Indiana Home Based Vendor Law: What You Can Sell, the No-Cap Rule, and the Labeling Rules After HEA 1149

It's a Saturday in late June at a farmers market just off the courthouse square in a mid-sized Indiana town. The light is still cool. A vendor is arranging her table: a row of honey jars catching the sun, a basket of high-acid fruit jams with hand-lettered labels, a stack of sourdough boules, a cooler-free crate of maple syrup from a cousin's sugarbush, and a small chalkboard with a Venmo handle and the words "we ship anywhere in Indiana." Two tables down, a mushroom grower is unloading flats of oyster and shiitake. Across the aisle, a retired schoolteacher is selling caramels and chocolate-covered pecans in cellophane bags.

Before 2022, much of this would not have fit the law the way it's being done now. The old Home Based Vendor rules were built around individual vendors at farmers markets and roadside stands, so the Venmo-and-ship sign had no place in that framework, and the market booth was the channel the law was written for.

Then Indiana rewrote the law. If you make food in an Indiana home kitchen and want to sell it, the good news is that the 2022 reform substantially widened how and where you can reach customers. The slightly-less-good news is that the food list stayed narrow, and two specific restrictions are exactly the ones that trip up new producers. This guide walks through what the Home Based Vendor law actually allows now, the unusually ag-forward food list that makes Indiana different from its neighbors, the verbatim label, the in-state-only shipping line, the separate Homestead Vendor and Small Farm track that took effect on July 1, 2026, and the outdated rules that online guides still repeat as if they were current.

The short version

What Indiana's Home Based Vendor law does: The law lives at Indiana Code IC 16-42-5.3 and was substantially rewritten by House Enrolled Act 1149 (opens in new tab), effective July 1, 2022. A "Home Based Vendor" (HBV) prepares and sells non-potentially-hazardous (non-TCS) food made at their primary residence. No revenue cap. No license, registration, or routine inspection. No local licensing ordinances — IC 16-42-5.3-12 bars local governments from requiring licensure, certification, or inspection, though local health departments still enforce the state chapter. The key affirmative requirement: a food handler certificate from an ANSI-accredited issuer, with a copy provided to your county's local health department. Allowed foods are non-TCS only — baked goods (no cream/custard fillings, no homemade buttercream), candy, tree nuts and legumes, honey, molasses, sorghum, maple syrup, cultivated mushrooms not processed past a single harvest cut, and traditional high-acid, full-sugar jams and jellies. Acidified foods (pickles, salsas, sauces) are excluded — a key difference from Tennessee. Sales are direct to the end consumer only — the label must say "NOT FOR RESALE," so no wholesale. You may sell in person, by phone, or online, and deliver in person, by mail, or by third-party carrier — but only within Indiana, in a sealed, tamper-evident package, keeping each consumer's shipping or delivery address for at least a year. No interstate shipping. The label must carry the processing date and the verbatim disclaimer below in at least 10-point type, and each label must be posted on your website. A separate Homestead Vendor and Small Farm track (IC 16-42-5.4) has run alongside the HBV law since July 1, 2026. Sources: the Indiana Department of Health Home-Based Vendors guidance (opens in new tab) and the IDOH/Purdue Home-Based Vendor Handbook (opens in new tab).

How Indiana got here

The reason so much advice about Indiana cottage food is wrong is that the law changed dramatically and recently, and a lot of guides — and a lot of well-meaning farmers market veterans — are still describing the regime that existed before July 2022.

Before July 2022, Indiana's home-food framework lived at the now-repealed IC 16-42-5-29, which was built around individual vendors at farmers markets and roadside stands. Online orders and shipping were not part of that framework. If you wanted to sell to customers who couldn't reach your market booth, you had to leave the cottage tier entirely and rent a commercial kitchen or license a retail food establishment. One thing the old law did not have, despite what some guides say, is a dollar cap on annual sales.

House Enrolled Act 1149 (opens in new tab), passed in the 2022 session and effective July 1, 2022, rewrote the framework at IC 16-42-5.3. The headline changes were substantial:

• Still no sales ceiling. The rewritten chapter, like the law before it, sets no annual dollar cap.
• Online and phone sales were authorized. A Home Based Vendor can now take orders over the internet or by telephone.
• In-state shipping and delivery were authorized. Orders can be delivered to the customer in person, by mail, or by a third-party carrier — as long as the destination is inside Indiana, the package is sealed so the customer can tell whether it has been tampered with, and the vendor keeps each consumer's shipping or delivery address for at least one year.
• Local licensing ordinances are barred. Under IC 16-42-5.3-12, a local unit of government may not, by ordinance or resolution, require any licensure, certification, or inspection of Home Based Vendor foods. Local health officers still enforce the state chapter and can inspect after a complaint.
• A food handler certificate became mandatory. Every Home Based Vendor now needs a certificate from an ANSI-accredited issuer.

What HEA 1149 did not change is just as important. It did not open the food list to acidified products. It did not authorize time-and-temperature-controlled (TCS) foods. And it did not permit wholesale — sales still go directly to the end consumer, and the label says "NOT FOR RESALE." The 2022 reform was generous on scale and channel — how much you can sell and where you can reach customers — while staying conservative on food safety category — what you're allowed to make in the first place.

That split is the whole shape of Indiana's law, and it's why the myths below cluster so tightly around two themes: people who underestimate how much the channel rules opened up, and people who overestimate how much the food list opened up.

Five myths HEA 1149 created (and the reality)

Because the law changed so much in one stroke, the most useful way to understand Indiana today is to take the things people still believe and check each one against the current statute.

Myth 1: "There's a revenue cap, so it's basically a hobby"

Reality: There is no cap at all. IC 16-42-5.3 sets no annual sales ceiling, and the repealed IC 16-42-5-29 did not contain a dollar cap either. A Home Based Vendor can do $2,000 or $200,000 a year in allowed-food sales and the framework doesn't change. If a guide tells you Indiana caps Home Based Vendor sales, or that HEA 1149 lifted a cap, it is wrong.

Myth 2: "You can only sell at farmers markets — no online, no shipping"

Reality: Online and phone sales are allowed, and you can ship anywhere in Indiana. The old farmers-market-and-roadside-stand framework is gone. You can take orders through a website, Instagram, or over the phone, and you can deliver in person, drop them in the mail, or hand them to UPS or FedEx — provided the package stays inside Indiana, is sealed so the customer can tell whether it has been tampered with, and you keep each customer's shipping or delivery address for at least a year. For a rural producer who used to be limited to whatever market was within driving distance, this is the change that actually grows a business.

Myth 3: "My county can require its own license or inspection"

Reality: Local licensing ordinances are barred. IC 16-42-5.3-12 provides that a local unit of government may not, by ordinance or resolution, require any licensure, certification, or inspection of Home Based Vendor foods. That does not take local health departments out of the picture: local health officers enforce the state chapter, can inspect after a complaint, and must receive a copy of your food handler certificate. If a county official tells you that you need a local food license to sell jam at the market, be polite, bring a copy of the IDOH guidance (opens in new tab), and ask them to point to the authority.

Myth 4: "Indiana opened up, so I can sell my pickles, salsa, and hot sauce now"

Reality: Acidified foods are still excluded. This is the trap that runs in the opposite direction — producers who hear "Indiana loosened the rules" and assume the food list opened up too. It didn't. Pickles, salsas, hot sauces, BBQ sauces, and other acidified products remain off the Home Based Vendor list, because they carry process-control risks (improper acidification can allow Clostridium botulinum growth) that the cottage tier isn't set up to verify. This is a sharp contrast with Tennessee, which does allow acidified foods at the cottage level. In Indiana, if it's a pickle or a sauce, it's not a Home Based Vendor product.

Myth 5: "There's no license, so there's no paperwork at all"

Reality: You still need a food handler certificate. No license, no registration, no routine inspection — true. But the 2022 reform added an affirmative requirement: every Home Based Vendor must hold a food handler certificate from an ANSI-accredited issuer and provide a copy to the local health department in the county where they live. It's a course, not an inspection, but it is not optional, and certificates expire (a ServSafe food handler certificate is valid for three years, according to Purdue Extension). If you ship or deliver, you also owe one record: each consumer's shipping or delivery address, kept for at least one year. The "no paperwork" framing is close enough to true that people skip the few things they actually owe.

What you can actually make and sell

Indiana's allowed list is genuinely distinctive. Most cottage food lists are bakery-and-confection lists with a few extras tacked on. Indiana's reads like it was written with small farms and homesteads in mind — honey, sorghum, maple syrup, cultivated mushrooms, tree nuts, and legumes all sit alongside the usual baked goods. If you keep bees, tap maples, or grow shiitakes, Indiana is one of the more natural states to sell what you produce.

The categories below come from the Indiana Department of Health's published Home-Based Vendor guidance, including the IDOH/Purdue Home-Based Vendor Handbook (opens in new tab).

Allowed — non-potentially-hazardous (non-TCS) foods:

• Baked goods. Breads, rolls, cookies, brownies, muffins, cupcakes, cake pops, quick breads, and custom cakes — as long as the cake contains no cream or custard filling and needs no refrigeration for safety. Watch the icing: IDOH does not allow homemade buttercream. Icing must be commercially prepared and shelf-stable, or made from a lab-tested, science-based recipe followed exactly. A frosting that must be refrigerated is not allowed.
• Candy and confections. Chocolates, dipped and molded chocolate, nougats, caramels, brittles, fudge, and chocolate-covered nuts.
• Tree nuts and legumes. Including roasted and seasoned nuts.
• Honey, molasses, sorghum, and maple syrup. The sweetener category that makes Indiana's list unusually farm-friendly.
• Cultivated mushrooms. IDOH guidance allows cultivated mushrooms only if they are not processed past a single harvest (field) cut. Dried or otherwise processed mushrooms are not allowed, and foraged wild mushrooms carry separate identification rules.
• Traditional jams, jellies, and preserves. Here's the fine print that matters: only high-acid fruit jams and jellies made with full-sugar recipes qualify. The high acidity plus full sugar is what makes these shelf-stable without process authority oversight. A standard strawberry or raspberry jam with a traditional sugar ratio is fine. A reduced-sugar, "no-sugar," or low-acid-fruit preserve is not — those fall outside the allowance.
• Dry goods and similar shelf-stable items consistent with the non-TCS standard (dried herbs, dry mixes, granola, popcorn, and the like), per IDOH guidance. Dehydrated vegetables are not allowed.

Excluded — regardless of how it's made:

• Anything requiring refrigeration (TCS foods). Cheesecakes, cream pies, custard-filled pastries, anything with a perishable filling or topping.
• Acidified foods. Pickles, salsas, hot sauces, BBQ sauces, relishes, and other acidified products. (This is the big one — see Myth 4.)
• Low-acid canned foods. Canned vegetables, green beans, pumpkin butter, and similar low-acid shelf-stable canned goods.
• Reduced-sugar or low-sugar jams and jellies, and preserves made from low-acid fruit.
• Fermented foods. Sauerkraut, kimchi, fermented sauces, kombucha.
• Homemade buttercream and other icings that are not commercially prepared and shelf-stable or made from a lab-tested recipe.
• Dried or processed mushrooms and dehydrated vegetables.
• Meat, poultry, fish, and seafood products, and dairy products (including cheese and anything containing unpasteurized milk). These stay excluded under the Home Based Vendor track; some meat products can be sold under the separate Homestead Vendor track described below.
• Juices and beverages requiring time-temperature control, and alcoholic products.

One more change trips up produce growers: whole, uncut produce has not been a Home Based Vendor product since July 1, 2023.

The pattern is consistent: if a food is shelf-stable because it's dry, baked, sugar-preserved, or naturally high-acid, it's probably allowed. If it's shelf-stable because someone acidified or canned it — or if it needs a refrigerator — it's probably excluded. When you're unsure about a specific product, the IDOH Home-Based Vendors FAQ (opens in new tab) is the place to check before you bake a batch you can't legally sell.

Where and how you can sell

This is the half of the law that opened up dramatically in 2022. The channel rules are now broad — with two firm boundaries: every sale must be direct to the end consumer, and every sale must stay inside Indiana.

The two boundaries are worth saying plainly because each one catches producers coming from a different direction.

Direct-to-consumer only. Indiana's "NOT FOR RESALE" rule means the buyer must be the eater. You cannot sell a case of cookies to a coffee shop to resell, and you cannot stock a gift shop's shelf. This is a real limit, and it's where Indiana is more restrictive than some other states — Tennessee and Texas both permit some form of wholesale-to-retail at the cottage tier. If wholesale is your growth plan, Indiana's Home Based Vendor law isn't the vehicle; you'd need a licensed commercial operation.

In-state only. You can ship — but the package cannot cross the state line. A Home Based Vendor in Evansville can mail jam to a customer in Fort Wayne. The same vendor cannot mail it to a customer in Henderson, Kentucky, fifteen minutes across the river: IC 16-42-5.3-6 bars shipping or delivering to a consumer located outside Indiana. For in-state shipments and deliveries, use a sealed package that lets the customer tell whether it has been tampered with, and keep a record of each consumer's shipping or delivery address for at least one year, which you must provide to the Indiana Department of Health on request. Out-of-state customers will ask — politely decline, or point them toward a future licensed version of your business.

What the label has to say

The Home Based Vendor law requires a specific, verbatim disclaimer on every product. The wording is statutory — you can't paraphrase it, shorten it, or soften it. Copy it onto your label word-for-word:

"This product is home produced and processed and the production area has not been inspected by the Indiana Department of Health. NOT FOR RESALE."

This statement must appear in at least 10-point type on the label. Both halves matter: the home-production/no-inspection clause and the "NOT FOR RESALE" clause. Leaving off the resale clause makes the label noncompliant. Note that IDOH's older handbook sample labels still show superseded wording ("State Department of Health"); follow the codified text above.

Beyond the disclaimer, IC 16-42-5.3-5(a) requires every Indiana Home Based Vendor label to carry:

• Your name and address. The vendor's name and the address of your primary residence. A PO box does not meet the requirement.
• Common or usual name of the product. "Strawberry Jam," "Sourdough Boule," "Sea-Salt Caramels."
• Ingredient list, in descending order by predominance by weight.
• Net weight or volume, by standard measure or numerical count.
• Processing date — the date on which the food product was processed.

Two more points round out the label rules:

• Post your labels online. Under IC 16-42-5.3-5(b), a Home Based Vendor must post the label of each food product on the vendor's website.
• Allergen statement (encouraged). IDOH says allergen labeling is not required for Home Based Vendor products but is highly encouraged. A "Contains:" statement covering the major allergens identified under FALCPA (opens in new tab) — milk, eggs, fish, crustacean shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, wheat, soybeans, and sesame — is a simple way to do it, and Indiana's allowed list is heavy on tree nuts, so it matters.

The IDOH/Purdue Home-Based Vendor Handbook (opens in new tab) (updated May 12, 2025) is the current reference for these requirements, with sample labels — just use the codified disclaimer wording rather than the older wording in its samples.

How Ardent Seller helps with the Indiana label

Ardent Seller assembles this label. Pick a finished product, choose Indiana, and the cottage food label generator pulls together the product name, the vendor's name and address, the ingredient statement in descending order by weight with sub-ingredients in parentheses, a "Contains:" allergen line, net weight, the processing date, and the verbatim IC 16-42-5.3 disclaimer — including the "NOT FOR RESALE" clause that is part of the statutory wording — rendered at 10-point type or larger, the font minimum enforced in the output rather than left to the design. A validation checklist shows every element Indiana requires, including the processing date, and blocks printing while any of them is missing. Output is a PDF sheet (Avery 5163, 4″×6″, or full page) or a direct print.

Generate your Indiana cottage food label with Ardent Seller free — the label generator is included on every plan, including the free tier.

The Homestead Vendor and Small Farm track (IC 16-42-5.4)

Indiana now has a second framework. House Enrolled Act 1424 (P.L.163-2026) created IC 16-42-5.4 for homestead vendors and small farms, and the Indiana Department of Health's homestead and small farm guidance memo (opens in new tab) confirms it has been in effect since July 1, 2026. It runs alongside the Home Based Vendor law — IC 16-42-5.3 remains in force, and everything above still describes that track.

• Who qualifies. A homestead vendor prepares and sells food or meat products from their property (an owned or leased primary residence or agricultural property) or at a farmers market, with no more than $1,500,000 in gross sales per year. A small farm qualifies on similar terms, with the same $1,500,000 threshold.
• What it covers. Items primarily derived from the property: meat products from animals raised on the property and slaughtered, processed, and labeled under IC 15-17-5; prepared foods, including baked goods; candy; produce; natural sweeteners; and fruit spreads. Meat must be kept refrigerated.
• Regulation. No state or local rules, certifications, or licensing apply beyond federal law, except investigations of foodborne-illness complaints.
• Shipping. Shipping or delivery is allowed only within Indiana, in a sealed package, and only if you hold an ANSI-accredited food handler certificate.
• Label or sign. Packaged food needs a label, and unpackaged food needs a sign, showing your name, your address, the ingredients in descending order by predominance by weight, a description of the product, a description of allergens that might have come in contact with the product, and this statement in at least 10-point type:

"This product was produced by a homestead vendor or the owner of a small farm that is exempt from government licensing and inspection."

The practical difference: meat products raised on your own property can fit the homestead track, while meat and other TCS foods remain excluded under the Home Based Vendor track. The two tracks have different labels, so use the disclaimer that matches the track you sell under.

Three Indiana producers and how the law fits each one

Three composite Home Based Vendors — none real, all built from common Indiana patterns — make the framework concrete.

A beekeeper in southern Indiana (composite)

She sells raw honey and a high-acid blackberry jam made from her own berries. Before 2022 her sales were tied to the Saturday market. Today she takes orders through a simple website, where each product's label is posted, and ships honey and jam to customers across Indiana by USPS in sealed, tamper-evident packages. Her labels carry the verbatim disclaimer, her name and address, ingredients, net weight, the processing date, and a "Contains: tree nuts" note on the almond granola she also sells. She holds an ANSI-accredited food handler certificate she earned online in an afternoon, with a copy on file at her county health department.

The law is, for her, almost frictionless — the online-sales and shipping authorization substantially widened the customer base she can reach, no longer limited to whoever could drive to the Saturday market, and the paperwork she owes is the certificate, a compliant label, and a year's worth of customer shipping addresses.

A retired teacher selling caramels and chocolate (composite)

He makes sea-salt caramels, chocolate-covered pecans, and molded chocolates for the holidays. Everything he sells is non-TCS confection, squarely on the allowed list. He sells direct at two markets and takes Christmas pre-orders by phone for in-person pickup. His one constraint is the resale rule: a local gift shop asked to carry his caramels for the holiday season, and he had to decline — Home Based Vendor products are "NOT FOR RESALE," and stocking a shop's shelf is wholesale. He's now weighing whether the gift-shop channel is worth stepping up to a licensed kitchen, which is exactly the decision the cottage tier is designed to make visible.

A mushroom grower in central Indiana (composite)

She cultivates oyster and shiitake mushrooms and sells them whole and fresh. IDOH guidance allows cultivated mushrooms as long as they are not processed past a single harvest (field) cut, so her core product is fine. The line she has to watch is processing: whole fresh mushrooms are allowed, but the moment she wants to sell a value-added product — a marinated mushroom jar (acidified — excluded), a refrigerated mushroom spread (TCS — excluded), or a cream-of-mushroom soup base (TCS — excluded) — she's outside the Home Based Vendor allowance. Dried mushroom packets and a dried-mushroom-and-herb seasoning blend are out too: IDOH does not allow dried or processed mushrooms as Home Based Vendor products. The framework rewards her for keeping mushrooms whole.

How Indiana compares to its neighbors

Indiana borders four states, and the contrast sharpens what's distinctive about the Home Based Vendor law — particularly the no-cap rule and the no-wholesale rule.

Comparison reflects publicly available information as of June 2026; state cottage food laws change frequently. Sources: Kentucky (Forrager (opens in new tab), $60,000 cap); Michigan (Public Act 51 of 2025 / HB 4122 (opens in new tab), which raised the cap from $25,000 to $50,000 effective in March 2026); Illinois (Forrager (opens in new tab)); Ohio (Forrager (opens in new tab)). Verify each state's current rules with its official agency before making business decisions.

The headline: Indiana is uncapped, like Illinois and Ohio — while Kentucky ($60,000) and Michigan ($50,000, raised from $25,000 by HB 4122 in March 2026) still hold their producers to a ceiling. On resale, Indiana's firm "NOT FOR RESALE" rule keeps Home Based Vendors direct-to-consumer only — the same position Illinois and Kentucky take; Ohio is the outlier that allows limited wholesale to grocery stores and restaurants. And on acidified foods, Indiana excludes them outright, like Michigan and the Ohio cottage tier, rather than routing them through the pH-testing or process-authority pathway that Illinois and Kentucky use.

For a producer deciding where they fit, the practical read is: if you want maximum sales volume direct to consumers with minimal paperwork, Indiana is excellent. If your plan depends on selling pickles and sauces, or on wholesaling to shops, the Home Based Vendor tier isn't the right tool — and you'll want to look at a licensed operation instead.

A simple records system the law mostly doesn't require (but you'll want anyway)

Indiana doesn't require Home Based Vendors to keep production records or register batches. The one record the law does require: if you ship or deliver, keep each consumer's shipping or delivery address for at least one year and provide it to the Indiana Department of Health on request. There's no routine inspection to prepare for, although a consumer complaint can trigger one. And "not required" and "not worth doing" are different things — and the day a customer reports a reaction or a market manager asks a pointed question, a small records habit turns an anxious afternoon into a five-minute lookup.

A workable system has four parts and takes a few minutes per batch:

1. A production log. Date, product, batch identifier, quantity made, and ingredients used (with the supplier and lot for anything you bought). A notebook works; an inventory and batch-tracking tool works better once you're shipping orders across the state and can't reconstruct from memory.
2. A sales log. Date, channel, quantity, and — for shipped or delivered orders — the customer's shipping or delivery address, which the law requires you to keep for at least one year. Your shipping platform already captures most of this; a tally sheet handles the market booth.
3. A label archive. One dated copy of every label version you've used, so a question about a product bought in March is answered by the March label, not your best guess.
4. A certificate and ingredient file. Your current food handler certificate, plus receipts and lot information for ingredients, so you can trace a problem to a specific supplier batch if you ever need to.

This is the part of the operation where Ardent Seller earns its place. It's a multi-tenant inventory and production tool built for small makers and home food businesses — lot-level batch tracking, per-product costs, channel-by-channel sales, and a tidy record of what you made and where it went. The free Maker Plan covers the record-keeping side of the Home Based Vendor law at no cost, which is exactly the right price for paperwork the state mostly doesn't require but that protects you when good faith gets tested.

Related reading

• Tennessee Food Freedom Act: A Cottage Food Maker's Guide — The instructive contrast to Indiana: Tennessee allows acidified foods and wholesale-to-retail at the cottage tier, exactly the two things Indiana excludes. Worth reading to see how differently two no-cap states draw their lines.
• Michigan Cottage Food Law: Caps, Allowed Foods, and Labeling — Indiana's northern neighbor, which still holds producers to a revenue cap (raised to $50,000 in 2026) — a useful look at the capped-revenue model Indiana left behind.
• Batch Tracking for Food Sellers — The records system above, expanded into a full lot-tracking guide for anyone shipping enough orders that a recall would mean reconstructing where each batch went.

Sell more, with less to worry about

Indiana did something unusual in 2022: it made its cottage food law dramatically more generous and easier to understand at the same time. No cap, no license, no routine inspection, no local licensing ordinances — and an ag-forward food list that fits beekeepers, maple tappers, and mushroom growers as naturally as it fits bakers. If you've been holding back because you heard Indiana caps sales or thought you couldn't sell online, the framework you're actually operating under is far friendlier than its reputation.

The discipline that remains is small and specific: earn the food handler certificate and give your county health department a copy, keep your products non-TCS and non-acidified, label them with the processing date and the verbatim disclaimer, keep your sales direct and inside Indiana, keep the shipping-address records the law requires, and — if you're smart — keep a light set of records the law doesn't even ask for. Read the rules once at the source, set up your system, and then go sell.

If you're an Indiana Home Based Vendor figuring out what to track and how to stay tidy as your orders grow, Ardent Seller handles the inventory, batch, cost, and sales side so the paperwork never becomes the reason you stop. Start free on the Maker Plan and keep the records that turn a good-faith law into a protected business.

Free resources

Free companion downloads if you want to put any of this into practice:

• Cottage Food Laws by State — The full 50-state-plus-DC quick reference PDF, with Indiana's post-HEA-1149 no-cap Home Based Vendor framework captured alongside every other state's rules.
• Cottage Food Revenue Cap Tracker — Indiana has no cap, so the tracker mostly confirms you're staying inside the in-state-only and direct-to-consumer boundaries — but it's already set up if you ever expand into a capped neighbor like Kentucky or Michigan.
• Home Bakers Order and Delivery Tracker — Keeps order, pickup, and in-state shipping details in one place once HEA 1149's new online and mail-order channels start filling up your week.

Sources & methodology

This guide is based on the Indiana Department of Health's published Home-Based Vendor guidance, on the codified text of the Home Based Vendor law (IC 16-42-5.3) as enacted by HEA 1149, effective July 1, 2022, and amended by P.L.56-2023, and on the Homestead Vendor and Small Farm law (IC 16-42-5.4, HEA 1424, P.L.163-2026), reviewed as of September 2026.

• Indiana Department of Health — Home-Based Vendors guidance documents (opens in new tab) — the state's official guidance hub.
• IDOH — Home-Based Vendors FAQ (opens in new tab) — allowed foods, label disclaimer, food handler certificate, and sales/distribution rules.
• IDOH and Purdue — Indiana Home-Based Vendor Handbook (updated May 12, 2025) (opens in new tab) — allowed and excluded foods, labeling, icing, mushroom, and allergen guidance. Its sample labels show superseded disclaimer wording; the codified text controls.
• House Enrolled Act 1149 (2022) (opens in new tab) — the Indiana General Assembly record for the enrolled act that rewrote the Home Based Vendor law, opened online sales and in-state shipping, and barred local ordinances requiring licensure, certification, or inspection.
• IDOH — Homestead and Small Farm guidance memo (opens in new tab) — the effective date and requirements of the IC 16-42-5.4 homestead vendor and small farm track.
• FDA — Food Allergen Labeling and Consumer Protection Act (FALCPA) (opens in new tab) — the federal list of major food allergens referenced in the allergen-statement guidance above.

Neighbor-state comparison figures (verify before relying on them; these change every session):

• Michigan Public Act 51 of 2025 (HB 4122) (opens in new tab) — the enacted statute raising Michigan's cap from $25,000 to $50,000 ($75,000 for units priced ≥ $250), effective in March 2026.
• Forrager — Kentucky (opens in new tab), Illinois (opens in new tab), and Ohio (opens in new tab) — secondary summaries used to populate the neighbor-state comparison table; confirm against each state's official agency before relying on a specific figure.
• Forrager — Indiana Cottage Food Law (opens in new tab) — secondary third-party summary used only to cross-check the Indiana food list and venue framework against the primary IDOH sources above.

Data freshness: IC 16-42-5.3 was substantially rewritten effective July 1, 2022, and amended in 2023; IC 16-42-5.4 took effect July 1, 2026. This guide reflects the law and IDOH guidance as of September 2026. Cottage food rules change; confirm current requirements with the Indiana Department of Health before making product or labeling decisions.

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This article is provided for educational purposes only and does not constitute legal, regulatory, food-safety, or health advice. Cottage food laws, labeling requirements, allowed food categories, and food handler requirements vary by jurisdiction and change frequently. Consult the Indiana Department of Health, your local health department, or a qualified compliance attorney before making compliance, labeling, or product decisions based on this content.