Sorry if this is a repeat question, I was not able to find anything with the search. I tried /r/history first but didn't really get any answers. I would love to know what the average Chandler's life was like. Did have their own shops that had their own places of work or was it more like going from house to house making candles for the residence? Were they able to carve out a good living? And I've read in a few places a vague reference to scented candles also being a thing (like bay leaves, rosemary, lemon verbena), is this something that would be fairly common for the gentry to have?
Thank you!
I can help a little, here. First, someone who's called a chandler in the 1850's might be selling naval stores- rope, tar, sailcloth, etc.- to ships in a port city.
However, as far as candlemaking goes, not sure about England, but it's one of the trades listed in Diderot's Encyclopedia. It's listed under cire ( wax). You can look at the plates online here and the article on Chandelier ( candle maker) here.
As you can see, it could benefit from economies of scale and specialization- someone in a large town could have a lot of big molds, large pots for melting, jigs for holding many wicks for dipping, and workers who did nothing but make candles and so were quite skilled and fast. They could produce many candles for sale and sell them in a shop, as they would have a large market. But it's not a trade that's inaccessible: there are few tools involved in the basic dipping of candles. Anyone in the country who kept bees could be dipping candles as well for their small local market.