Cottage food label requirements in Ohio
The short version
A label on food made in a home kitchen in Ohio carries six things wherever you are: what it is, everything in it heaviest first, the major allergens, who made it, how to reach you, and the date. On top of that comes the wording below.
What goes on the label
- The product name, in words a customer would use.
- Every ingredient, heaviest first.
- The major allergens, called out separately from the ingredient list.
- Who made it: your name or your business name.
- How to reach you.
- The date it was made.
What the label has to say
As published for Ohio, read on 5 August 2026:
This Product is Home Produced.
This is published as fixed text, so reproduce it exactly rather than rewording it. It has to appear at 10 point type or larger, which is part of the requirement rather than a design choice.
The detail
Statutory basis is ORC 3715.023. A Cottage Food Production Operation needs no license and gets no inspection, but ODA can sample product and declare it misbranded or adulterated. Full label also needs: statement of identity, net quantity in BOTH US customary and metric (metric in parentheses), ingredients in descending order by weight, and business name and address. Products may only be sold inside Ohio. ODA's own fact sheet is internally inconsistent about capitalization: the requirements list gives "This Product is Home Produced." while the sample label art shows "This product is home produced." Either casing tracks a published ODA example.
Make one
Free, nothing saved, no account. It fills in Ohio's wording for you and prints a sheet.
Where to verify all of this
Rules change, and this page can lag behind them. Before you rely on any of it: