Candles and Fire Safety – What You Need to Know

According to the National Candle Association, candles caused 4% of reported home fires, 3% of home fire deaths within the 5-year period from 2018-2022 within the US. That’s almost 6000 fires and about 74 civilian deaths per year caused by candles, as well as over $250 million in property damage. Ouch!

Those are preventable accidents that could be avoided with better awareness about how to safely burn candles as well as offering safer alternatives to traditional candles. 

Here at Foton, we take candle burning safety very seriously. Heck, we’re teaching people how to play with fire! While Foton Pearled Candles are the safest candles to burn, it’s important to note that since they still burn with real fire. This means accidents can still happen so it’s important to explore candle fire safety tips. 

Candle Fire Safety Tips – How to Avoid Accidents

There are a few warnings written in fine print on candle labels that you may or may not have noticed. Let’s explore these warnings and how they’re designed to affect candle burning safety.

1. Never burn candles on or near anything that can catch on fire. This seems like common sense, but ignoring this warning is nevertheless the most common cause of candle-related fires and resulted in about half of all candle fires from 2018-2022. Accidents happen when a piece of flammable décor or furniture is too close to a burning flame, causing it to catch on fire. Before you light a candle, it’s a good idea to take a quick scan of the area and move the candle to a safe distance from anything potentially flammable.
2. Never leave burning candles unattended. It’s like Murphy’s law that as soon as you leave the room, an unexpected draft comes that could blow something flammable like curtains too close to the flame and potentially cause an accident. Also, what you don’t see, you tend to forget about. This can cause a candle to remain lit longer than recommended, causing it to overheat. Not only is this dangerous by potentially causing the surface such as a wooden table that the candle is sitting on to catch fire, but it can also cause a glass candle jar to shatter and spill hot candle wax.
3. Keep candles out of reach of children and pets. Curious by nature, they tend to get close to candles and burn themselves, or knock the candle over, and potentially into something flammable. Note there are fire safe candles that self-extinguish if accidentally knocked over – more about this property of Foton Pearled Candles below.

What Makes Foton Pearled Candles the Safest Candles to Burn?

Every candle that burns with a real flame can never be completely safe so care should still be taken to avoid accidents. However, there are two primary properties of Foton Candles that makes them the closest things you can get to fire safe candles.

1. They self-extinguish if accidentally tipped over. Normal candles keep burning most of the time if you knock them over. Foton Pearled Candles suffocate the flame when they’re tipped over. This makes them a good fit for homes & locations with chaotic environments – a home with pets like cats or dogs, a wedding or party with lots of guests, etc.
2. The wicks self-extinguish if accidentally left burning – Normal container candles have wicks that are attached to the bottom of the candle jar. This means that if the wax level runs low in the candle jar, the bottom of the candle jar can get very hot and cause the surface that it’s sitting on to catch fire. Foton Pearled Candles have short wicks that are designed to not reach the bottom. Assuming the container is properly sized as per instructions, the melt pool will also never reach the edge of the container. This keeps the jar from heating up and the wick will simply fall over and self-extinguish once it reaches the end of the wick.

 If you’re considering upgrading your candles to Foton Pearled Candles, there are a few candle fire safety tips to keep in mind. 

First, make sure to only use fire safe candle holders. Normally this means a container that’s made from something like ceramic, concrete, metal, or tempered glass, but that’s not the only consideration for Foton Candle containers. In fact, rather than what it’s made of, the primary consideration for a safe container to use for Foton Pearled Candles is the size. We recommend a minimum container size of 4 inches wide at its narrowest part for a single-wick candle. This is to ensure the melt pool will not reach the edge, which prevents the container from heating up or get damaged by the melting pearls.

Another safety consideration with Foton Candles is to keep any decorations you use at a safe distance from the flame. For a standard-size Foton wick, that means the decorations should be at a minimum of 2 inches away from the flame. This will prevent the flame or the melt pool from reaching the potentially flammable decorations.

Whatever the candle type, it’s important to read the manufacturer’s recommendations on the label before lighting up your next candle wick. And if you’re considering Foton Pearled Candles - cheers to playing with fire…safely!

About the Author:

Heidi Stojanovic is one of the sisters and co-founders of Foton. Before launching Foton Pearled Candles, she spent 9 years leading the Research & Development team of a global chemical company. Foton combines her passions for sustainability and using chemistry to solve real-world problems in simple yet clever ways.