For local farmers market vendors, selling the food they make in their home brings them money.
Now, Senate Bill 572 will allow a person to sell food directly to the consumer and online.
“The cottage food bill is all about local home produced product,” said Wolfforth Farmers Market spokesperson Dan Baze.
The bill will give farmers and food producers more opportunities to make shelf-stable products in their kitchen at home and sell them directly to consumers anywhere in the state.
“You’re gonna see an increase in the number of vendors,” Baze said. “Cause there’s a lot of people that are at home, that are thinking about starting a business, and now they’ll come to the forefront.”
A big thing the bill adds, is being able to sell food online.
“It opens up the door for any vendor to sell over the internet, the caviat being they have to deliver directly to the consumer,” Baze said.
Baze said they can sell such as pickled fruits and vegetables, canned goods that are acidified and frozen fruits and vegetables.
“The new bill adds a number of items to it, it used to be just picked cucumbers, now we got pickled okra and pickled beets,” Baze said. “The key is it’s any shelf stable item, okay you can’t do anything that requires refrigeration.”
