Bees wax could also used as wax seals, added with some coloring materials, in pre-modern Europe, so the use of bees wax was not limited to candles. On the other hand, wax other than bees, such as tallow (animal fat), could be also used for candles for non-liturgical use. The following passages is a very rough summary of the case of Later Medieval Swedish Church (Husberg 1994), and I'm afraid that the situation might have been different in other part of medieval Europe, and especially for tallow candles.

Beekeeping was also widely practiced across medieval southern Scandinavia (Denmark and Sweden), and since 13th century law books and other texts like land register have sometimes includes the regulation of beekeeping as well as bee ownership - in medieval Danish laws, as it had been in Roman law, bee was regarded as a kind of wild animals, and when the bee swarms moved from the land of person X to person Y, the laws recommend the original owner (X) and the new owner of the land where the bee moved to (Y) to negotiate the terms in partnership of beekeeping (Tamm & Vogt eds. 2016: 30f.). After the Reformation, Swedish crown (the early Vasas) also introduced systematic beehive administration (lotte-biodling) in their royal manors (Husberg 1994, Chap. 6).

One of the main primary source for Husberg's study was the accounting records of some later medieval Swedish churches, and he confirms the following facts in the records:

• Pre-Reformation Swedish church indeed bought large mass of bees wax annually: While the cathedral of Uppsala purchased ca. 200 kg of bees wax in the end of the 15th century, even local church (Kumla kyrka in Östergötland, SE Sweden) bought 15-35 kg of bees wax per a year (Husberg 1994: 81-83, 343)
• Expenditure for bees wax also amounted to 83% of the total purchase of Kumla Church in the year 1422 (Husberg 1994: 84)
• Husberg identifies at least 8 of 13 bees wax seller of the Kumla Church for the year 1423 within its parish - in short, the wax sellers mainly came from the very local milieu, and the trade was mainly conducted out of the market. He confirms this pattern also in the entry of the year 1495 (Husberg 1994: 88-90). This find has replaced the traditional view that Swedish churches mainly used the imported bees wax.
• Neither candles nor tallow rarely (or not at all) appear in their accounting records before the Reformation, but in the late 16th century (after the Reformation), the expenditure for tallow surpassed that for bees wax: Taking the price difference between these two kind of wax (bees wax costed 3 times as tallow) into consideration, we can say that post-Reformation Swedish church began to buy much more tallow than bees wax then (Husberg 1994: 94f.).

These entries found in accounting records and the analysis suggest that both pre-Reformation and post-Reformation Swedish church made it rule to buy wax/ tallow and made candles for their own liturgical use by themselves.

On the other hand, the lay people were expected to pay money for the cost of such candles in lawbooks:

'The one who provides full billeting shall give the priest two örtugar (money unit) for candles at a wedding and candles at churching after a child's birth and offering if she wishes. he one who does not provide full billeting shall give one örtug for wedding and for churching.......' (The Västgöta law: Laurentius' book, Chap. 19, in: Lindkvist trans. 2021: 175).

Anyway, there seems to have been little or no room for the candle maker's guild to involve at least with the alleged trade of liturgical candles of bees wax in medieval Sweden. We should also taking the possibility into consideration that not only the church institution, but also individual persons could make candles domestically - though as for latter's case, preferably with cheaper material like tallow.

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[Added]: In addition to sealing wax, I forgot to the third popular use of bees wax in medieval Europe above - as a wax model/ mold for non-iron blacksmithing. To give an example, the blacksmith used the lead and the (bees) wax to make a mold for the 'serial' production of metal accessories. While clay mold had been one-time use, both lead and bees wax could be melted and recycled again. Pedersen argues that this kind of market-oriented 'serial production' of metal accessories had already begun in Viking Age Scandinavia. In turn, this kind of use of bees wax also suggests that the non-iron blacksmiths like gold smiths and their guild could be another candidate buyer of bee wax in medieval Europe.

References:

• Lindkvist, Thomas (ed. & trans.). The Västgöta law. London: Routledge, 2021.
• Tamm, Ditlev & Helle Vogt (eds. & trans.). The Danish Medieval Laws: The Laws of Scania, Zealand and Jutland. London: Routledge, 2016.

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• Husberg, Erik. Honung, vax och mjöd: Biodlingen i Sverige under medeltid och 1500-tal. Göteborg: Department of History, University of Gothenborg, 1994.
• [Added]: Pedersen, Unn. "Viking-Period non-ferrous Metalworking and Urban Commodity Production." In: Viking-Age Transformations: Trade, Craft and Resources in Western Scandinavia, ed. Zanette T. Glørstad & Kjetil Loftsgarden, pp. 124-38. London: Routledge, 2017.