Get ready to heave a major sigh of disappointment, because what was supposed to be a joyful, lighthearted shopping experience with a small business has turned into an annoying, near-stalkerish nightmare: This handmade candle maker has sent you 14 different updates in the past hour about the $17 candle you ordered.
Not cool. So much for “Relaxing Chamomile Peach Butter.”
Ever since you clicked “order” to purchase a single handmade candle you saw a friend share on their Instagram story, what was meant to be a fun impulse buy that supported a small artisan has turned into a mental health emergency. After picking out a candle from Puremood Candleworks’ webstore and paying $17 plus shipping by using the code WAXOFF to save 10%, you’ve been absolutely bombarded with unnecessary, redundant emails, texts, and even push notifications from some app called ShopNow which you deeply regret installing.
Being that there’s a lot of important stuff going on at work this week and you’re waiting to hear back about a friend’s cancer screening results, you can’t exactly silence your phone, which means that you’re now forced to feel it vibrate with each and every order confirmation, order processing update, and shipping notification for this candle, which for some reason are being sent to you in triplicate. Not only are important work emails getting buried in your inbox by superfluous ones with subject lines like, “Your candle is being poured!” and coupon codes for your next order (already?), but you also keep receiving notifications that you have 17 “NowPoints” (whatever the hell that is), which apparently amounts to 29 cents off your next purchase of the same exact type of candle you just bought.
Yep, you are now officially living in small retailer hell.
Whether this candle maker is grossly overestimating how important this one sub-$20 purchase is to you or they just use some weird order processing software that they haven’t quite calibrated correctly is unclear, but what is absolutely certain is the fact that your buying experience for this purportedly “relaxing” candle has been anything but. We’re hoping that the day your Relaxing Chamomile Peach Butter candle arrives on your doorstep means the end of this hellish ordeal—but you may also want to prepare yourself for the possibility that Puremood Candleworks is planning to overwhelm you with updates on their latest candle offerings, 2x NowPoints events, and requests for reviews for the rest of eternity.
