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About HOMEMADE FOR SALE

 

From pies to pickles, wedding cakes to granola, preserves to decorated cookies, fledgling food entrepreneurs now have the freedom to earn, producing non-hazardous foods in their home kitchen.  Homemade for Sale Second Edition -- fully updated and expanded -- provides a clear roadmap to go from idea and recipe to final product.

 

Widely known as “cottage food legislation,” every state in the US and numerous Canadian provinces currently have varying forms of laws that encourage or allow home-cooks to create and sell to the public specific, “non-hazardous” food items, often defined as those that are high-acid, like pickles, or low moisture, like breads. Addressed in great detail in the forthcoming Second Edition of Homemade for Sale, some states, like Wyoming and Utah, have "food freedom laws" which allow food entrepreneurs to sell certain types of meals at specific public outlets or or directly to people. Additionally, California has passed a law permitting a Microenterprise Home Kitchen Operation (MHKO), a food facility operated by a resident from their private home kitchen, essentially allowing a home cook to sell directly to the public restaurant-type meals or offer catering services from their home.

 

Key topics covered in the new Homemade for Sale Second Edition include:

 

  • Product development and testing

  • Understanding state cottage food and food freedom laws and advocacy

  • Independently tested recipes for non-hazardous food products, including frostings

  • Marketing and developing your niche

  • Step-by-step guides for packaging, labeling, and creating displays

  • Structuring and running your business while planning for the future

  • Bookkeeping and financial management

  • Managing liability, risk, and government regulations

  • Avoiding burnout through self-care and time management

 

To make the book as accessible and inspirational as possible to the widest audience possible, Homemade for Sale Second Edition features ten “story profiles” of cottage food start-ups addressing real life challenges while sharing practical advice and opportunities.  Every major cottage food category and direct sales channel is represented, including decorative cookies, wedding or custom cakes, breads, pickles, preserves, cookies and salsas.

 

From “Buy Local” to “Small Business Saturdays,” from slow food to fancy food, from farm-to-fork to hand-made artisan breads, more people than ever are demanding real food made with real ingredients by real people – not by machines in factories, the same way they make cars or computers.  Homemade for Sale Second Edition  gets you started, organized and cooking for your customers, creating items that by their very nature are small batch, fresh, unique and specialized.

 

Here’s the simple and encouraging fact for home-kitchen-based entrepreneurs: You can’t fail in the traditional business sense. Since most of these entrepreneurs avoid taking on debt to launch their home enterprise, start-up expenses are negligible. Most already own everything in their home kitchen that’s needed to bring their products to market.

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