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Ervin Jason

  • Jon Flores posted an update in the group California 9 years, 12 months ago

    Hey everyone! I’m new to Forrager but have been a CFO owner for about 6 months now. I’m working to build my customer base and wanted to see if anyone could give some advice. My company, Lush Cupcake Creations, is working to reestablish itself in the community with a more specified audience (business owners) to coincide with the labor intensive…[Read more]

    • I’ve heard that the utility of Facebook is now pretty limited due to their paywall restrictions. I’ve heard that Yelp is pretty good at reaching out. However, since it sounds like you’re trying to sell to businesses, I don’t think there’s going to be any replacement for cold calling and tons of effort.

      I see you’re in Santa Barbara. Isn’t there a…[Read more]

      • Well I’m not really in Santa Barbara. I’m about an hour north of there. The big advantage of being in this area us the heavy support for small local business. Coming from the thousand oaks area I was shocked to see suck a huge town with Vertu little corporate exposure across multiple industries. We plan to market ourselves addy the local mall, a…[Read more]

  • Some counties require every single label with ingredient lists for each and every final product and variation you could possibly make, but I think Sacramento is a little more relaxed about that. However, they may have changed their policy about that, especially considering the fact that their application now asks for “specific foods”. This is one…[Read more]

  • I agree that it doesn’t make sense from a practical standpoint, but I wouldn’t go so far as to call it discrimination. Although your kitchen has been inspected, a commercial kitchen has to adhere to hundreds of other requirements that your kitchen does not. I don’t think the shipping restriction stems from a food safety concern… rather, it’s a…[Read more]

  • David replied to the topic Selling online in the forum California 10 years ago

    It’s not possible to do what you’ve described by using your home kitchen. You can either do this with your home kitchen and sell in-state (you can sell online, but shipping is not allowed) by following the cottage food law described on this site. If you want to sell nationwide, you need to use a commercial kitchen and adhere to a different set of…[Read more]

  • Thanks for the quick response David. As far as the shipping restrictions ,for our direct sales, I agree! The Health Department has inspected my kitchen, as they would a commercial kitchen, and their roll is food safety….right? Not allowing us to ship and allowing a business with a commercial kitchen to is kind of a discrimination. Thier roll…[Read more]

  • I’m not sure if there’s a definitive answer for this question yet. From what I’ve heard over time, it’s likely that although you can’t ship to the wholesaler (or any other customer), the wholesaler can sell your product by almost any means, including shipping it. It still doesn’t make sense to me why Class B CFOs cannot ship their products within…[Read more]

  • Since it has cream in it, it’s unlikely that it will be allowed. Often fudge is made with evaporated or condensed milk, and it’s possible that a fudge recipe made with cream would not be allowed.

    But really, it’s entirely up to your environmental health dept to decide. If they aren’t familiar with the law, then they can seek guidance from someone…[Read more]

  • I have a class B permit and a wholesale customer would like to include my packaged & labeled cookies in their gift basket which they ship. Is this okay?

  • Trephena posted an update in the group California 10 years ago

    Can someone please advise..

  • Trephena posted an update in the group California 10 years ago

    I have a nonprofit where we donate homemade meals. Do I need to follow the cottage food laws?

    • No, full meals don’t fall under the cottage food law. There is an exemption for donating certain types of food, but I don’t think a nonprofit can donate meals unless they’re properly licensed and using a commercial kitchen. You should talk to your county’s health dept about this.

  • I’m not sure if you need some sort of certification for gluten free labeling, though I do know that there are certain quantities that you need to stay under. By making this health claim, you need to place a nutrition facts panel on your label, which is an extra expense and process.

    Labeling a product as organic can be very complicated and…[Read more]

  • David replied to the topic pancake mix in the forum California 10 years, 1 month ago

    I really don’t know, as this is a sourcing issue that health depts in CA seem to be very particular about, especially since you’re sending an ag-based product across state lines into CA. If you followed the appropriate regulations to legally get your raw wheat it into CA (may not be possible), then your sons would have to check with the…[Read more]

    • Honey certification – my husband is a beekeeper and we sell our honey to family and friends in jars and all but when we go to markets they tell us that we have to get our honey certified to be able to sell at stores. I’ve been trying to contact people but everyone seems to be unaware of the requirements they keep giving me different numbers or…[Read more]

      • Yes, you should be able to use the cottage food law and you would need to get a simple inspection to sell at stores. Contact your environmental health dept to learn about the process in your area to get a class B cottage food permit.

      • Is it home inspection? Or warehouse inspection? What is the inspection process ? I’m calling everyone and no one seems to know… They seem to pass the ball.

      • Your health dept should be inspecting the facilities where you are making your product. Usually this is your home kitchen and they may require that it be only your home kitchen. Technically, the law is written in such a way that requires all processing to take place in the home kitchen. The inspection is usually pretty easy… just try getting…[Read more]

      • It’s confusing because as I read restrictions or limitations it says you can’t be cooking or handling while doing any house duties or have children around etc that’s why we were planning on renting a small warehouse to extract the honey and put it in jars and store and all my kitchen wouldn’t be big enough for that? Please help

      • Once the home kitchen isn’t sufficient for your business’ needs, that’s the point where you would move beyond the cottage food laws and become a commercial food processor like most of the honey producers in the state. Usually you’d contact the health dept about that, but maybe the ag dept manages honey production.

  • I believe that if the egg whites are cooked to a certain temperature, it will pass the non-potentially hazardous test, but you should check with local health authorities to confirm that the recipe is acceptable.

  • At least in San Diego and Orange County, you can use online calculators or laboratory testing for determining your nutritional value if you’d like to include a label. We’ve found there are easy to make/print nutritional labels at http://www.onlinelabels.com

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