Is Candles By A Dad Woke?

Company Overview

Candles By A Dad is a family-run candle company in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, founded by Keaton Davis, a husband and father of two who started pouring candles in his own kitchen. The origin story is a family health crisis turned business: after his wife Ashley was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, the family overhauled every product in their home, and Keaton learned that traditionally made candles can put heavy metals, endocrine disruptors, and carcinogens into household air. He threw out his own beloved candle collection, then spent months of research, trial and error, and, in his words, lots and lots of wax, building a candle that smelled great without the toxins. What began as a hobby is now a full Shopify business with seasonal collections, wholesale accounts, and a charitable project run alongside it.

The catalog is organized into Everyday, Spring + Summer, and Fall collections of 7-ounce candles at $20 and wax melts at $8, with scents like Tennessee Leaves, Tennessee Sunset, Dad's Favorite Flannel, Great Smoky Mountains, Cowboy Boots, and Seaside Cottage. Ashley is the co-founder in practice — Keaton credits her social-media talent and go-getter attitude for the business's growth, alongside her roles as a stay-at-home mom, founder of The Mom Walk Collective in Murfreesboro, and operator of her own side brand, Ryman + Co. The candles are stocked in six-plus Middle Tennessee retail shops, from The Country Gourmet in downtown Murfreesboro to Heart and Hands in Franklin.

ESG & Sustainability

Candles By A Dad publishes no ESG report and runs no corporate sustainability program. Its environmental claims are product-level and verifiable: 100% USDA soy wax described as American-grown, which the company calls eco-friendly and carbon-neutral; cotton wicks with no metal core; and fragrance or essential oils certified clean of carcinogens, mutagens, reproductive toxins, organ toxins, and acute toxins.

That is the honest small-business version of sustainability — material choices stated plainly, with no carbon audit attached. The company's practical footprint is a home workshop, regional wholesale deliveries, and recyclable glass tins; nothing is billed as a climate campaign. Shoppers who want cleaner-burning candles without a corporate sermon get exactly that.

DEI Programs

There are no DEI programs, no diversity officers, no hiring quotas, and no identity-based marketing at Candles By A Dad. The company's entire public identity is family: a dad who makes candles, a mom who builds the community side, and two kids who appear in the brand's story. Its team page would fit on an index card.

The shop's inclusion story is geographic and economic rather than ideological — a Murfreesboro family business selling through other Murfreesboro family shops, with pricing kept at $8 to $20 so ordinary households can afford non-toxic candles. That is Main Street economics, not activism.

LGBTQ+ Advocacy

The brand has no Pride collection, no Pride-month marketing, no sponsorships of LGBTQ+ organizations, and no HRC Corporate Equality Index participation. June on the shop's calendar looks like every other month: new scents, farmers-market pop-ups, and restocks of the fall line when the season turns.

The company's only public advocacy runs through its own charity, described below, which is aimed at NICU families and pregnancy loss — causes chosen from lived experience rather than from a corporate cause-marketing calendar.

Political Activity

No PAC, no lobbying, and no candidate activity exists at any level of this business. What Candles By A Dad does with its platform is deeply personal rather than political: The Holding Hope Project, a family-run fund supporting high-risk pregnancy, NICU, and pregnancy-loss families at Ascension Saint Thomas Rutherford in Murfreesboro and Saint Thomas Midtown in Nashville. The project grew from the Davises' own 87 days of antepartum bedrest and 46-day NICU stay after their daughter Lorelai was born at 31 weeks, and it funds care carts, sibling crafts, and books for hospital families. Ten dollars from every Wave of Light custom candle goes directly into the fund, and the family states plainly on the donation page that they are not yet a 501(c)(3) and donations are not tax-deductible — a level of disclosure most corporations would never offer.

The project's language is openly faithful — hope in the darkest of places, pointing to the One who carried us through — which tells shoppers exactly whose values they are supporting without a single partisan word.

Consumer Impact

Candles By A Dad scores 1 out of 100 on the woke scale. It is a clean-profile Tennessee family business doing things the old way.

• Buy for genuinely non-toxic formulation: USDA soy wax, metal-free cotton wicks, and certified-clean fragrance, at $20 per 7-ounce candle and $8 per wax melt.
• The fall line — Tennessee Leaves, Tennessee Sunset, Cowboy Boots, Great Smoky Mountains — doubles as a Tennessee-gift store in a jar.
• Ten dollars of every Wave of Light candle funds The Holding Hope Project for NICU and pregnancy-loss families — a real, disclosed, non-tax-deductible family ministry.
• Shop locally at six-plus Middle Tennessee stockists, or order direct with e-gift cards and bulk custom options for events.
• Private candlemaking workshops are bookable for groups — a hands-on team or party option almost no national candle brand offers.

The bottom line: a dad in Murfreesboro pouring clean candles for his family and yours, a mom building the community around them, and a charity born from their own NICU story. No ESG, no DEI, no Pride, no politics — just family business done right. Values shoppers can light one up with a clean conscience.