Colorado Cottage Foods Act: $10,000 per Product, Shelf-Stable Only, and No License

The Act is one section of Colorado's food code, added by Senate Bill 12-048 in 2012 and last amended by Senate Bill 16-058 effective May 4, 2016. Its reach is defined by what it switches off. Section 25-4-1614(7) says that §§ 25-4-1604 to 25-4-1613, the run of statutes covering department rules, plan submission, licensure, fees, disciplinary action and unlawful acts, do not apply to a cottage food operation. Section 25-4-1602(14)(m) does the same work from the other direction by excluding a home, commercial, private or public kitchen producing under the Act from the term retail food establishment. There is no application, no fee, no preoperational inspection and, under subsection (8), only a permissive electronic registry that the department or a county, district or regional health agency may create. Registration is not required in Colorado today.

The eligible-food list in subsection (2)(b)(I) is closed to anything needing refrigeration for safety: pickled fruits and vegetables, spices, teas, dehydrated produce, nuts, seeds, honey, jams, jellies, preserves, fruit butter, flour, and baked goods including candies, fruit empanadas and tortillas. The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment reads that list to also cover roasted coffee beans, freeze-dried produce, cotton candy and fudge, and buttercream made with ghee or vegetable oil but not buttercream made with butter, and it requires pickled products to finish at an equilibrium pH of 4.6 or below. CDPHE's ineligible list is the sharper one: any meat product including bacon, jerky, chicharron, poultry, fish and shellfish, and those may not even be used as an ingredient or topping; cream, custard or meringue fillings; sauces, salsas, condiments and salad dressings; beverages and juices; pumpkin, sweet potato and cream pies; cut fresh fruits and vegetables; pepper jellies made with fresh or home-dehydrated peppers; freeze-dried meals; and anything containing CBD or THC. Whole eggs are the one animal product allowed, capped by subsection (2)(b)(II) at two hundred fifty dozen per month and subject to § 35-21-105.

The revenue cap is per product, not per business. Subsection (2)(e) applies the Act only to producers who earn net revenues of ten thousand dollars or less per calendar year from the sale of each eligible food product. CDPHE confirms the reading that matters in practice: a producer selling blueberry, banana and chocolate chip muffins may earn up to ten thousand dollars from each. The same threshold appears outside Title 25, in § 35-36-102(8)(b)(II) and (12)(b)(II), which keep a cottage food producer at or under it out of the definitions of commodity handler and dealer under the Colorado Farm Products Act.

Training is mandatory before you sell. Subsection (2)(c) requires a food safety course covering basic food handling that is comparable to, or is, a course given by the Colorado State University Extension service or a state, county or district public health agency, and requires the producer to stay in good standing with the course's own renewal requirements. CDPHE accepts three routes: the CSU Extension classroom course Food Safety Training for Colorado Cottage Food Producers, whose certificates run three years from completion; an online food handlers card; or a course offered by your local public health agency where that agency admits cottage food producers.

Sales channels are narrow by design. Subsection (2)(d) requires the food to be delivered directly from the producer to an informed end consumer, sold only in Colorado, and kept out of interstate commerce, and subsection (5) forbids the purchaser from reselling it. That closes off restaurants, grocery stores, wholesale and consignment unless the store and its staff genuinely act as your designated representative, and CDPHE states plainly that cottage foods may not be made for a catered event. Internet sales are allowed, because the delivery mechanism is left to the producer and the consumer so long as it stays inside Colorado. Under subsection (9)(c) a producer may only be an individual who is a Colorado resident, or a Colorado limited liability company with two or fewer members who are all Colorado residents. Subsection (6) encourages home bakery or other liability insurance without requiring it.

Labeling is where most Colorado producers slip. Subsection (3)(a) requires an affixed label carrying the product identification, the producer's name, the address at which the food was prepared, a current telephone number or email address, the date the food was produced, a complete ingredient list, and this exact disclaimer: "This product was produced in a home kitchen that is not subject to state licensure or inspection and that may also process common food allergens such as tree nuts, peanuts, eggs, soy, wheat, milk, fish, and crustacean shellfish. This product is not intended for resale." Subsection (3)(c) separately requires a conspicuous placard, sign or card at the point of sale reading "This product was produced in a home kitchen that is not subject to state licensure or inspection. This product is not intended for resale." CDPHE adds that a cottage food may not be labeled allergen free, and may be called organic only with USDA National Organic Program certification, though an individual ingredient may be described as organic if the word does not appear on the primary label.

One dated change is already law but not yet in force. House Bill 26-1033, the Tamale Bill, was signed June 4, 2026 as chapter 375, and its rewrite of § 25-4-1614 takes effect January 1, 2027. From that date a producer may sell packaged foods requiring time and temperature control for safety, expressly including tamales, burritos and tortas, limited to one such food product type with up to five variations; any meat used must be federally inspected and bear the mark of inspection or satisfy a federal or state inspection exemption; the producer must take a course covering time and temperature control; bare-hand contact with ready-to-eat foods is banned; a temperature-controlled product may be transported only once and for no more than two hours; and the final product may not be cooled and reheated before sale. The revenue cap becomes one hundred fifty thousand dollars in gross revenue per permitted food per calendar year, adjusted annually for inflation by the department using the Denver-Aurora-Lakewood consumer price index. Annual registration with CDPHE becomes mandatory, the department issues a registration number that must go on the label, and the registry becomes a monthly-updated public list shared with every county and district public health agency. Raw milk, low-acid canned foods, fermented or acidified products needing temperature control, alcohol, cannabinoid products, and foods made with preservation smoking, reduced oxygen processing or curing stay outside the Act. Until January 1, 2027, none of that is in force and the shelf-stable, ten-thousand-dollar rules above are the law.

A cottage food product that is not labeled the way subsection (3)(a) requires is misbranded under subsection (3)(b), and misbranding is what opens the door to the state. Section 25-4-1614(4) makes any product made under the Act subject to food sampling and inspection by CDPHE or a county, district or regional health agency under § 25-5-406 in three situations: the product is misbranded, a consumer complaint has been received, or the product is suspected in an injury or foodborne illness outbreak. Selling ineligible food, exceeding the ten thousand dollar per product ceiling, selling through a store or a caterer, or shipping out of state all take the operation outside § 25-4-1614, and the § 25-4-1614(7) exemption falls away with it.

At that point the operator is running an unlicensed retail food establishment, which § 25-4-1610(1)(b) makes unlawful and § 25-4-1611.5(1) punishes with a civil penalty of not less than two hundred fifty dollars and not more than one thousand dollars once written notice and a reasonable time to comply have passed. From January 1, 2027 the Act gains its own penalties: a fine of up to one hundred dollars per violation, recovery of investigation or inspection costs up to one thousand dollars, and a bar on selling temperature-controlled foods after three misbrandings or compliance failures within twelve months.