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Louisiana cottage food law: selling food from home

General information, not legal advice. Rules change, and counties add their own. Check with your state and county before you start selling.

"Cottage food" is the term most states use for food made in a home kitchen and sold directly to customers. What it covers, and whether your state uses the phrase at all, differs by state.

The short answer

Yes, with no license — and since 1 August 2026 the ceiling is $100,000. Act 801 of the 2026 Regular Session raised it from $30,000. Read the limit carefully all the same, because it is a cliff rather than a ceiling: the exemption stops applying at the figure rather than capping you at it.

Louisiana's allowed list is broader than most, and it includes something Oregon bans outright: pickles and acidified foods. The one thing that runs through every category is that none of it may consist of any animal muscle protein or fish protein. And unusually, the statute expects you to hold a sales tax certificate for your parish — a tax step written into the food law itself.

The cap is $100,000 — and where the old number still lives

Act 801 of the 2026 Regular Session (House Bill 403) was signed on 8 June 2026 and took effect on 1 August 2026. The Legislature's own digest is unambiguous: prior law exempted a producer selling "less than $30,000 of low-risk, homemade foods annually", and new law "increases the gross annual sales limit for this exemption from $30,000 to $100,000, after which a producer would no longer qualify for the exemption."

If you look this up yourself you will probably find $30,000, and it will look authoritative. The statute page for R.S. 40:4.9 on the Legislature's own site still prints the old figure and lists amendments only through Act 357 of 2022. The Act is newer than the statute page, and the Act governs. We published $30,000 ourselves when this page first went up, and corrected it — which is why it is called out here rather than quietly changed.

It is still a cliff, not a ceiling. The exemption stops applying at the figure: you are not capped at $100,000, you are outside the exemption once you reach it. Cross it and you are an unlicensed food business, which is a worse place to be than a licensed one. If you are approaching it, talk to the Department of Health about a licensed facility before you cross, not after.

It is also gross annual sales — the whole of what customers paid you, not what is left after ingredients and packaging.

Exemption ends at
$100,000 in gross annual sales, since 1 August 2026. The ladder was $20,000, then $30,000 (Act 357 of 2022), now $100,000 (Act 801 of 2026).
License or permit
None, while you are inside the exemption.
Parish sales tax certificate
Required.

Act 801 (HB 403) digest · HB 403 bill status · La. R.S. 40:4.9

The low-risk list

The statute covers low-risk foods, and the list is generous:

One rule runs through all of it: none of these "shall consist of any animal muscle protein or fish protein". That is the line, and it is cleaner than the category-by-category lists other states keep.

Pickles and acidified foods being on that list is worth noticing. Oregon prohibits pickles outright because a cucumber has a pH above 4.60, and Minnesota allows home-canned pickles only under a separate category that cannot leave the state. Louisiana puts them in the main list. Cane syrup is a Louisiana entry you will not find anywhere else on this site.

CBD is excluded unless it is FDA-approved.

What has to be on the label

The statutory requirement is a label that clearly indicates that the food was not produced in a licensed or regulated facility.

Note what that is and is not. Louisiana states the substance of the disclosure rather than dictating a sentence word for word, which is different from South Carolina's all-capitals script, Maryland's 10-point contrasting type or Tennessee's fixed paragraph. You have some latitude in the wording — but none in the message, which has to be clear to an ordinary customer reading your label.

One exemption: raw honey — unpasteurized, unfiltered, with the natural pollen intact — is exempt from the label rule.

Beyond the statute, federal food labeling applies to packaged food, and listing your ingredients and declaring allergens is what any customer with an allergy needs from you whatever the state requires.

Where you may sell — and the resale ban

The exemption is for selling to the people who will eat your food. There is a specific limit on going further:

Breads, cakes, cookies and pies may not be sold to any retail business or to any individual for resale. So a bakery or a coffee shop cannot stock your bread under this exemption — a route Ohio, Tennessee, Maryland and South Carolina all leave open in some form. If reselling is the plan, the exemption is not the vehicle.

And like every cottage food exemption in the country, this one is state law: it reaches sales in Louisiana. Crossing a state line brings federal rules and the other state's law into play.

The parish sales tax certificate

This is the step people miss, because in most states tax is a separate conversation from food safety. In Louisiana the exemption expects you to hold a sales tax certificate for your parish.

Louisiana's sales tax is administered substantially at parish level, so this is a local registration rather than a single state one, and which parish you are in determines who you deal with. Sort it out before your first market day — it is a form, not an obstacle, but it is one you will be asked about.

We are not going to print a rate. Rates vary by parish and change.

License and inspection

While you are inside the exemption there is no license, no permit and no routine inspection of your kitchen. That is the whole point of R.S. 40:4.9.

What you are relying on is the exemption continuing to fit you, and it has three edges: the $100,000 cliff, the food list with its no-animal-muscle-protein rule, and the resale ban on breads, cakes, cookies and pies. Step over any of them and you are not a smaller version of a licensed business — you are an unlicensed one.

What changed, and what did not

Act 801 of 2026 is the change, and it is covered above: the limit went from $30,000 to $100,000 on 1 August 2026.

HB 150 of the 2025 Regular Session is not law. It would have added R.S. 40:4.13 covering "farm food products". It passed the House 70 to 21 on 8 June 2025 and is still pending in Senate and Governmental Affairs. Until that changes, R.S. 40:4.9 is what governs, and nothing from that bill is on this page. HB 150, 2025 Regular Session

Official sources

Last verified: 31 October 2026. Every number on this page is linked to the official page it comes from.

Questions people actually ask

Do I need a license to sell food from home in Louisiana?

No, not while you are inside the exemption in La. R.S. 40:4.9. There is no license, no permit and no routine kitchen inspection for a preparer of low-risk foods. You do need a sales tax certificate for your parish, which the exemption expects of you.

How much can I sell in a year in Louisiana?

Less than $100,000 in gross annual sales, since 1 August 2026. Act 801 of the 2026 Regular Session raised it from $30,000. It is worded as a cliff rather than a ceiling: the exemption stops applying once you reach the figure, so you are outside it rather than capped at it.

I looked it up and the statute says $30,000. Which is right?

$100,000. The Legislature's statute page for R.S. 40:4.9 still prints $30,000 and lists amendments only through Act 357 of 2022, but Act 801 of 2026 amended R.S. 40:4.9(B) effective 1 August 2026, and its official digest says plainly that it increases the limit from $30,000 to $100,000. Where an enacted Act is newer than the statute page, the Act governs. We published $30,000 ourselves at first and corrected it.

Is the figure gross or profit?

Gross. It is the total your customers paid you, before ingredients, packaging, market fees or anything else. On a normal baking margin that is a much smaller business than $100,000 of take-home income would be, which is worth working out early rather than discovering in November.

Can I sell pickles in Louisiana?

Yes. Pickles and acidified foods are on the low-risk list, alongside baked goods, candies, cane syrup, dried mixes, honey and honeycomb, jams, jellies and preserves, sauces and syrups, and spices. That makes Louisiana more generous than Oregon, which prohibits pickles outright because a cucumber has a pH above 4.60.

Can a shop or bakery sell my bread?

No. Breads, cakes, cookies and pies may not be sold to any retail business or to any individual for resale under this exemption. If that is the plan you need a licensed facility rather than the cottage food route. Several other states on this site do allow a retail route — Ohio, Tennessee, Maryland and South Carolina each leave a door open in some form — but Louisiana closes this one.

What does my label have to say?

It has to clearly indicate that the food was not produced in a licensed or regulated facility. Louisiana states the substance of the disclosure rather than dictating exact wording, which gives you more latitude than South Carolina's all-capitals script or Tennessee's fixed paragraph — but the message has to be clear to an ordinary customer. Raw honey that is unpasteurized and unfiltered with the natural pollen intact is exempt from the label rule.

Can I sell food containing meat or fish?

No. The statute says that none of the low-risk foods it covers shall consist of any animal muscle protein or fish protein. That single rule runs through every category on the list, so it applies to a sauce or a dried mix just as much as to a pie.

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