Some of you may have heard whispers of change through the rumour mill, which we’ve discovered moves at the speed of light! So we thought it was time to address the speculation directly to ensure false rumours aren’t being spread.
This is a decision that we’ve been mulling over for more than a year, and it hasn’t been made lightly.
This is a bit of a long read, but here goes!
First and foremost…
We are NOT closing down
But we are changing directions.
Navigating through these last couple of years with all the seemingly never-ending price increases, product availability (or lack thereof), insane shipping bills and stresses of operating through COVID, has brought into focus what is really important to us –
Keeping our business sustainable as a “small family business” – this is super important to us. We started out as a small family business and that’s exactly what we want to be. We don’t have ambitions of being a big organisation with lots of staff members. Being a small “owner operated” business means our customers are dealing with a person who truly cares – no one will care about a business as much as the person who owns it, and I think this shows in our level of customer service and how fast we ship our orders out (even though it sometimes means we have to get up at 1am to start packing orders!)
Fragrance is our passion – without a doubt this is my favourite part of the business, and I feel like it’s the core of our industry. Smelling new samples, sharing fragrance suggestions and testing how they perform in soap are the things I most look forward to and the thing that brings me joy.
Which is why we will be transitioning to:
Selling only fragrance and essential oils (and a very limited range of carrier oils/solvents).
As we run out of ingredients over the next few weeks and months, we won’t be restocking them.
What products are we keeping?
ALL fragrances oils
ALL essential oils
Fractionated Coconut Oil
Sweet Almond Oil
Reed Diffuser Base Oil
Ethanol
Isopropyl
Why are we changing?
Many of our ingredients are imported directly from the USA and Asia, and I’m sure you’ve all noticed the shipping delays and price increases – this is one of the major reasons why we’ve chosen to become a fragrance house rather than a “one stop shop” for soap and candle making. Instead of splitting our time and money between hundreds of different products, we will have a single focus – fragrance and essential oils. All our time and resources will go towards learning about, investing in and supplying you with the largest range and best quality premium fragrance in New Zealand.
I’m sure you’ve all heard the saying “Jack of all trades, Master of none”
Well we are going to be the MASTER OF FRAGRANCE!
We already have the largest range of fragrance oil in the country, and it’s about to get much bigger! As our other range of ingredients drop away, and we free up space in our warehouse, you’ll see our selection of fragrances grow, and grow… and we are SO EXCITED about it!
TIMELINE
When is all this happening?
We don’t have any fixed dates, as the timing largely revolves around how fast we go through our stock on hand and how much warehouse space we are freeing up, but this is a general guideline for how we expect things to progress, please be aware that we may run out of certain products sooner than we anticipate so we can’t guarantee all ingredients will be available for as long as we think.
But a rough estimation based on current stock levels –
Common soap making ingredients such as coconut oil, castor oil, shea and cocoa butter, and caustic soda will start to run out quickly (within weeks)
GW464 soy wax – before Christmas, if not sooner
Wicks and accessories – several months for most sizes.
Glassware – several months for most styles.
We have a pretty good supply of other raw ingredients such as micas, epsom salt, citric acid, SLSa and various other items, however certain other ingredients such as baking soda and beeswax are running very low.
We are anticipating moving to our new fragrance focused website in early 2023.
Important Information
As part of this transition we are completely overhauling our website. We’re are making the switch from WooCommerce to Shopify. What this means for you: When our new website goes live you will need to reset your password to access your account. We’re unsure at this stage if all your past order history can be transferred over – more information to come as we setup and learn to navigate Shopify!
New rewards program – we are going to be scrapping our current rewards program and setting up a much simpler system (no more confusing levels) What this means for you: We will transfer over any reward points balances to our new system, however you might like to redeem your points now while you still have access to our full range of products.
When we make the switch to our new website in early 2023 it will only have our new product range, however we anticipate that we will still have remaining stock of several products. We’ve set up a new “clearance” website where you will be able to purchase any of these items. We’ll let you know the website in a few weeks so you can check it out and maybe even score an early bargain! What this means for you: This new website is very basic – there is no past account history, no free shipping, no further discounts or coupons and we can’t combine shipping with any purchase made at Zen Aroma – this is a completely stand alone website.
We will be sending out more information on all of these subjects as we near closer to the time.
Summary
We know this news is not going to be welcome by many of you, and for that we sincerely apologise. We are fully aware that you have come to rely on us for your ingredients to keep your businesses and hobbies operating. Which is why it was such a agonizing decision to make, and one that I went back and forth on for months.
Changing direction to be a fragrance house is something that I’ve been dreaming about, and desperately wanting to do for a few years now, and I finally found the courage (with a big push from all the COVID related issues) to follow through with my dream.
I genuinely believe that if I can zero my focus in on the thing that I’m truly passionate about, then our business will thrive and it will be a good thing not only for us, but all of you as well.
Sadly, I think we all knew this was coming. The knock on effect of so many people having to self isolate means courier companies don’t have the staff to either collect or deliver parcels in certain areas.
While the situation is changing daily, these are some general guidelines given to us by the courier companies to help you navigate these challenging times
Please allow an extra 3-4 days for any freight being delivered within Auckland, although we anticipate that these delays may increase next week.
As a result of re-allocating our fleet and depot resources, effective immediately, we will not be making any same day deliveries in Auckland.
Use the web based tracking tool to check the delivery status of your shipment, and please avoid calling the couriers to check a delivery unless it is significantly delayed.
Note that we are now using Contactless Pickup and Delivery procedures and applying ATL to all residential deliveries. ***
*** If you are not comfortable with your parcel being left without your signature, please provide an alternate (work or friend/family) address where your parcel can be delivered safely.
Network Status
NZ Couriers has a tool where you can check their current network status – please click the link to see the status for your area.
PBT is currently working on a network status tool which is due to be released next week
At this stage PBT have informed us that they are not servicing (no pickups and no deliveries) these areas:
Run 21 – Remuera Area Run 45 – Meadowbank, St Johns area Run 74 – Karaka , Drury, Redhill Area Run 61 – Papakura, Ardmore – Area Run 40 – AKL CBD
If you are in any of these areas PBT will be unable to deliver your parcel until they can arrange relief drivers. Please select NZ Couriers.
We ask that you be patient and understanding during this difficult time. I know we’re all well and truly sick of life under COVID and can’t wait to return to better days.
As of 6 September 2021 we have made the decision to permanently close our retail shop.
We are NOT closing down! Our website will be operating as per usual
Many of our local customers would already have been aware we had decided to close our retail shop at the end of this year, but with this latest round of lockdowns we decided to bring that forward and not re-open once we go back to Alert Level 1.
I know so many of you will be disappointed by this decision, but after long discussions with our family we know we’ve made the right decision for our health, and for the business as a whole.
We operate as a very small family business. Most of the time it’s just myself (Kirsty) and Lynn processing the orders (and doing the other million jobs that come with running a business), with Rob and Jess working part time to fill our stock.
When the retail shop gets busy (as is often the case these days), our online orders have to wait until our shop closes for us to get a chance to process them. This has resulted in outrageously long working hours for us (Lynn especially). It’s no exaggeration to say we often work in excess of 70 hours per week to maintain our same day order processing service.
By closing the retail shop that means we are now all fully focused on your online orders, and our workload should be cut back significantly by not having to restock shelves in the shop.
Click and Collect
You can absolutely still come and collect your order. We will be moving the click and collect area to the front of the building. Through the glass doors (you will be familiar with this area from lockdown)
We will also be setting up all our fragrances in the foyer so you can still smell the entire range as we know this is one of the most important aspects of visiting our shop.
We will be giving priority to click and collect orders.
We aim to have any click and collect orders processed and ready to collect within 30 minutes, although this isn’t guaranteed as when we get super busy we often don’t get back to the computer to check new orders as frequently.
** All click and collect orders must be paid for before collection. If you opt to pay via bank transfer we must be able to confirm the funds are in our account before you take your order away
** EFTPOS will NOT be available
I’d like to take this opportunity to thank all of our customers, but especially our loyal locals. The ones who have been visiting us for years and support us above all others. Lynn and I have enjoyed getting to know you, learning names, seeing your kids grow up and sharing your excitement when you show us your projects. We hope you’ll still come in to collect your orders and have a chat 🙂
We’ve noticed since the 49th Amendment to the IFRA standards many of our fragrances have had major usage rate changes. Fragrances that used to have a maximum usage rate of 3% for category 4, now have a maximum rate of 5-10 times that! Or conversely, fragrances you used to be able to use at 5% have now dropped below 1%
In a nutshell, the 49th amendment revised the methodology and risk assessment for fragrance ingredients and devised a new way to assess toxicity.
What is IFRA? The International Fragrance Association (IFRA) is an organization that publishes a set of standards for fragrance & essential oil material use in body-care products. Its main purpose is to ensure the safety of fragrance materials through a dedicated science program.
How are IFRA usage rates calculated? This is a pretty complicated formula. Every ingredient that makes up a fragrance needs to be checked against the IFRA standards database to see the maximum % in a finished product. There are 12 categories, and each category may have a different percentage.
You can see Category 9 (soap) has a usage restriction of 4.9%
Now this doesn’t mean you can only use 4.9% of a fragrance that contains Eugenol, because a fragrance might contain only a small percentage of Eugenol – for example our Honey & Wildflowers fragrance has 2.4737% Eugenol
So, according to IFRA we are allowed 4.9% Eugenol in category 9 products.
Our fragrance only contains 2.4737% total Eugenol, that means for this particular fragrance there are no restrictions due to the Eugenol amount since technically our fragrance could contain 4.9%
You can see Category 9 (soap) has a usage restriction of 0.52%
Our Honey & Wildflowers contains 6% – this is well over the maximum usage restriction. What that means is you have to use less fragrance in your product, which is where the IFRA certificate maximum usage rates apply.
Because of the coumarin in Honey & Wildflowers, the maximum usage rate for category 9 products would be 8.66%
That means the maximum usage rate for category 9 products would be 0.64356% – which as you can see by our IFRA certificate is the correct rate. If this particular fragrance DIDN’T contain p-Methoxybenzaldehyde, then it’s maximum usage rate would have been 8.66% because the coumarin was the next lowest percentage (for category 9.)
You need to go through every ingredient to check the percentages for each of the 12 IFRA categories – if each ingredient contained in the fragrance is below the maximum percentage in the IFRA standard then there will be no restrictions on the fragrance use.
Important things to remember Every time a fragrance is reformulated – even if it’s only slightly, a new IFRA certificate will be required. Keep in mind that just because a fragrance used to have a certain usage rate, it might change in the future due to formulation changes which are happening more frequently at the moment due to raw material shortages.
IFRA Usage rates ARE NOT recommended usage rates!
Just because a fragrance has a IFRA Maximum Rate of 40% for Category 4/5 (lotions, body creams etc) DOES NOT mean you need to use that much. It just means that according to the IFRA standards the ingredients that the fragrance contains are safe to use to that percentage.
Absolutely no way would you ever use 40% fragrance in any body lotion recipe. And just because Category 12 (candles) has a usage rate of 100% that doesn’t mean you can light a puddle of fragrance on fire!
IFRA certificates are there to give you safety information, not formulation percentages.
Why Can I Use More Fragrance in Lotion than I can in a Soap!?
This is a great question, and one I have actually been asked by a customer. It doesn’t seem to make much sense, but it all comes down to the individual ingredients and their IFRA standard restrictions.
Here’s an example – Aloe & White Lily (clips from the IFRA certificate)
Here you can clearly see Category 4 and 5A has higher usage rate than Category 9.
If we do the calculations for each ingredient in the Aloe & White Lily fragrance you can see why – this is a spreadsheet of all the ingredients contained in Aloe & White Lily and calculated against the maximum rates on the IFRA Standard (49th Amendment) The red numbers are the ingredients with the lowest percentage which gives you the IFRA maximum usage.
I know it’s a little hard to see, and there are a lot of numbers on this chart, but according to all the current IFRA standards you can in fact use 100% Aloe & White Lily in lotions and only 18.28% in Soaps (remembering we would never actually use these amounts)
* Please note – Many of our IFRA certificates are still using the 48th Amendment at this stage. These will gradually be updated to the 49th Amendment standards as we receive new stock and/or fragrances are reformulated. So if you have a copy of an IFRA certificate from us that says it is 48th Amendment or old, please get in touch so we can advise you on the most up to date information.
I’m sure many of you have noticed over the last several months our logo branding has changed to ‘Zen Aroma’
We wanted to change our name to something that reflects what we believe is the most important part of candle, soap and body care products… fragrance.
So our new name keeps our familiar Zen brand, but incorporates our love of fragrance.
This is something we’ve been working on for quite some time and we’re almost ready to release our newly made website.
What this means for you…
We have to close down our old website in order to migrate everything to the new one, so
At 5.00 PM FRIDAY 19 MARCH our website will be shut down for maintenance for 24 hours.
Our new website www.zenaromaold.wpengine.com will replace our existing www.zendesigns.co.nz website and will be live at
5.00 PM SATURDAY 20 MARCH
During this time you will be unable to access our website at all. So if you need supplies, please order them before Friday.
Once our new website is live, you can go ahead and place an order as usual. All your account details will be migrated across so your user name and password details will work on the new site.
We’ll be setting up redirects so if you forget our new website name you will automatically be sent over to our new one.
We have been preparing for this change for a long time and we hope things will go smoothly, but in my experience things rarely go without a hitch when dealing with technology!
If you do experience any issues with our new website, please let us know. I’m sure we’ll be squashing bugs on the new website over the coming few weeks.
We have a lot of new content on our new website, including help and support pages and a growing list of calculators to help you formulate.
I hope you all love the new website as much as we do and we look forward to showing off the new features over the coming few weeks.
As be are based in Tauranga, we are in the very fortunate position of being in Level 3 as of this morning.
This means we are fully operational to process all online orders. Our current processing time is still our usual same day service for all orders placed before 12pm. Please note that couriers are under extreme pressure, not only due to increased work load, but the added delays of navigating the border closures between us and Auckland.
Please be patient. Our courier delivery times are guidelines. These are usually accurate during the best of times, but we are under unusual circumstances so please allow the courier companies a little leeway, we’re all doing the best we can.
CLICK & COLLECT
Our retail shop remains closed. However we are operating click and collect.
Many of you will know from our previous lockdowns our click and collect area is at the front of our building – at the other end of where our shop is located (Incidentally, this is where our click & collect will be permanently located once we close our retail shop for good at the end of this year.)
When you place an order for click and collect, you will receive an email when your order is ready. We aren’t allocating specific collection times this time around, however we will be operating a “one in, one out” policy. If you arrive to collect your order and you see another person inside the glass doors, please wait outside.
Click & Collect Guidelines:
1) Please come to the glass doors at the very front of the building (just inside the driveway.) We have a Click & Collect table just inside the front door.
2) Once you receive the email saying your order is ready; you can collect at any time during our opening hours which are Monday to Friday 7am – 1pm
3) When you arrive please wait outside if you see another person inside the front doors. We are operating a one in, one out policy to ensure social distancing.
4) Please scan the Covid-19 QR code if you have the app on your phone. We have a QR poster on the outside of the doors, and another poster inside at the collection table.
5) Orders must be PAID in full before collection – we are not able to process cash or EFTPOS payments.
We look forward to getting back to normal once we go back down to Alert Level 1.
Thank you for your patience and understanding.
Last updated 17 August 2021 7:30pm
WE ARE NOW CLOSED ONLINE AND INSTORE
As I’m sure you’re all very much aware; New Zealand is heading back into Alert Level 4 at midnight tonight for three days (at this stage)
We have made the decision to close completely during these next three days. This means any orders you may have placed from 1pm Tuesday 17 August until 7am Monday 23 August will not be processed.
Although legally we are allowed to operate as an essential services business due to the fact we supply personal care and hygiene products, we have chosen to completely close for the next three days. Our hope is that we will only need to be in Alert Level 4 for three days! If the government decides to extend Alert Level 4 (for Tauranga) longer than three days then we will re-open on a limited basis as we did during the first Level 4 lockdown.
What does this mean? We will enable the ability to shop on our website for items that are essential to make soap and other personal care products which are deemed essential to maintaining your health. You WILL NOT able to buy anything not related to personal care or hygiene such as candle making materials.
What about your retail shop? Our retail shop remains CLOSED and will continue to remain closed for the entire length of the lockdown until we are back to ALERT LEVEL 1
Click & Collect
Alert Level 4 means NO PICKUPS. This includes if we re-open whilst still in level 4 if it extends for more than three days. We absolutely WILL NOT be make any exceptions. Please don’t ask us to do so. The safety of our staff is paramount. We very much appreciate your co-operation.
Once we drop back to lower alert levels we will reinstate click and collect – more information will be posted once we know more details regarding alert levels.
Last updated 14 February 2021 8:00pm
Tauranga is moving back to Alert Level 2 from midnight 14 February 2021.
After carefully reading the rules around retail operations and the requirement to keep customers 2 metres apart we have made the decision to close our retail store until we move back to Alert Level 1.
Our space is very small and it is not possible for us to ensure all visitors can keep 2m apart while inside.
Click & Collect
We have a Click & Collect option for those of you who would like to pick up your order.
Please follow the instructions carefully –
Ordering
Place your order as per usual on the website
At checkout choose the shipping option Click & Collect
Next pick a date you would like to collect by clicking the calendar icon
Once you have selected a date choose from any of the available time slots. Each time slot is 30 minutes so please ensure you collect your order within that time (for example if you choose 7:00am you have until 7:30am to collect) If you don’t see the time you want that’s because it has already been taken.
Collection
The address for collection is 22c Portside Drive, Mt Maunganui
Please come to the glass doors at the very FRONT of the building (just inside the driveway)
Your order will be placed on a trolley just outside the door
Your order will be ready to collect ONLY during your allotted time slot. If you are not able to collect within your time slot, please let us know so we don’t have a clash with another customer coming to collect their order.
Please scan the Covid-19 QR code if you have the app on your phone.
Orders must be PAID in full before collection – we are not able to process cash or EFTPOS payment
12 August 2020 Update…
Tauranga is moving back to Alert Level 2 from midday 12 August 2020.
After carefully reading the rules around retail operations and the requirement to keep customers 2 metres apart we have made the decision to close our retail store until we move back to Alert Level 1.
Our space is very small and it is not possible for us to ensure all visitors can keep 2m apart while inside.
Can I collect my order? No. I’m very sorry but we are unable to offer click and collect at this time. If the Alert Level restrictions extend past the current speculation of Friday 14 August then we will look at implementing a time slot system to ensure pickups are made without chance of interacting with other customers.
We thank you all for your patience and understanding during this frustrating time. No one wanted to be back here so lets all hope for a speedy recovery and swift action to get on top of this thing!
Last updated 12 May 2020 7:00pm
With the move to Alert Level 2 on Thursday 14 May we are now able to start operating a little more normally!
However, there are a few changes we’re putting into place to ensure we can keep things running smoothly.
Is the shop open? Yes! From Monday 18 May our retail store will be re-opening. Please note we will be closed Thursday 14th and Friday 15th May – this is so we can take the time to restock the shelves and do a final clean of the store.
We also have NEW shop hours. We are now open Monday to Friday from 7am to 1pm
(previous hours were 8:30am – 4pm)
We’ve changed our shop hours because we are still running split shifts for our staff, these new hours coincide with our staff roster. It also means you can pop in before work.
Can I collect my order? You sure can. Once you receive an email stating your order is ready for collection, feel free to pop in during our opening hours. Please note: you will not be able to collect your order outside of our shop opening hours of 7am – 1pm
Safety Notice Past visitors to our shop will know that space inside is limited. We ask that if you plan on visiting us, you do so alone if possible. We will be strictly monitoring how many people are inside our shop at any one time so we can maintain 2m social distancing rules. We may need to ask you to wait outside if our shop becomes full to capacity.
Hand sanitiser will be available for use and located on our counter while in store.
Thank you all so much for your support over these past six weeks. We’ve been blown away by how kind and patient you’ve all been during this tough time. We truly appreciate every single order that has been placed with us. We’re a small family business and the community has really come together to show their love and #shoplocal. We will continue to pay it forward with other small businesses in our community and throughout NZ
Last updated 21 April 2020 3:00pm
From 11:59pm Monday 27 April we will be in Alert Level 3. Well done New Zealand for making it through 35 days of relative isolation and online shopping withdrawls! I know my list of “non essential” items that I’ve been hanging out to buy has been growing by the day.
We’re super pleased to announce that we can now sell ALL the items in our store. That means candle makers are back in business!
What happens if I order “non essential” items before Tuesday? Your order will go “on hold” ready to be collected by the courier on Tuesday. We will be processing orders on a first in first out basis. So if you order today your order will be picked and packed first so will be guaranteed to go out first on Tuesday.
If you order a combination of essential and non-essential items your entire order will be placed on hold until Tuesday – we won’t split orders. So if you need soap making supplies this week make sure you don’t add any candle making items to your order.
Is the shop open? No sorry, our physical store remains closed until we move into Alert Level 2
Do you offer ‘Click and Collect’? No sorry, we are unable to implement a ‘non contact’ way for you to collect orders, so we are unable to offer order collections until our store reopens at Level 2
Can I use NZ Couriers/Post Haste? Yes! We will be re-enabling all our courier options so if you prefer to use a different carrier you can choose from PBT or NZ Couriers (and Post Haste in the South Island)
Last updated 31 March 2020 6:30pm
WE ARE OPEN ONLINE ON A LIMITED BASIS
Since the government made the announcement last night about the expansion of supplying essential goods to the public via online shopping we have made the decision to re-open our online store on a limited basis.
We are registered with MBIE and have official confirmation that we are a business selling essential goods
What does this mean? We have enabled the ability to shop on our website for items that are essential to make soap and other personal care products which are deemed essential to maintaining your health. You WILL NOT able to buy anything not related to personal care or hygiene such as candle making materials.
Do I have to be an “Essential Business” to shop? According to the new government guidelines. Anyone in the public is now able to make these purchases.
PLEASE bear in mind that our courier/postal system is still under enormous strain and are dealing with so many extra steps and protocols to ensure they keep their staff and drivers safe. ONLY make a purchase if it is essential to your health or wellbeing during the Alert Level 4 lockdown.
Can I collect my order? NO. Absolutely not. You must stay home and stay safe.
What are you doing to keep your staff safe while working?
We only have one person in our warehouse at any one time. This ensures we are practicing total social distancing.
We are using CDC recommended bleach solutions to keep our work areas clean and disinfected. We also have a supply of isopropyl on hand for our personal use (no sorry this is not for sale)
All our courier pickups and deliveries are “contactless”
Why can’t I choose NZ Couriers when I checkout? At this stage, NZ Couriers has chosen to only deliver to “Essential Service Businesses”. We respect their decision as they’re doing what they feel is right for their staff and company. All parcels will be sent with PBT until we’re informed by NZC that they will accept residential deliveries.
Anything else? Please remember we only have one staff member working to process, pick and pack orders. This means things are probably going to running a little slower than usual. We thank you for your patience and support.
Last updated 26 March 2020 7:30am
WE ARE NOW CLOSED ONLINE AND INSTORE
We have been closely watching all new developments as they’ve been unfolding. As of last night the government has tightened the rules around sending parcels to ‘non essential’ businesses
Because of this restriction we can no longer continue to send out parcels unless you are an official essential services business or part of their supply chain.
We had hoped to continue supplying to all our small businesses and hobbyist crafters, however the rules now in place prevent us from doing so. This is to ensure we can try and stamp out covid-19 as fast as possible so we can hopefully all go back to our daily lives as soon as possible.
What happens if you’ve already placed an order? We will be sending out all existing orders on Thursday 26 March
I’m an Essential Services business, can I still order? Yes! We are still able to send out to these businesses and their supply chains. Please email us directly at [email protected]
When will you reopen? As soon as the government gives us the go ahead. Please check back here for more updates and follow us on social media
Thank you for your understanding. Stay safe out there!
Last updated 24 March 2020
Our online store is remaining OPEN throughout the lockdown period We have made the decision to keep operating during the COVID-19 alert level 4 lockdown.
We have living facilities on site which are now going to be utilized by a member of our staff. They will remain in isolation here at our warehouse for the duration. In essence, our building has now become their home. This means they can continue to process all your online orders. Because they will be working alone, things may take a little longer to process but we are still aiming to ship orders within 1-2 days if possible. We will continue to operate unless we are informed otherwise.
What about your retail shop? Our retail shop remains CLOSED and will continue to remain closed for the entire length of the lockdown until we are advised we can open again.
This means NO PICKUPS. We have already been asked several times to make an exception to this rule since we closed the shop yesterday. We absolutely WILL NOT be make any exceptions. Please don’t ask us to do so. The safety of our staff is paramount. We very much appreciate your co-operation.
We have discounted our shipping rates to a flat fee of $3 for anyone who lives locally with a postcode starting with 311-
Courier Services I have been in touch with both PBT and NZ Couriers. Both are remaining open during the lockdown period. They will of course be prioritizing deliveries to essential services, so you may not get the same speed of delivery that you’re used to, but please be patient and kind with your driver.
Stock Availability We have a large range of stock on hand, but many of our suppliers will be closing for the next four weeks. This means we are likely to run out of some items. Please be patient and know that we are working hard to ensure once things start running normally again we will be ready to receive more stock into our warehouse as it becomes available.
Additional Information I will be working from home during the next four weeks which means I can answer any emails or messages you send through. We will be keeping you all up to date with any further developments.
Please make sure you LIKE our page on Facebook, or follow us on Instagram to ensure you don’t miss any updates.
@zendnz
Lastly, we would like to thank you all for your amazing support not only over these last few weeks as things have been spiraling downwards throughout the country and world, but during the last six years we’ve been open. The support you’ve shown our small business has impacted the lives of my entire family and I thank you all from the bottom of my heart.
Stay safe out there and remember to wash your hands! – Kirsty
Due to the recent events happening with COVID-19 and the increased risk to our staff, we have made the decision to close our RETAIL shop effective from Monday 23 March at 12pm.
We didn’t take this decision lightly, but we are confident it is the right thing to do.
Can I still order? Absolutely! Our warehouse operation is still running at 100%. In fact we’re working harder than ever to ensure all your online orders are being dispatched within hours of your placing the order on our website.
Can I pickup my order from the store if I place it online? No sorry. We have disabled the local pickup option from our website. We want to do our part to help contain the virus spread. This means limiting any non-essential contact with as many people as we can.
How much is the courier fee? We have put a flat rate fee of $3 for all our loyal locals. That means if you have a postcode starting with 311- you won’t pay more than $3 to have your order shipped directly to your door!
How long will my parcel take to arrive? We are shipping out orders almost as fast as they arrive. Depending on the local courier schedule our locals may even see same day delivery. Usually your parcel will be delivered the following day.
When will you reopen? We will be keeping a close eye on the developing situation and following all Ministry of Health guidelines. Once we feel it is safe for us to reopen and the alert level has been lowered we’ll be reopening our doors.
We’ve had so many requests from people asking how to make your own hand sanitiser. The supermarkets and pharmacies are running out of stock due to COVID-19 awareness.
The best thing that you can do to keep yourself safe is to practice good personal hygiene, wash your hands well and try not to touch your face.
Sometimes it isn’t possible to wash your hands when you’re out and about, or maybe you’re concerned about that supermarket trolley or door handle. That’s where having a bottle of sanitising spray in your bag really comes in handy!
Making hand sanitizer spray is actually really easy (making a gel is a bit more tricky) One thing to be aware of though is the actual alcohol content in your isopropyl. You need a minimum of 60% pure isopropyl in order to be an effective sanitiser. If you have a 70% active isopropyl (as opposed to our 99.9% active isopropyl) you will need to use MORE than it states in the recipe.
Combine allantoin and glycerin into a slurry. Make sure the powder has completely dissolved.
Add the slurry to the aloe vera juice and mix
Add the fragrance and isopropyl and mix together
Pour into spray bottle
Notes
Allantoin is added to help soothe and protect your skin. Alcohol can be very drying on the skin. If you don’t want to add allantoin, just increase the aloe vera juice by 0.3g
Substitute any fragrance of your choice
Learn how to reconstitute our 100x Aloe Vera Powder by watching our YouTube video
If you only have Isopropyl 70% strength you will need to use 85g of isopropyl and reduce the aloe vera to 11.2 grams
As much as we love using glass bottles for our oils and fragrances, unfortunately this busy season has highlighted the fact that they are very breakable! I’ve had one too many courier claims to deal with lately, which isn’t fun for me, and it especially isn’t fun for you with the delays that it causes, waiting for the courier to inform me of the breakage, then waiting some more for me to send a replacement!
Over the coming few weeks we’ll be switching our 300ml glass bottles to 250ml plastic bottles. Don’t worry, all the smaller 25, 50 and 100ml sizes will be staying in glass as those little bottles are much stronger than the large bottles and we have far fewer breakages with those sizes.
One of the most common questions I get regarding candle making is “what wax should I use?”
The wax that you should use is entirely dependent on the type of candle you want to make. Are you using a container, or making a free standing candle? Or perhaps you’d like to make a votive candle or wax melts?
Pillar Candles (Moulded Candles)
These are the candles which you make by pouring into a mould, usually made from aluminium or polycarbonate. Pillar candles need to be hard since they don’t go into a container. They need to stand on their own without becoming too soft, or even melting, in the hot sun and while burning.
Container and Tealight Candles
These are the most common type of candle that we make, as such there are a couple of different choices in wax. They are all pretty similar, but have a couple of differences that set them apart.
GW464 has the best fragrance throw of all the waxes and happens to be the easiest to use for consistent results (in my humble opinion!)
CB-Advanced doesn’t have as good a fragrance throw as the GW464, but it is the best wax on the market for achieving smooth finishes with the least amount of frosting.
CB-135 is similar to the GW464 but it is EcoSoya brand. This is a great wax to use if you’re using essential oils in your candles.
Votives
Votive candles are a cross between pillar and container candles. They’re hard, but not hard enough to stand alone while burning which is why you burn votive candles in a votive holder – they “puddle” when burning.
The GW416 has a higher melt point than the other waxes so is perfect for tarts and votives.
Here’s a handy table which outlines the properties of the available soy waxes that we currently stock.
The Christmas season has come around again, scarily fast this year!
We’ve been in the throes of our busiest time of year these last few weeks and I’d just like to say a big THANK YOU to all our customers for being patient and sticking with us throughout some of our more challenging times – The worst of these being our website crashing during our busiest week of the year, or our most frustrating issue this year – running out of stock!
We’re already planning big things for 2016, the first of these is to make sure we have ample stock on hand to supply fragrances in larger sizes – it’s been a long time coming and I’m super excited to be able to finally sell our yummy fragrances in big bottles. Our fragrance shipment is now on the water, the ship left California a couple of weeks ago (after a 3 1/2 week delay!) and is due to arrive early January, so watch this space for larger sizes early next year.
We’ve also got a new product range that we’re going to be launching next year – it’s still a work in progress so I can’t give too much away right now, but it’s going to be awesome! (sorry that was really vague!)
Zen Designs has been open for just over two years now, and it’s been one massive roller coaster of a ride! We’ve continued to grow and hopefully improve (!) all the time. We’re so, so grateful for everyone that supports us and offers their kind words and feedback. We know that you have a choice when it comes to buying your craft supplies so it really means a lot to us that you choose us. We may not be the biggest, or the cheapest, but we always try to make sure our service is the best.
I hope you all have a wonderfully Merry Christmas and a safe and Happy New Year!
– Kirsty, Yasmin and the Zen Designs Team 🙂
IMPORTANT DATES
In order to receive your parcels before Christmas, please order no later than –
South Island – Friday 18th December North Island – Monday 21 December
For locals who would like to PICK UP your order from our shop we will be open until
WEDNESDAY 23rd December 8.30am – 12pm
Store Holiday Opening Hours
Wednesday 23rd December – Open 8.30am – 12pm Thursday 24th December – Sunday 10th January – CLOSED Monday 11th January – Open 8.30am – 4pm (resuming normal opening hours Monday – Friday 8.30am – 4pm)
Holiday Deliveries
While our physical store will be closed until the 11th of January, we will be dispatching online orders made during this time, so don’t worry your order definitely won’t be sitting here for three weeks waiting to send out!
Having so many fragrances to choose from can be a little overwhelming when you’re first starting out. Often people get stuck trying to pick just one or two scents, or want to make sure the fragrances that they choose are going to be a popular choice with their customers, so inevitably we get asked pretty regularly… “what are your best selling fragrances?”
So here it is! In order of popularity, these are our 20 top selling fragrances. This list is dynamic so will change as the popular scents come in and out of favour. Also, it might not show any of our newer fragrances until they’ve been around for a little while and catch up with the old favourites.
