's a. When it reached out to me, I addressed the issue immediately and tried to explain to them what's going on, and also some media is the same thing we post about our behind the scenes, some of the challenging that we encounter when we're making be what candle and you know, because of all of those issues, it actually make it unique. So we really stand out because we were looking at a product and say it's so natural. I have a customer about our candle on Amazon for a year and a half came to a farmer market to see me in person.

Chris: Really.

Tram: Just because she told me she's so impressed with the product she had to come all the way to the farmer market to see me.

Chris: Well, that that had to make you feel good. Yeah, so you're dealing with two of the biggest companies in the world. What are some of the things that you do to try to foster and grow those relationships with the people you're dealing with at Amazon and Walmart?

Tram: I think the first thing we do, we, we I don't always say like when you start out with them, you have to do right from the beginning, we from from even our account, you know reservation. We make sure everything is correct, no mistake, or you know, and we have actually have two people dedicated to just handling Amazon and Walmart. It's just because that this is a really bulky system from them and you need to have certain understanding and I feel like sometimes I'm in and out so much. That's why I'm dedicated to people. Don't do anything, spend four hours a day taking care of Amazon and Walmart for me and you make sure that you follow the rules.

They have a lot of policy and rule. You make sure you understand it. You make sure that you you know update about the news because it changed up around a lot. So the thing is, you keep your communication with them. When something pop up, something doesn't, you know, sound right to you, you reach out to them immediately and they're actually very helpful when you calmly reach out to them, you know, and they will definitely get to you.

I love working with Amazon and Walmart.

Chris: Well, I think you hit on something. I mean that the key is communicating right yeah uh constantly and and timely uh yeah so let's talk about you. There's always learning and setbacks. What's what's a setback that you've encountered kind of along this journey that you know you maybe didn't think you could overcome, but but you did and it's made you stronger and better. Uh, can you, can you think of anything to share?

Tram: yeah. So, um, we actually lost our Amazon account beginning of the year. Oh, we thought, we thought, we thought it for three months. It's, it's a. It's a disappointing feeling. You know, I just wake up. I just went too bad.

Wake up in the morning, my account gone completely, amazon couldn't look, fired and there were so many people involved. Um, I was thinking that, all right, you know, maybe Amazon, you're not right for me. I have to be out Amazon, grow outside of Amazon. I was so I was really negative, you know, at that time, because you're losing a really big part of three months beginning of year. Sure, that's really hard for me. And we still have candle and a way hand needs to be sell. So, you know, I need to think about what do I want to do with it.

So what we do is I reach out to so many people. I reach out to Amazon, prove multiple way. I send them a letter, I reach out from Twitter. I do everything I can make sure I'm in contact with a right person and then, when I'm in contact with them, we try to bring in an Amazon lawyer to just have some help from them, you know, to speed up the process and I really fight for it to get my account back.

It's a three month. It's a long three month in my whole life, every day. You know we didn't get the answer we need. They say we cannot be an Amazon again. And then suddenly you know they, we just have to keep trying, send them more email, send them more message. Um, try to be kind with them. Even we be frustrated, but we need them help, they help.

So we keep reaching out for three months and then finally they say, all right, we let we. They have to allow me to open a new account, so they allow me to open a new account, transfer everything, but the thing that you have to restart. We love all of our customers. Um, I thought that I would be out Amazon completely because of frustration that I have with Amazon. But, taking a look back now, we have so many great customers, like we have so many customers that reach out to me personally and send another message because just how much they love the candles and you know the fact that the people go out their way to go to the final market to see us, making me feel like Amazon, bring my product closer to more customers, and we actually have some wholesale order from customers on Amazon. So we roll really big on Amazon.

Chris: That's right. So your persistence paid off, right.

Tram: Yeah.

Chris: But I have to imagine that was a pretty trying time for you as a young entrepreneur to lose an account like that.

Tram: Yeah, and the thing is you cannot over new account. The moment you over new account, you shut it out completely. So you have to do the right thing.

Chris: How did the rest of your team respond during this time?

Tram: They actually work in hard with me. So at that time you know my Amazon team working hard every day with me. Sometimes I have to be at work so I wasn't being on the phone with them, so they help me to take on a call with Amazon, follow up with them every day. And the thing is, I'm really grateful for the people that I work with. We have awesome team. I have to tell you that we cheer every single wins, like, let's say, we have really great read, like Friday during this weekend, and it's when it's so great. So you know, that's the thing. You just have to put trust in your team and then know that they will do the best for the business and I just have them like hey, I don't care what you do, what long we, you know, can come back and run again. It should be good.

Chris: Yeah. So that kind of leads me to the subject of talking. Maybe you as a leader of this team. How do you try to show up as a leader for your team?

Tram: I think the thing is I show that I care in understanding and listening because, you know so we have one of my teammates recently have some of the things happen outside of work which you know affect the candle, because he dropped so many candles on the floor because of, you know, his mind was so busy. But instead of me yelling or upsetting what I tried to do, I tried to be calm and learn from it and ask hey, what's the issue, you know, do you have any problem that you want to share with me? So the thing for me is you'll be there for them when something happened, talk to them, listen to them, text them, like every day. Even I am not at the warehouse, I'm still calling.

You know my people has, hey, are you doing good? Or I'm making sure they drink water, and you know we could text them hitting no joke for me. So I'm making sure that I'm taking care of them in everything I can Like. If they need a day off, you know I can cover for them. Or that's the reason why, you know, when I need help, when I need long hours, they will be there for me, because I'm be there for them and I listen to them and I go out of my way to help them, you know.

Chris: That's right so it sounds, you know, someone likes servant leadership right, yeah. To make sure that they're taken care of when? How would you describe your leadership style? Where have you learned over the years in your other career maybe to develop these leadership skills?

Tram:

Chris: It's an evolving process.

Tram: Yeah, it's a lot, but when I went to work, graduated walking I've been through it with so many it worked with so many bars, worked with so many managers and throughout the year I worked with them, I figured out what do I lie from them and what I don't lie from them. And now when I have my business, I try to do whatever I like from the manager. I have a boss that used to be there for me. He's so nice, he was helping me so much he could send me a card for Christmas or Thanksgiving and that's really something that, beyond our manager and work, a relationship he goes out of his way to help me when I need. And that's what I want to do for my people too. I want to be a type leader that if something happened at work, the people can feel okay to tell me what's going on, like there will be no upset or no being too aggressive. I want to be a good listener to them too, and I'm still working on that.

Chris: Sure, so you're somewhat of an empathetic leader where they yeah. And have you seen that kind of take hold with your employees? The culture is forming where everyone feels safe to share if something's going on.

Tram: Yeah, we have a worker just dropped like 20 candles on the floor the other day. If it's won't be before I have a business, I will be really aggressive, really angry. But with me dealing with my so many people, I try to become and try to clean up and I really don't mind to go to clean up their mess. That's what I normally say if I have to. So I really go out of my way to help people and that's actually make people want to work with me and stay longer. And we see that too. We see that even. You know we're small business, we're not big cooperation, so sometimes it's hard for us to keep people. But all of the people are working with us until this point in two years and I can see that they still want to work with me.

Chris: Yeah, so you've talked several times at least referenced, kind of plans you have for the next year. So what are kind of, when you look to the next year or next three to five, what are the plans and strategies that you are putting in place and what you hope to accomplish and where do you see this company in the near future?

Tram: So every year, like so, right now, I'm doing my six month plan. So I'm working better when I plan everything out and I would encourage all intravenous. You know, do nothing about it, write them down in the paper, do the chart, do everything you can you have. I think, like you can only achieve your goal when your mind is all about it. So right now, everywhere, I could sit everywhere and I could write down. You know how much revenue I want for every single platform. So so my year for next, go for next five years.

You know I want that we will become the candle brand, that when customers want a clean candle they will say living, good candle code. So we want we, of course, that we want to become, you know, the goalie. Everybody wants to become a multi-million company, right, but for me, the goalie. You know, when you want something clean, you think about us and that's and that's something that I work hard every day and we and we have to do. You know, be what is so expensive. That's why so many brand cannot make a profit with them. And every day I have to continue, improve, to make, to make sure that a product is profitable. And another thing is you know, you just have to keep you know, thinking about what you want to do in your, what's your end goal of everything, all the hard work, and one of our next year I want to roll out a very, very new product on the market. We we don't want to disclose yet.

Chris: That's fine you don't have to tell your secrets.

Tram: Yeah, we, you know we will be rolling them out on January, but I think it's really right around the corner. Yeah, so it's really big hit for the market.

Chris: So everyone should be looking out. It'll be on Amazon.

Tram: Yeah, we Amazon and Walmart and our website Enough, we will be at a farmer market too. So if you locally to Houston, you know, stop by saying hi to us.

Chris: Which farmers market. You mentioned that a couple times, so which farmers market are you at?

Tram: We are the market for maker. Okay, so they in the highs. That's either only market I'm doing right now, but next year I would love to do, you know, more family market. I love the feeling of going there, going out there, talking to a customer and have them smell. I can't know. Yeah, but back to the question. We have a lot of go for next year. We want it to be more automation. We don't want people to manually apply every single label or every single jar. So we're working with a company, you know, to try to automate our process. We would love to hiring one or two person full-time with us, and that's something I'm working on. And we would love to increase our capital too. And it's really you know when, when you want to go, big capital can be a problem. So I try to get it ready for that.

Chris: Yeah, let's talk a little bit about that. What? What are some of the the things that you're doing to put in place to Access? Yeah additional capital.

Tram: That's a hard question. So right now we still small and I, you know, and I mentioned I invest everything I make from nine to five into my psychic, like my kind of business all the money, all the serving. Another thing that I do a you know we sometimes we will ask help from friends and family and that's the only way that pretty much I'm doing right now to keep the company running. But of course it's still about us hustling. So we try to go to more farmer market, we try to do different things, expanding them on Amazon, like on tick tock we now have tick tock shop and Instagram. So we try to run, you know, expand them out to make a little bit money.

But I'm very strict on how I spend it, so I'm budgeting everything. So right now I'm looking at the how much money I need for 2024 and that's helped me. That you know. Try to see where can I get all the old fun? Do I have to get it from the bank? Or you know, like it's a heart, I still try to figure out a capital part.

Chris: Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, it's a very important part of the new business right. I think what you mentioned a minute ago to budget very consciously and thoughtfully so you manage your expenses well. Yeah and that's gonna be important. When you go out for capital whether it's a bank or you know investor one wants to know you actually run in a good business.

Tram: Yeah, of course I try to talk to some bank right now to to hopefully get a funded. Hopefully that will be, you know, something I can achieve next year. That's one of my goal.

Chris: Okay, have you had any mentors kind of along the way in your career that have kind of Help, guide you or inspire you to do what you're doing now?

Tram: I actually have a lot of mentor. I know so many people that I learned so much from them, and you know some people that they probably don't know me, but I learned them from their podcast. I listen some of your podcast to you, by the way. I try to know that, whatever the people do that I'm really enjoying. Like you, talk a lot about innovation and that is something that I really want us to be better at. I want us to be more. You know Concepts about how we can improve thing.

So I guess one of my biggest mentor I have a mentor that meant to me how to sail on Amazon and he actually was the one that get me started. So I wish out to him, you know, talk to him about my desire, why I want to have this brain and why I want to start on Amazon, and he actually will help me from day one. So he guided me throughout the way and then I met some other mentor. You know, like we, I learned a lot from people more than most of me. More of the thing I learned is cell top. You know from YouTube.

Chris: Well, you, I think, what you Find along the ways, you can kind of learn from everybody, right, I mean some more than others where there's a lot of you, if you're Observing enough and willing to pay attention, that there's always yeah sometimes learning is learning what not to do.

Tram: Yeah, yeah, that's true, yeah, it's. We learn from our customers. We have customer that angry right, you know, because on Amazon, so people can just buy our product and change them up there by the next day. So we learn so much about our customer and the thing might go it to review our return rate to almost zero and, to be honest, we don't have a lot of return in the big market like that, but we still have some. And Every time that I have a customer return, I accept it, I reach out to them, I want them to tell me what's happened or what can I make them better, and I do think that dough feedback is something that you know make us better every day.

Chris: That's good, I agree. So any One or two things you might tell an aspiring entrepreneur to to think about as they're About to step off and start a company, like you did a couple years ago. Any pointers?

Tram: I did so. If I have, I would love to Tell this to all intrapreneur. I think having the business and actually running a business at two different things is a lot of hard work. You have to read yourself out there. I used to be so shy, you know, but I have to go out there hustling, selling stuff at family market, ringing my product out there for people to judging is, but the thing is, when you want to do great in your intrapreneur, you have to make sure that you, you know you just keep pushing, don't care about anybody else, just think about yourself and be in it. And the second one a do not ever think that you can do everything by yourself. It's impossible. They have to be balanced between your life, your work life and your family. And you want to make sure that you know when you at your high point in your career, you still feel happy because your family happy with you. So that's it. Two things that I would love people to think about when I started their internship.

Chris: Those are two great things to share, so thank you for that. Listeners out there, well, thank you.

Tram: So let's, let me ask you this what was your first job? My first job. I used to work in Chick-fil-A before. Okay, you know, so I can't learn a lot about value. Customer week my in my mind. Customer in my number one, my priority. Everything I do to make sure they happy.

Chris: So if you, if you work there, you must have eaten the food a lot. Are you like, done with Chick-fil-A now? They get me every time yeah, yeah, what's not the like about it. So, keeping with the theme of food, do you prefer Tex-Mex or barbecue?

Tram: You.

Chris: Very good. Who doesn't like good barbecue?

Tram: and Texas yeah.

Chris: So are there any things that you do to kind of keep yourself up, like reading or you mentioned podcasts any business related books or podcasts you like to listen to that you share?

Tram: I listen to. I read a lot of books, so I actually attend to a book club, so we wake up at 5am in the morning picking the book that we read. So right now I'm reading a book called the Messy Truth from Alie Wab. So that's a really new book.

Chris: The Messy Truth.

Tram: Yeah, the Messy Truth. So she talks about the behind the scene of intravenous and every new intravenous will find themselves in there. She talks about lots of dark side of the business the busy, the doubt about your business yourself. So if anybody wants to start intravenous, I think that's a good book to start with, Because it will help you to see that everybody out there having a small business dealing with the same thing that you're dealing with.

Chris: It takes hard work, it takes courage and a little bit of you know willing to take a risk, right yeah. So that's great, I'm going to have to go check that book out.

Tram: Yeah, they actually just released. Yeah, they actually just released, like last week, I think. Okay, yeah, so just now yeah, they just out.

Chris: Well, tramp, thank you so much for being on the show. Enjoy hearing your story. Best of luck as you continue to grow, living in good camel company.

Tram: Thank you. Thank you, Chris. I really appreciate the opportunity and, you know, really appreciate that you helping me here. Let me share my story and hopefully it can inspire many small business out there.

Chris: No doubt it will Take care.

Tram: Thank you.

Special Guest: Tram Nguyen.