Brittany Whitenack (Founder of Antique Candle Co.)

Today's episode will begin in three minutes. But first I want to tell you about something crazy I'm doing for my new book, five Mere Christians. I've never seen an author do this before, but I'm giving a money back guarantee on this book. I'm so confident you're gonna love this book that if I'm wrong, if you pre order the book, you don't love it, I'm gonna send you a $20Amazon gift card as a money back guarantee. Why? Two reasons. One, this is a different book for me, right. I know this is a very different biography. What is Jordan Rayner doing? And I know it's risky, so I'm going to de risk it for you. Because listen, in my other books, Redeeming youg Time, the Sacredness of Secular Work, Master of One, etc, etc, I am telling you and me how we can glorify God in our work, but in five Mere Christians, I'm doing something very different. I'm showing you what that looks like practically through these unforgettable life stories of five Mere Christians from history. These are the top men and women that I would love to have on this podcast today if, you know, they weren't dead, right? So that's the first reason this is a risk and I'm gonna de risk this book for you. Here's the second reason. I'm just confident you're gonna love this book. My friend Mark Batterson said, quote, five Mere Christians proves that biographies can be extremely entertaining, profoundly helpful, and mercifully short. If you're looking for a book that combines the punch of a great sermon with the pace of a great thriller, this is it. Highly recommended. End quote. But here's the thing. In order to qualify for this money back guarantee, you got to do two things. Step one, pre order five Mere Christians in any format, hardback, ebook, audiobook, whatever. And then step two, go to 5meerchristians.com and fill out the form on that page and that's it. But you got to do it by midnight Eastern Time on May 9. By filling out that form, you'll also get all the pre order bonuses listed on 5 mereChristians. Calm and be entered to win this crazy, epic trip for two to Europe. So visit 5merechristians.com right now to sign up. Now, please enjoy today's episode. Hey friend. Welcome to the Mere Christians podcast. Hi, I'm Jordan Raynor. How does the Gospel influence the work of mere Christians? Those of us who aren't pastors or religious professionals, but who work as critical Care nurses, fishermen, and administrative assistants. That's the question we explore every week. And today I'm posing it to Brittany Whitenack, the founder of Antique Candle Company, which she's grown from zero to 70 employees in just a few years. Brittany's an incredible founder who recently sat down with me to discuss the incredible impact that a prayer committee has had on her customers and her team. We talked about how her faith compelled her to spend tens of thousands of dollars on a company perk that the world told her was totally nonessential. We also discussed what heaven might smell like when it comes to earth. You guys are going to love this terrific conversation with my new friend, Brittany Whiteman. Hey, Brittany. Welcome to the Mere Christians podcast.

Thank you. So excited to be here.

I'm super pumped about this. Hey, so we're recording this on a Monday. I was thinking about you yesterday because on Sunday, Sabbath Sunday, as my kids call it, our home constantly smells like some amazing candle. And as I was lighting the candle yesterday, I'm like, dang, if I had planned this a little bit better, I would have had an antique candle company candle burning. But alas, I did not.

That's all right.

If I did, which one should I have chosen? What's your go to candle?

Okay, Jordan, it really depends. I feel. Are you a bougie candle person? Do you like cakey? Are you more staple?

All right, here, here. I'll give you our all time favorite. Probably eight months out of the year, there's a pumpkin pecan waffle candle.

Dude. Yes.

It's next level. That's my jam.

Yes. I feel you would need a pumpkin spice or pumpkin spice latte when fall and the flannel and the bonfires come out. So, so good.

Which, by the way, it's absurd that we have this because I live in Tampa, Florida, where it never feels like fall. So this is just our attempt at, I don't know, making it feel like sweater weather.

That's awesome.

Yeah, it's very limited.

Candles can help you.

Yes, candles can help. Candles can put us in the vibe, put us in the mood. Hey, tell us the founding story of this business. I love founding stories.

Yeah, it's so funny because I never thought I'd be an entrepreneur. So I went to Purdue University, boiler up, and got a business degree. I love business. It took me two times to change my major to figure that out. But once I did, I took a job at Target and as an assistant store manager. And Target's amazing. I mean, I got 10% off plus another 5% off of my red card. It was fantastic.

What a country. Come on.

I know. Yes, But I worked that job for about a year and as a 22 year old recent graduate, it was, it was really, really difficult. I had 70 people under my purview. I had a lot of responsibilities and KPIs that just kind of like thrust into the work world from outside academia. And the expectation was to open once a week, close once a week, work every other Sunday. And as a newlywed and as a first time manager of a large team, I was really, really struggling. I remember one night I got home from work, I closed this, closed the store. It was 1am in the morning, my husband was in bed. And I remember walking in, the sink was full of dishes. It smelled terribly. And I just remember this thought of, is this it? Lord, like, is this the next 50 years of my life? Life was so good, why is it so hard? And I remember all I could do was bend down, open the cabinet doors, pull out the Lysol and spray those dishes, like literally. And I just went to bed. And you know when you're in that much pain and suffering, all you can think to do is just like flee, like run away. And so I put in my two weeks, my husband, I talked about it and I quit. And like the number one rule they teach you at business school is do not quit a job with nothing lined up. Like that gap in your resume is like the most horrible thing that you could do.

Must have a plan B. Yeah, right.

And so I took that summer off. I baked bread, I laid by the pool. I wasn't like working. And after about four or five months, I got to a place where, okay, I think I'm ready to enter the workforce again. But I picked up all these other hobbies. And one of the hobbies that I picked up was candle making. I bought a $200 candle making kit online. I've always liked candles and it was so fun. Like experimenting with the fragrances and the wax and finding these old ball jars and coffee tins and teacups and thinking, oh, I could turn that into a candle. How cool would this be to have vanilla in it? Or pineapple coconut. Oh, this is so fun. And while I was looking for work, I'm like, you know what I wonder? This is when Etsy was getting really popular. So this is 2014. And I thought to myself, I wonder if, I wonder if I can work up to the salary I was making at Target, you know, and sell these candles online. And I talked to my husband and I was like, sure, let's try it. And that, that's kind of how it got started. It was not the plan.

Not the plan.

Not the plan, man. I was not working the plan.

It started with play, which I think is interesting and common.

Yeah, yeah.

All right, give us an idea of the scale of the organization today.

Yeah. So antique candle company today. It's been 10 years. We're still E Commerce based. We serve about 50,000 customers online, mostly direct to consumer. Our candles are carried in about 650 stores across the US and Canada, and depending on the time of year, right now we employ about anywhere from 40 to 70 employees. We make thousands of candles a day and thousands of candles a day, Monday through Friday. It's pretty incredible.

That's unbelievable. I love it. All right, so I love being an entrepreneur. You know, I really consider myself an entrepreneur first, a content creator second. But man, the journey of growing any venture, I don't think people who have never started a venture can understand just how taxing this can be emotionally, mentally, relationally, spiritually. I'm curious, when you look back over the last 10 years, where would you say, man, I had to really rely on the Lord deeply on this specific issue during kind of the grind and growth of this business?

Yeah. Well, Jordan, as you know, as an entrepreneur, the number one reason people go to business is cause they run out of cash, they run out of money. And it's much more likely for a business to fail than it is to continue to grow. And so I would say year six or year seven of my business, we were growing really fast, but I didn't know we were going to grow really fast. And it was actually when Covid hit and everybody was sent home. And I don't know what happened. I think maybe they realized their homes didn't smell very good or something.

They could finally sit with that stench.

Yeah, like I need to order candles. And right when that was happening, I remember talking to my attorney on the phone. I'm like, hey, we're not essential. I these orders are coming in. I don't know if they're going to continue coming in. Everybody was afraid of the economy completely crashing. And I remember thinking to myself, because I had 30 employees at the time that are relying on me to provide employment. And I remember looking at my bank balance and doing some calculations and I realized, okay, it's like April 1st and I have enough cash in the bank right now to pay people through the end of June. What do I do? And I remember business owners around me laying off folks and they could go and collect unemployment. And I'm like, oh geez. Like going through that process and just then having to find another job, like what can I do? And I remember just making this decision to pay them at least while I had cash and give them some time, two months, three months before the economy completely tanks, maybe giving them a leg up. I just remember having to lead on the Lord a lot during that period of time because it's really scary that that idea of not only me, but there's people under my care that are counting on me to make good business decisions. That was really, really difficult.

So you're paying them even though they weren't working?

Yeah, they were trying to do as much as they could remotely, but there's really only much you could do. Like we tried to give them side projects like you have to come to work, make candles. And it was me and then my household, which was two brothers, three brothers at the time, and then my husband, we were all showing up. But funny enough, my husband was a full time missionary at the time and he was pulling a salary. So I felt this intense need to not only provide for the other families, but for mine too. And so he had his work. We could ju in but pouring candles, I mean we were, it was night and day. I'd wake up, go to work, ship all the candles I could make all the candles, I could go home, go to bed. And that was months. And I actually it was really difficult towards after a few months of doing that before everybody came back to work because I noticed my sinful heart. I was becoming bitter towards my workforce even. I'm like, here I am grinding and I'm sending you a paycheck. You know, like you could just see how much I had had to rely on the Lord for that.

Yeah, it's so interesting. All right, so I didn't know your husband was a donor supported missionary. And it makes your company's mission statement all the more interesting to me. So on the website it says the company's mission is to quote, make a positive impact in the world by spreading light. Not only the light of our candles, but the light of Christ. End quote. And here's what I love about how that sentence is constructed. You say not only the light of our candles, but also the light of Christ. It's a both and right. In other words, yeah, hey, we are here to leverage this venture to the instrumental end of making disciples of Jesus Christ. But there is also value intrinsically in spreading the light of literal candles. And I'd love For you to talk about how, why does God care about candles if they don't save a soul?

That's awesome. I have your book here, Jordan, the book you just wrote, the one the Sacredness of Secular Work on page 70. You say this all throughout Scripture. God shows that he values work beyond its usefulness. Genesis 2. 9 says that he made trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. And this is where I highlighted. There was no need for these trees to be pleasing to the eye. There was no need. But God values function and beauty so much that he called out the beauty of the trees before their usefulness. That just really resonated with me a lot and has a lot to do with the question you just asked. Because, I mean, the candles themselves aren't necessarily beautiful to look at, but when you think about how God created us as image bearers of himself, it's. We focus so much on the physical attributes, but we don't. One of the senses that he gave us is the sense of smell. And sometimes I think when we picture the new heaven and the new earth, we don't. We don't think about what it'll smell like.

Oh, come on. Go here. Yes.

We think through our dominant sense, which is, I think, eyes, our ability to, like, visually absorb what's going on around us. But I love this idea of the scent or smell. Like, even, like, we talk about spraying the Lysol in the dishes. Like, maybe we think of more negative smells than we do the positive ones that provide vibes. But of course, it's. It creates. It's its own sense of beauty. It's its own sense of creating hospitality, comfortability, a sense of belonging for the people that live with you and the people coming over to your house. And one of the ways that I love doing this with our customers, like I said, we have 50,000 customers. We've done this for years. And we just started noticing brands copying us now, but it was kind of unique at the time. We invite our customers to help us create the fragrances. So it's not like we're all sitting in a room and saying, hey, like, let's make this. Let's make a blueberry cobbler. That sounds really good. We actually decide on a category. So say coffee. Let's make a new coffee candle. Okay. Let's maybe test 20 to 25 fragrances, and then we distill it down to maybe four or five or six. And then we invite our audience to be candle testers. And we will literally send them four or five candles. That I have no idea, which, if they're any good, like, and send it to their house. I mean, there's thousands of folks that sign up. What is it about creating something and having a voice and getting your hands in the muck and creating the world around you? And we invite our audience to do that with us, and then they help us select, they give their honest feedback. We do polls. We aggregate the data. We engage with them. Like, that's. Not only are we creating it, but we're inviting those who follow us to create it. And that's just way more fun. And I always have no idea. Sometimes they're like, please do not launch this candle. It smells horrible. You have no idea. Idea. I burn it in my house. And it was like, do not do it. Like, how fun is that, you know, to engage in that process?

All right, so I gotta reflect a couple things back here. So the intrinsic value of creating a candle, you just hit on one. In the way that you're creating these candles and inviting your customers into the creation process, you're helping them live more in the image of God, which is God the creator, number one, yeah. Number two, God creates beauty, and so we are free to create beautiful things. And number three, he gave us a nose. Right. He gave us more than one sense. And so by creating beautiful smells, that brings a pleasure. By the way, your story about how you guys create the candles reminded me of this great podcast episode I listened to recently. I don't listen to a ton of audio. It was on Masters of scale with the founder of Exploding Kittens. Oh, have you listened to this?

I know the podcast very well, but I haven't heard that episode. Let me write it down.

You have to listen to this episode. It's all about how the founders of Exploding Kittens created the product in conjunction with their community. It reminds me a lot of what you guys are doing.

Oh, okay. Thank you. I love it.

All right. You're welcome. All right. So, hey, you talked about your team. We just talked about the intrinsic value of spreading the light of candles. But you and your team are spreading the light of Christ in some pretty explicit and instrumental ways. Your mission statement is one example. But you also encourage customers. I thought this is fascinating to send in prayer requests. I'm curious, do you have a story or two about the impact that that practice has had, maybe on your team internally, maybe on your customers externally?

Yeah, absolutely. One of the things that we do at Antique candleco to help accomplish things outside of, like, our direct workflow is we form committees. So we have a plant committee, we have a missions committee. We have a, just like the office, a party planning committee. So gossip.

I love it. I was about to go there. So glad you did.

Yeah. But also a prayer committee. So they're a group of, I think about five folks who sit on this committee and they pray over requests weekly. And I thank you for sending this question advance because I was able to get their feedback. And I have three stories that just quickly that they wanted to share with me.

I would love to hear these. Yes, this is awesome.

And so the first one is from Mark and he is our operations technician. He is the guy that is building and fixing our candle making equipment. Since we have conveyors, remember we're making thousands a day. So this is what he said. I can't speak to the impact on the customers, but for my part, it brings an added layer of spiritual awareness to the day. It could be so easy to get caught up in the day to day items. And those prayer requests help bring that bigger picture awareness back into the equation. They also help me feel more linked to the customers. We're not just sending candles out into the wild blue yonder. They're going to real people with real problems and concerns and we're all a part of that. So good. And then one of my previous coworkers, Leah, she used to serve on the committee. I texted her. She was our wholesale manager, so she's the person that interacts with the business owners that carry our candles and then sell them their store. She said one story I remember a wholesale customer in 2022 had experienced a fire at her business and informed me of that. When I had sent her a wholesale promotional email, I asked her if our team could pray for her and add her to the weekly prayer list. She was so thankful that our team cared enough to intentionally pray for her. And she shared how much that meant to her. She knew we didn't just view her as a sale, but that we really wanted to support her and see her succeed. That story encouraged me to be bolder in asking other customers if we could pray for them whenever they shared their personal struggles. And I realized we were sending a unique message that we weren't just another supplier to these folks. They knew they had a relationship with the ACC team itself. And then I'll conclude with this one. This is Jeremiah. He is our chemist because we make sense. So of course we have a full time chemist on our team.

I love that. So cool. For those wondering what your kids are going to do with that chemistry degree.

Yeah. Here you go, exactly, Absolutely. He has a PhD in chemistry and here, here he is.

It's amazing.

As an employee, most work environments the emphasis is not to waste company money, which includes your time. It impacts me by demonstrating the authenticity of our company values and that our company leaders also believe these values. We spend time as a company to pray for our customers and each other because we know it is a far more value and impact than our task list at work. We demonstrate we trust God with how we use our time as a company. So I thought that was awesome.

I love this so much. So you just finished reading the Sacredness of Secular Work. You know, I talk in there towards the end on how to make disciples effectively in a post Christian context. There's this idea of kind of outing ourselves as Christians and how we do that. And one idea I tossed out there was like, hey, just, just ask your co workers, your customers if you can pray for them. Right? Yes, I mentioned this and I'm curious if you're going to prove me wrong here. I said, hey, I've never known anyone to be offended when asked if I could pray for them. Have you guys ever had a Cosby back? How dare you ask if you could pray for me? Have you had that?

Not to my knowledge, no. And to your point, there is something about prayer. So, you know, sometimes we'll post scriptures or hymns on, you know, occasional Sunday, things like that. And sometimes we do get hate mail, like, please leave religion out of business. But when you're talking about, hey, can I pray for you? And this is why I'm so excited about this idea and this concept. And I think it could just be so much built to be such a bigger thing at ACC than it is today. Because what I love about the future of work is emotional well being and mental well being is becoming very welcomed and supported in the workplace. Here's why I think that is so awesome. Because before it was just focused on physical safety and taking care of people, getting a paycheck and being happy. And I'm like, okay, if we're focused on emotional and mental well being and employees are receiving that, it's not that much harder to take one more step into spiritual well being. And that is when the real soul care conversations begin. And that is really exciting to me as an employer, as an entrepreneur. I'm like, maybe I'm too optimistic about the future. But I'm like, lord, this is pretty exciting stuff in this post Christian world. I'm actually more excited about the future than I am today.

100%. I couldn't agree more. I think it's going to give us more opportunities to share the light of Christ. All right, so you said a couple of minutes ago you hope this becomes a bigger thing at acc. Praying for customers. How so? What are you dreaming of? What could that look like? Practically?

Yeah. So this is something that the Lord's really been prompting my imagination about. So we send candle packages to about 50,000 annual customers a year and we're continuing to grow. But right now, like the opening of prayer requests or can I pray for you? It's kind of ad hoc, like a social media post in there, a bottom of an email, an occasional blog. But I don't know, it's not like that imaginative yet. But one of the things I've thought about is how cool would it be, you know, in each candle package that goes out because they might just order a candle online and that's good. And there's some information about the candles and what have you. But it'd be kind of cool if somehow we incorporated some type of literature. Not like, you know, like a smiley face, like.

Yeah, not a track.

Yeah, not a track. But like maybe like along with the branding, like somewhere in that message to that customer. If we can use generative AI to like really customize that message, we could also include maybe an organic blurb about, hey, like if you need prayer, here's a link to. This is a team of people that be happy to join you in prayer or whatever. I'm not sure exactly yet, but like there's just, I mean, 50,000 people. I mean, it's like it's so many folks. So many. It's just mind boggling to think that we have this type of platform and influence to really engage folks if they want to engage with. Wouldn't it be nice to ask?

I love this so much. It's so good. It's so practical. You're convicting me. I mean, people email me a lot. You know, it's interesting. I actually get some really heavy emails from listeners and readers because they don't know who else to turn to to share this stuff with. And when we receive those, I pray for every single one of them. But I'm not proactive about this. And what a missed opportunity to bless people and intercede on their behalf. And so, man, I'll just say it now. You got something you want prayer for? Email me@jordanordanraynor.com it's my personal email and I'd be happy to pray for those things along with my team and I'm going to be committing to think about what this looks like in a more systematic way. Not. Not to use cold language. You get my heart, I think. But.

Yep.

No, I love this so much and I love. This is such a great example. It's such a great answer to a question I've been trying to pose more and more to our listeners, which is what in your business, what in your work can only fully be explained by your commitment to the ways of Jesus? Right. Because by God's common grace, there's going to be a lot of similarities between how you, Brittany, run a candle company and how a non Christian would run a similar candle company. Right. But there ought to be some things that are different. There are to be some things that are distinct. You've talked about prayer. It's one great example. Can you think of anything else within how you lead this venture that can only be explained by your faith?

Yeah, that's a really great thought provoking question. And I'm a part of this Indianapolis, Indiana, like Praxis Guild. I know you're familiar with Praxis. It's been helpful to be in that community of other fellow entrepreneurs and venture builders to help us think through scripture. And what does that look like in terms of proactivity to incorporate into our business? That may be hard to really imagine on your own or in your small group with your local church of maybe no other entrepreneurs. So that group's been really pivotal at helping validate some of the stuff I've already done, but also challenge me to, oh, you're kind of hanging out and just more ethical. Really what we want to do is how do we think about this redemptively, like really, really going past beyond just the pure ethical to this redemptive frame.

And proactively blessing people.

Yes, exactly. One of the things I did a few years ago, which it's like not business smart, but I had to do it, was I had been leasing spaces to make candles for my team for years. And for warehouses, traditional warehouses, you do not have air conditioning. I don't know what it's like down there in Florida or states that are more in this, like heavy heat. But in the Midwest, it's. You kind of just live with it. So it's typical for the warehouse to get to 90 to 100 degrees during the summer. It has heat, but it does not have air conditioning. And you cannot find a place to lease with air conditioning for the comfort of your team. I mean, you're in there all day and you're doing physical Labor. It's not like you're sitting there and, like, have a fan blowing on you. There's things you could do to help circulate the air. But when you are making candles and the wax is hot, by the way, it's hot. It's like working in a kitchen. It's so uncomfortable. And I did that for years with my team. And the only way I could think of was to either install it myself, which would be hundreds of thousands of dollars for a place we don't own, or I'm like, we're gonna have to build a place. We're gonna have to build a place or renovate a place. And that's what we did. And we bought two buildings. One's completely redone, and it has air conditioning. And I remember talking to the construction manager, and I was trying to find. The project was becoming really expensive, and we were trying to find places to cut and. And he talked about the air conditioning. I'll never forget this. And he's like, it would save us tens of thousands of dollars, which is what we're looking for. And I remember thinking, oh, my goodness, what am I going to do? Like, and we didn't cut it. And tens of thousands of dollars, It's a lot of money. But in the business world, I had to generate hundreds of thousands of dollars, months and months of labor to make in profit, tens of thousand dollars to be able to pay for this and then, let alone, you know, the air conditioning bill for the years to come. Like, but we have it and we've had. And it was. It's so comfortable. It's so comfortable. And there's no other space like it. There's no other space like it. It's very not business smart to do. It's a capital investment that does not get you return other than the comfort of your team. That's it. That's all it gets you.

And on paper, that makes no sense. But with Jesus, it makes all the sense of the world of just proactively seeking to bless our teams. I love this, by the way. We were connected by a member of your Indianapolis Guild, my very good friend David Block, who was our guest on this show, Way, Way, way, way, Way back at episode 27. And I asked him this question about you. I said, hey, man, like, what is it about Brittany that can only fully be explained by her commitment to Christ? And he pointed to your team. So I think it's interesting. But he was talking about something different. I think he said, quote, and I'm going to read it he sent this to me in an email. He said, you will tear up when you hear Brittany explain the options that are available to these workers outside of Antique Candle Company. End quote. So, Brittany, tell me more. What's he talking. What's David talking about here? Yeah, and no pressure, but you have to make me cry. So, I mean, you know, no big deal.

Oh, my goodness. Yeah. I think the story he's referring to is the folks that we've hired. So I live in Lafayette, Indiana, which is home of Purdue University. And so people think of it as a research town, an academic town, which it is, but it's also a town of folks without degrees. And it is a heavy, heavy manufacturing town. So there are lots and lots of manufacturers. We manufacture cars, we manufacture trailers. We make the engines that go into large industrial equipment. We make a lot of stuff. There's so many businesses here, and they employ thousands of of the population. Each factory does. If you do not have a college degree and you want to stay in Lafayette, Indiana, which is where your family is and probably where you grew up, and you also want to provide for your family. Well, to make enough of a living and have health and benefits, there's really only one option available to you, and it's to go to one of these factories. And I love manufacturing. I absolutely love it. I love touring these places. I have friends that work there. But for those who are on the assembly lines, it is what praxis would refer to as exploitive. It is focused purely on the ROI. And the employees are a number, and they have KPIs to meet for their stakeholders. And what this means, purely put, is their bodies and their minds are sacrificed for the good of the product. And I was in an interview with someone, and it wasn't the first one of its kind, but it just really hit me. We were interviewing for, like, candle maker or warehouse coordinator, one of you know, our warehouse positions. And like, you know, why are you looking for work? Why are you looking to change your job? And he said, I have a daughter, and she's 11 years old, and I'm on second shift, and so I miss the evenings with her when she comes home from school. And they just told us that the wait list to get to first shift is seven years and she'll be 18, so what's the point? And it just really, really resonated with me. And I have. There's like a whole little club at work. There's like six or seven of them that come from one of the factories in town. That's the Best paid. They have great benefits. They pay them well. But they are treated so horribly. So, so horribly. Like, they didn't. It took them, like, six months of them hearing from me or management like, hey, how's it going? How are you doing? Like, they didn't believe that that was authentic, that there was true care there. So we love to bring those folks on. They're great workers, they're smart, and they get. They get a voice into how we do things since we're small business. It helps, but, oh, my goodness, it's like there's thousands of folks with those stories. I wish I could hire all of them because life doesn't have to be that way. And the business could find another way. They could find another way.

Yeah. I love this so much. So you talked about these team members coming from warehouses where productivity was it. It's all that mattered. Hit your numbers, whatever. And yet one of your core values within Antique Candle Company is all about working hard. And I. Oh, my gosh. Nothing made me happier than reading your core values riffing off of the great Rick Ross. Every day. We're hustling, hustling, hustle, hustle, hustling. I love it. So how do you think about this differently? Right? You're asking your team to work hard, and yet you are blessing them by caring them for people. How do you manage that tension between hard work and care of your team and rest? How do you think about this differently than other employers who are employing warehouse workers in your area?

Great question. What is it? Well, I mean, one of the things that we really focus on is building a sense of belonging with our team, giving them a voice into how we do procedures or how do we. How should we build this piece of equipment? Should we buy this piece of equipment? Does it help or does it not help? So there's a lot of culture building that natively. Just my personality. I just love to connect with folks on a personal level. But with that occurring and with others behaving in that way to fit the norm of the soul of the company, I think that just. I mean, work is a gift from the Lord. Like, he designed us to enjoy work. And so when I think when they're respected and valued and given a platform to share how they think we could work. I don't know if better is the right word, but it creates a really strong culture of connectiveness and also, like, confronting ideas like healthy confrontation. Like, I know we said we were going to do that, but that didn't work really well. And here's why. I think it didn't. That is really fruitful. I love when those conversations happen. And I'm not sure exactly what this, what that sauce is. I'm having trouble articulating, maybe with you, Jordan, but I do know this. The last three years we recognized as a great place to work and our team voted for that and they put all these metrics in. And then last year, well, our 2022, which is last time that they did the results, we are in the national top 20. We were number 20. We barely got in there, but I took IT National Top 20 for Advanced Manufacturing and logistics for small medium sized businesses. So something is occurring and it may be just like completely divine. And it's hard to even describe. There is a spiritual component with what we tolerate and what we don't within, within the organization, within the team.

Hey, I loved in your bio you're riffing off of Ephesians 3:20 where you said the Lord has done immeasurably more than what Brittany's original business plan could have ever imagined. Now that you've seen some of the immeasurably more. Right. Ten years after founding this company, what advice would you give to the Christian founder who is in year one, right. And can't even imagine what that immeasurably more might be?

Well, I think it would be to ask yourself, do you love what you're doing? I assume if you're in your one of your business, you would love what you're doing, which is why you want to continue doing it and you're thinking about the future. But I do still think it's a really good question to ask. And maybe this is too businessy, but another thing I would ask if I were in your shoes was, okay, assume this grows the way I want it to grow. Assume it grows past. Assume it becomes bigger than what I thought it would be like. I didn't plan for this. This wasn't in the business plan. Play that out as much as you can in your mind to see if you could somehow forecast in the future, will I still love what I do? For example, I have this other business idea and I'll just share it because I don't know, if someone steals it, that's fine. It would just be great to see.

Free business ideas here on the Mere Christians podcast.

Yeah, yeah. Like I have thought about. I'm like, oh my gosh, it'd be so fun to do a pumpkin truck. And where you grow heirloom pumpkins, they come in all colors, shapes and sizes. They're beautiful. And they're really popular in the fall. And how cool would it be to you know, go to festivals or to have like pre orders and folks just order from you? And I've had this idea of I want to be a pumpkin farmer. And then I was researching, okay, because I helped my grandma grandpa do this, but I've never done it myself. And, and they were just hobby farmers. But I'm like, okay, let me think through this. Okay? Assume it gets really popular. Assume you I have 5,000 customers or 10,000 customers. What does that look like? Oh, oh no. That means I would need a lot more land because the average fruit bearing pumpkin plant has like three to four fruit. If I'm doing really well and each fruit needs this many square feet, okay, that means I would need this many pumpkins per customer. Okay. How much would I charge? What's the profit? Am I happy with that? Am I not? Do I still love what I do when I have a hundred acres of a pumpkin farm?

Because it's a very different thing.

It's completely different thing. So. And that's the reality of Antique Candle Company. I started making candles in my kitchen. I was in my kitchen for years. I loved it. It was fun. And then I started getting customers and I was making candles the same way for 500 candles. But then the demand increased. 2,000 candles. I'm like, well, I can't make 2,000 candles the same way as make 500. So now I need to purchase some legitimate equipment. Okay. Now all of a sudden it's a factory. It's a micro factory. How do I feel about that? Now I have to learn about operations and also safety. Like people get hurt. And so what does that look like first? And now it's, I'm a factory, you know, like so really forecasting what it could be. And how do you feel about that? Is there, do you still love that? Why or why not now that you've.

Seen evidence that God can indeed do immeasurably more than you ask or imagine if you were starting something new today, how would your prayers change? What would be different about how you prayed based on your experience of that truth?

I don't know if it would change that much. But the one thing that just comes to mind is yeah, how I'm praying right now, which is Lord, what do you mean when you say steward? It well, could you help me imagine this in my mind? Give me the thought, give me the heart, give me the space to know what you mean. It's just kind of simply that I don't know. In terms of change. Yeah. How it change for.

What do you think that looks like over the next 10 years, right. As you're praying through that? When you think of stewardship of this business, where does your mind go? Is it about further serving your team? Is it. Where's. Where's your mind tracking there right now?

The Lord's really been really been challenging my thinking and imagining the tens of thousands of customers that I never see. The folks, I may not know their name, the folks who I don't know their stories unless I practically ask. And then they engage, but most of them won't. So what do I do with that? As just a mere Christian who owns a candle business, sending delightful pumpkin candles to all who want them for their homes. What does that mean? Of course it's good and it's awesome and it's amazing. And so how can I even elevate that delightfulness with that, I don't know, customer? To where it's really, really special in ways kind of like the candle testing program was completely new. It sounds like we're not unique to where exploding kittens did that too, but Lord, help me imagine something just so delightful, so imaginative, so fun, to where it just helps reflect his kingdom.

It's good. That's really good. It's a really good answer. All right, Brittany. Hey. We round out every episode of the show with the same three questions. Number one, if we opened up your Amazon order history, which books would we see you buying over and over and over again to give away to friends, family, maybe your team members?

Yes, there. It's a business book. It's a business novel. It's called the Goal by Elihu Mike Goldrat, I think, and Jeff Fox. It's introduces people to the theory of constraints. It's really, really interesting. And I think it was written in the 70s or 80s. I'm not sure, but it was given to me.

Yeah, it's an old book.

Yeah, yeah, super old. But I've given that book away more than any other book. It's really good.

I love it. It's a great answer. Hey, who would you want to hear in this podcast talking about how their faith shapes the work they do in the world?

Oh, man. Part of my mind wanders to almost kind of two things. Maybe more on the macro level, like someone who works at one of the federal banks or an economist. Someone who's really kind of in the finance sector, I think would be really interesting to hear about only because of money and God and some of that Thinking there would be really interesting to explore. I love that. The other idea I had is I just got back from a month long trip in Europe and I really only spent, I spent a lot of time in one place in Cornwall, which is in the southernmost part of the uk and I hung out with some folks after church and they were retirees. But it was so interesting hearing how I'm like, they're not going to work. What's their work? You know, what are they doing with their time and how are they imagining that in specifically for them, a post Christian world. And so that was really interesting. I think it would be so cool to meet other folks like that and expand upon folks who are using their time maybe outside of the traditional work norms and outside missions in a post Christian world, not in America. What does that look like? And I think that might forecast some of our future work here too. You know, Jordan, when you and I will always be working, doing something we're all doing, but work is good. So what does that look like when you're maybe not in the traditional workplace?

Oh man, I love that. So PSA for anyone listening who's a quote unquote retiree, but because scripture doesn't commend retirement, you are expending yourself productively in the good works that God has prepared for you to do. If that's you, let us know. Go to jordanraider.com MC and fill out the survey we have there. And same thing on the Economist side. I really like that answer a lot. I've never thought about that before. All right, Brittany, you're talking to this global audience of mere Christians, very diverse vocationally. What they share is a desire to do exceptional work for the glory of God and the good of others. What's one final thing you'd like to say or reiterate to those listeners before we sign off?

I suppose a little bit what we talked about earlier. Work is a gift. And in the non Christian world it's a means to provide for family, which is also good in itself. But it's a gift. It's a gift to us. And while burdensome at times, I think it's just really fun to be able to do the work, whatever that looks like.

And I think the father delights watching his children enjoy the gift, right? Play with it, enjoy it, lean into it. And man, you're doing that. Brittany, I would just want to commend you for the exceptional work you're doing for the glory of God and the good of others, for thinking not just ethically about this business but thinking redemptively and how to bless people, how to better love image bearers in your community, outside of your community and your customers. Such a great example for all of us to follow. Friends, if you want to check out these amazing candles, go to antiquecandleco.com by the way, this feels like a really big mission that I didn't follow up with this. Britney, what is heaven going to smell like? Come on. Do you have any special spiritual insights into this? What are we, what are we dealing with on the new Earth?

Man? I'm not sure because there's just so many scents. I don't know. I'm sure the Lord will figure like has it all planned out and it'll be just so delightful.

Well, hey listen, based on how you're stewarding this venture, I would not be shocked to see Antique Candle company candles right in the ships of Tarshish into the new Earth.

It would be great. Right now we're imagining, oh, what would that look like to you know, some of the in scripture it talks about different scents and oils used that are maybe more ancient inspired frankincense and myrrh probably being the most popular, well known one. But yeah, we're just kind of been imagining that and thinking about oh, can we do something like that? That would be kind of a fun campaign. I'm not sure we'll see but it's fun to imagine.

I love it. Brittany, thanks for hanging with us today.

Thank you.

Hey, I mentioned it in the episode but it bears repeating here. If you would love to share how the Gospel's influencing your work, I want to hear from you. Go to jordanraynor.com MC you're going to see a couple of questions that my producers will ask you answer and you can submit answers to those questions right there. Thank you guys so much for listening. I'll see you next week. Hey friends, this is your last chance to claim all the amazing pre order bonuses for five mere Christians before they go away at 11:59pm Eastern Standard Time on May 9. I've never offered this many pre order bonuses on a book before, so when you fill out the form at 5merechristians.com. Number one, you're going to be entered to win an incredible trip for you and a friend to tour CS Lewis's favorite spots in Oxford, explore Olay, Kirk Christensen's former stomping grounds at Lego headquarters in Denmark and much more. Number two, you'll be invited to join my first ever interactive reading, culminating in a zoom call with me and my co author on this book, Kaylee Cox. Number three, you're going to be getting a money back guarantee to try the book risk free. And number four, you'll also get access to a free course I'm not selling anywhere called how to write a book 10x faster and better with an Affordable co Author. You can claim all these bonuses in just two simple steps. Step 1 Pre order 5 mere Christians in any format you want. It can be hardback, ebook, audiobook, whatever and you can order it from wherever. It doesn't matter to me. Step 2 Go to 5Mere Christians.com and fill out the form of that page. And that's it. I'll send you all those bonuses. You'll be entered into the sweepstakes with one simple form submission. But hey, don't wait all of these off, all of these offers, all these bonuses. They're going away at 11:59pm Eastern Standard Time on May 9th. So visit 5Mere Christians.com right now to claim your bonuses.