What Licenses and Permits Do You Need to Start a Food or Beverage Business?
Which registrations you actually owe as a brand versus what your co-packer holds: FDA facility registration, acidified/LACF filings, USDA and TTB permits, state licensing, cottage food limits, and the 2026 dates that matter.
Most "what licenses do I need" checklists are written for restaurants. If you are launching a packaged food or beverage brand through a co-packer, the honest answer is shorter than you expect — and the few things you do owe come with hard dates.
Start here: your co-packer holds most of the licenses
A brand owner that does not manufacture, process, pack, or hold food generally does not register as a food facility with FDA. The plant does. What you own is the formula, the label, the claims, and the liability attached to them.
That flips the moment you touch product yourself. Renting kitchen time, hand-packing samples, repacking cases, or holding inventory in a warehouse you control can make you a facility in your own right. Using a 3PL does not — the 3PL registers itself.
Verify your plant's registration — 2026 is a renewal year
FDA food facility registrations must be renewed every two years, during the window that runs October 1 to December 31 of even-numbered years. The 2026 window is open now. Registration and renewal are free, but each facility needs a DUNS number as its unique facility identifier, and a registration not renewed by December 31 expires.
Ask your co-packer for their current registration number in writing before you book a run, and again after the window closes. An expired registration at the wrong moment is a stopped shipment, not a paperwork problem.
Layer 1 — Business basics (everyone)
Entity formation and EIN; state registration wherever you have nexus
Sales and use tax permit; local business license
Product liability and general liability insurance — $1M per occurrence / $2M aggregate is a common starting point, with the plant named as additional insured
A GS1 company prefix for real UPCs. Not a license, but retailers treat it like one
Layer 2 — Federal, and it depends entirely on what you make
Conventional shelf-stable, refrigerated, or frozen food. The plant carries the FDA facility registration, a written food safety plan under FSMA preventive controls, and a PCQI to sign it. Your job is to ask for the plan's scope and confirm your product is inside it.
Acidified or low-acid canned foods — salsa, pickles, sauces, canned coffee, shelf-stable soups. The processor registers the establishment on Form FDA 2541 within 10 days of first processing, and files a scheduled process for each product and container size within 60 days of registration and before packing. Behind that filing sits a process authority letter and Better Process Control School training. The plant files; you usually pay for the process authority work, and you should hold a copy of the letter.
Meat, poultry, and egg products, including many soups and entrees that contain them, require a USDA FSIS grant of inspection and an approved HACCP plan at the plant. Labels go through FSIS, not FDA.
Imported ingredients. If you import an ingredient yourself rather than buying it landed from a domestic supplier, Foreign Supplier Verification Program obligations land on you, not on your co-packer.
Dietary supplements are a different rulebook entirely: 21 CFR 111 cGMPs, new dietary ingredient notifications, and structure/function claim notification to FDA within 30 days of first marketing. A "functional beverage" is a food; a supplement in a bottle is not.
The 0.5% ABV line
Any beverage at or above 0.5% alcohol by volume is TTB's, not FDA's. Kombucha is the classic accident: it tests under 0.5% at bottling, keeps fermenting on a warm truck, and crosses the line in the bottle. Test at fill and at the end of shelf life under real distribution conditions, not just at fill.
If you are going alcoholic on purpose
Federal permits are slower than an LLC and faster than the horror stories. TTB's median processing times for original applications as of July 2026: brewery 35 days, bonded winery 48, distilled spirits plant 48, importer 19, wholesaler 17. TTB's stated goal is to issue 85% of permits within 75 days. After the permit come COLA label approvals and, for many flavored products, formula approval. Then state ABC licensing and distributor rules, which are usually the longer pole.
Layer 3 — State and local
State manufactured-food or food-processing license for the plant. Most routine inspections are run by the state under contract to FDA
A food storage or warehouse registration for you, in many states, if you hold your own inventory
Weights and measures / net-content registration in some states
California Prop 65 exposure the moment you ship there
Cottage food laws are not a launch path. They vary state by state, but most cap annual sales, restrict you to direct-to-consumer channels, and exclude anything refrigerated or acidified. That excludes wholesale, which is the business you are trying to start. Use them to test a recipe at a farmers market, not to build a brand.
Layer 4 — Not laws, but still gates
None of these are government requirements, and every one of them can stop a purchase order: GFSI certification at the plant (SQF or BRCGS), USDA organic certification for both your brand and your co-packer's handler operation, kosher or halal certification, Non-GMO Project verification, a documented allergen program, and a certificate of insurance that satisfies the retailer, not just the plant.
Who holds what
You hold: entity, tax and insurance; GS1 prefix; label copy, nutrition panel, and claim accuracy; organic or kosher certification in your brand's name; FSVP if you import; the TTB permit if you are the permittee; and your half of the recall plan.
The plant holds: FDA facility registration; the food safety plan and PCQI; FCE and scheduled process filings; USDA grant of inspection where applicable; the state manufactured-food license; and the GFSI audit.
Two dates for the calendar
October 1 – December 31, 2026 — FDA food facility registration renewal window. Registrations not renewed by December 31 expire
July 20, 2028 — FSMA 204 food traceability rule compliance date, extended from January 20, 2026. If you sell anything on the Food Traceability List, the record design work starts years before the date
What people over-worry about
There is no FDA approval for a conventional food or its label. Nobody stamps your product before launch; you are responsible for compliance and FDA finds out afterward. Low-volume exemptions from the Nutrition Facts panel do exist and require an annual notice to FDA, but any nutrient content or health claim voids them — and most brands want the panel anyway, because retailers do.
This is an orientation, not legal advice. Requirements turn on your exact product, process, and states. Confirm your specifics with a food attorney or a process authority before you launch.
Next steps
Go deeper on the federal side in our FDA Compliance & Regulatory Guide, learn what to demand from a plant's food safety program in Food Safety Beyond FDA, and lock the details before your run with the First Production Run Checklist. When you are ready to find a plant that already holds what you need, Get Matched with vetted U.S. co-packers.