Kneading to Bake

Correct, it’s almost always illegal for someone to operate a restaurant in their neighborhood, even a small one. When these services get large enough, they have to answer to regulators. One Bay Area service like this (Josephine) recently got shut down by the health dept because they were growing very quickly.

Self-employment tax includes social security tax. That’s the tax you pay in your quarterly estimated tax payments as a business. If you earn under a certain amount, you don’t need to pay quarterly.

Yes, you need a license and you need to use a commercial kitchen. http://forrager.com/faq/#commercial

I’m sure it will depend on your state laws and what the health or ag dept in your area decides. I doubt that you can do this with a cottage food law, but perhaps some states would allow it.

As long as all of the proceeds go to the nonprofit, usually there is an exemption that you can use: http://forrager.com/faq/#nonprofit

No — that would be considered an indirect sale.

1) I don’t think customers can pick it up from your home. Probably the best thing would be to deliver the items.

2) It would depend on your local zoning laws, since that might increase foot and car traffic in a residential area. Since I just focus on the cottage food laws, I haven’t really tracked resources for commercial food businesses, but the…[Read more]

Since you are making the sale, this is an indirect, out-of-state order. She needs to have a license that will allow indirect and out-of-state sales, which may not be allowed with a TN domestic kitchen license. There’s a very good chance that she will need to open a commercial bakery in order to do this. Unfortunately, I can’t give a definitive…[Read more]

Ashley, you won’t be able to transfer it. You will just need to start up a new business in Florida under their cottage food law, just the same as if you had initially lived there. It’s actually much easier to start a CFO in FL, but also much more restrictive, as you can only sell $15K of product per year.

How to close down your business in GA…[Read more]

Hi! We have a cottage food business in Georgia, but will be moving to Florida in the Summer. How do we stop the business here and start it back up in Florida?

Sales need to be made directly between the customer and producer. A farmers market wouldn’t be able to take orders on the behalf of a vendor. A producer could probably do a paper order (pre-order) one week at the farmers market and collect money then, and then fulfill the order at the next week’s market. But I don’t think anything beyond that…[Read more]

If you can get into a farmers market, that would be a great starting point for all of your items. And also ask around about other markets, like artisanal markets.

Regarding the GF baked goods, I’d say that the success of that is a combination of the GF demand in your area and the types of baked goods you’re offering. Some people have been quite…[Read more]

Hi Lauren, I think that’s totally dependent on what you are selling! For instance, custom cakes are best done from home. What are you planning to make?

Jackie, I’m not aware of the specifics for NV, but everything you said sounds about right. If you are only going to sell one cake per month, then I suggest you save some money and just give away the cake for free.