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Nearly every state allows cottage food businesses to operate by exempting certain homemade food operations from state laws that regulate commercial food establishments more generally. However, laws governing the cottage food industry vary widely. Cottage food regulations include, but are not limited to, caps on the dollar amount of cottage foods that may be sold, restrictions on the types of cottage foods that may be sold, restrictions on where cottage foods may be sold, and restrictions on who may sell cottage foods or on what ingredients producers may use to make them. Sales Caps Twenty-seven states cap how much cottage food producers can sell. These caps range from as little as $5,000 for some producers in South Dakota and Wisconsin to $50,000 in several other states (see Table 1). Some states’ sales caps apply only in certain circumstances. For example, South Dakota’s $5,000 sales cap applies only to producers who sell baked goods directly from home.13 Those who instead sell from venues such as farmers’ markets or events face no sales cap but must submit each of their products for safety testing. (Maryland's /year sales cap is $25,000) Food Restrictions Most states allow the sale of only “non-potentially hazardous” cottage foods like cookies, cakes, high-acid canned goods (e.g., jams and pickles), and other items that do not require refrigeration. However, some states also allow the sale of cottage foods that do require refrigeration, such as cheesecakes and cream-filled desserts, under certain conditions. For instance, Iowa, Ohio, Oregon and Virginia have multi-tiered regulatory schemes that allow home-based producers to sell some perishable goods provided they follow more stringent regulations. In Iowa, producers can sell as much non-potentially hazardous cottage food as they would like out of their homes and at farmers’ markets with few restrictions. But if they want to sell perishable baked goods, they must obtain a “home food establishment” license from the government, undergo annual inspections and limit their sales to $20,000 per year. Ohio, Oregon and Virginia allow producers to sell some perishable products with no sales cap and at any venue if they submit to licensing and inspections; Virginia also requires food safety training in some cases. Such multi-tiered schemes give cottage food producers the option of jumping through additional regulatory hoops in exchange for more freedom in the kinds of foods they can sell. At the same time, they provide less onerous regulatory options for those who just want to sell certain cottage foods that do not need refrigeration. North Dakota and Wyoming—the states with the freest homemade food laws—have legalized the home production and sale of nearly all foods (except for some meat products) without any sort of government license or inspection. North Dakota’s food freedom law is more restrictive than Wyoming’s in that it, among other things, prohibits online and phone sales. Farmers Only A few states place restrictions on who may sell cottage foods or on what ingredients they may use to make them. Kentucky, for example, allows people to sell cottage foods only if they are a farmer or else personally grew the main ingredients in the food. Rhode Island also limits the sale of cottage foods to farmers and requires that the main ingredients for jams, preserves, fruit pies and syrup be locally grown or harvested. In Ohio, if a person wants to sell homemade syrup or honey, 75 percent of the syrup or honey must have come from their own trees or hives. Venue Restrictions Nearly every state allows people to sell cottage foods at farmers’ markets, and the majority of states also allow sales at roadside stands, community events and right from producers’ homes And some states allow producers who submit to stricter requirements to sell from more venues, such as at retail stores or over the internet. However, Illinois, Maryland and Nebraska allow producers to sell their goods only at farmers’ markets, limiting opportunities to interact with customers. In places with particularly cold winters or where farmers’ markets otherwise operate only seasonally, such restrictions may mean that producers are effectively allowed to sell their goods only a few months out of the year. And bans on sales from the home effectively prohibit producers from taking custom orders for things like wedding or birthday cakes. Other Regulations Many states require cottage food producers to pay a fee and obtain a license or permit from the government or, barring that, register with the state, county or local department that regulates food production. A number of states also require producers to complete food handlers’ training. Some states also require periodic health inspections of the home similar to those that restaurants must undergo or testing of the products themselves. Individual product testing, as South Dakota requires, could become costly for producers who make a wide variety of goods. Hawaii has no cottage food laws, which means that the sale of homemade food is not statutorily allowed in the Aloha State. However, it appears that the health department is currently allowing the limited sale of cottage foods through a temporary permitting scheme. In August 2017, Maine adopted a first-of-its-kind “food sovereignty law” that allows municipalities to regulate local food distribution as they see fit. Generally, food regulation is a top-down affair, with state governments setting standards by statute or regulation.