Can You Sell Homemade Jewelry? Rules, Permits, and How to Start

Your coworker bought two pairs of your hammered brass earrings, your cousin wants beaded bracelets as party favors for a 7-year-old's birthday, and a craft fair two towns over has a table open in November. Before you order a spool of wire and 200 earring cards, you want to know whether any of this needs a license.

Mostly, it does not. Jewelry skips the food rules that bakers deal with, and there is no jewelry permit to apply for. What jewelry does have is a short list of rules that most craft guides skip: a federal lead law for anything made for kids, federal definitions for the metal words on your tags, a stamping law for 925 and 14K marks, and a few state laws that reach every piece sold there. This guide walks through each one with its numbers, then covers taxes, market rules and where to sell.

Can You Sell Homemade Jewelry?

Yes, you can sell homemade jewelry in the United States, and there is no federal license for making it. The Small Business Administration's page on licenses and permits, read September 30, 2026, lists the business activities that need a federal license, such as alcohol, firearms, aviation and wildlife imports, and jewelry making is not on it. The federal rules below apply in all 50 states, and your city and state add the ordinary paperwork any vendor files, which is covered further down.

Which jewelry rules apply to you comes down to three questions:

• Who is the piece made for? Jewelry designed or marketed for kids 12 and younger is a "children's product" under federal law, which brings a lead limit, lab testing and a certificate. Jewelry for teens and adults falls outside that federal rule, though California's jewelry law counts anyone under 15 as a child.
• What do you call the metal? Words like "sterling," "gold filled" and "vermeil" have exact federal definitions. A plain description like "brass" or "stainless steel" only has to be true.
• What is it made from? Feathers from native wild birds can make a piece illegal to sell no matter who it is for, and in Minnesota any component over the state's lead or cadmium limit does the same.

This page is the permission half of selling jewelry. For booth setup, pricing and which non-food products move at a market, the guide on selling soap, candles and other non-food products at farmers markets covers the selling half once you know which rules you are under.

Does Jewelry Need a Cottage Food Permit or a Special License?

No, jewelry does not need a cottage food permit, because cottage food laws cover food made in a home kitchen and jewelry is not food. Those laws exist so a baker can sell cookies or jam without renting a commercial kitchen, and they come with permits, sales caps and label rules. None of that reaches a necklace. Homegrown's signup page, checked September 30, 2026, says the same thing in its FAQ: "No food license required for non-food products," and it names jewelers among the vendors it is built for.

Here is what skipping food law means in practice:

• No kitchen inspection and no food safety class for your jewelry work.
• No cottage food sales cap. The caps written into food laws count food sales, not earrings.
• No food label rules. Jewelry has no ingredient panel. The words you put on its tag answer to the metal and stone definitions later in this guide.
• No food tax break. Some states tax groceries at a lower rate. Virginia taxes food and personal hygiene products at 1%, while jewelry pays the general rate of 5.3% to 7% depending on the locality.

If you sell jewelry and bread or cookies at the same table, keep two sets of paperwork. The bread answers to your state's cottage food office, and the jewelry answers to product safety and tax law. Mixing them up is how a vendor ends up asking the health department about earrings, which wastes a phone call and gets you no answer that applies. Pottery is the craft that breaks this split, because a mug or bowl that could hold food falls under FDA's lead rules, which the pottery rules and permits guide covers piece by piece.

Which Jewelry Rules Are Law and Which Come From Your Market?

Of the 10 rules in the table below, 4 are federal laws, 1 is federal guidance the FTC enforces through its power to stop deceptive claims, 2 are state laws that cover every piece sold in that state, 1 is a voluntary industry standard, and 2 come from your tax agency, your city and your market. A home jeweler making adult pieces deals with the bottom rows every week and the top rows only when selling to kids, using precious metal words or shipping.

Scroll sideways to see every column.

Federal rows come from the U.S. Code on uscode.house.gov, the eCFR, the CPSC's business pages and the Fish and Wildlife Service, and state rows from Minnesota's statute and California DTSC's lead in jewelry page, all read September 30, 2026. Tax and market rows vary; the sections below show real 2026 examples.

The quick read: an adult pair of $25 earrings made from copper wire and glass beads, described honestly and sold outside Minnesota and California, touches almost none of the top rows. Its paperwork lives in the last two. Add a kids' line, a sterling stamp or a feather and the top rows start to matter. For that $25 pair, what is left is the selling itself, and the guide on how to sell jewelry from home prices a pair at materials plus your time, doubled twice, then shows a $40 pair keeping $38.54 through a storefront against $35.75 on Etsy.

When Does Your Jewelry Count as Children's Jewelry?

Your jewelry counts as children's jewelry when it is designed or intended mainly for kids 12 and younger, and federal law weighs four factors to decide. The definition sits in 15 U.S.C. 2052, read September 30, 2026, and the four factors are:

• What you say about it. A card that reads "for ages 6 to 10" or a listing titled "girls' charm bracelet" is your own statement of intended use.
• How you package, display and advertise it. Cartoon characters, a kids' corner at your booth or photos of the piece on a child all point the same way.
• What shoppers would assume. A $12 stretchy pony-bead bracelet spelling a name in alphabet beads is commonly seen as a kids' item, whatever the card says.
• The CPSC's age determination guidelines, which agency staff use to sort products by the age they suit.

The law counts your own statement only when it is reasonable, so labeling a unicorn charm bracelet "for adults" does not move it out of the children's category if everything else about it says kid. The reverse holds too, by our reading of the factors. A sterling stacking ring sold from an adult display, with nothing aimed at kids, does not become a children's product just because a 12-year-old might buy one.

In California the line sits higher. California's DTSC says a 2019 update to the state's jewelry law changed the definition of a child from age six and younger to anyone under 15. A piece aimed at a 13-year-old is children's jewelry there even though it is not under the federal definition.

What Are the Lead Limits for Children's Jewelry?

Children's jewelry can contain no more than 100 parts per million (ppm) of lead in any part a child can reach, and paint or coatings on it are capped at 90 ppm. The 100 ppm limit comes from the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act, now at 15 U.S.C. 1278a, and the CPSC's Total Lead Content page, read September 30, 2026, says a children's product over that limit is "a banned hazardous substance." The paint limit is written as 0.009% in 16 CFR 1303, which is the same 90 ppm.

The good news is that common jewelry materials have already been judged to fall under the limit. In 16 CFR 1500.91 the CPSC determined that these do not exceed the lead limits, as long as nothing containing lead was added to them:

• Precious gemstones (diamond, ruby, sapphire, emerald) and semiprecious stones that are not based on lead or found with lead minerals, a group the rule says excludes stones such as galena and cerussite
• Natural or cultured pearls
• Wood, bone, sea shell, coral, amber, seeds, nut shells and leather
• Natural fiber cord such as cotton and silk, dyed or undyed
• Surgical and other stainless steel, except the leaded grade called 303Pb
• Gold of at least 10 karat, sterling silver of at least 925/1000, platinum, palladium and titanium

The same rule says paint, coatings or electroplating do not count as a barrier, so a leaded part does not become legal because something is painted or plated over it.

Do You Have to Lab Test Kids' Jewelry You Make at Home?

Yes, children's metal jewelry has to be tested for lead at a CPSC-accepted third-party lab unless every component is a material the CPSC has already cleared, and registering as a small batch manufacturer does not change that. The CPSC's small batch page, read September 30, 2026, lists "Lead in children's metal jewelry" among its Group A rules, which small batch manufacturers must always test at an accepted lab. Lead in paint and small parts sit on the same Group A list. Small batch status itself has limits: the page says your prior-year gross revenue from all consumer products must be $1,436,864 or less, you made no more than 7,500 units of the product, and you register with the CPSC every year.

There is one real break. The materials on the 16 CFR 1500.91 list are exempt from testing for total lead content. The CPSC's Total Lead Content page puts the catch in capital letters: the exemption does "NOT" excuse the piece from meeting the limit, and firms are "still expected to certify compliance" on a Children's Product Certificate.

If you want to sell a kids' line, here is the order that keeps it manageable:

• Decide the age before you design. A piece clearly made for adults, or for teens 15 and up, skips the federal children's rules and California's under-15 line. A piece for 13 and 14 year olds skips the federal rules but not California's, if you sell there. A piece for kids 12 and under takes all of them.
• Build from materials the CPSC already cleared. Sterling or stainless findings, natural stones, unfinished wood beads and cotton cord cut down on what needs a lab.
• Send metal and painted components to a CPSC-accepted lab. Base-metal clasps, plated chain and painted or coated beads get tested there for the rules that apply to them, because lead in children's metal jewelry and lead in paint are Group A rules. If you are a registered small batch manufacturer, the CPSC's small batch page says you can meet other rules, such as total lead in an all-plastic bead, with your own testing, a lab that is not CPSC-accepted or a supplier's written assurance. If you are not registered, those parts go to the accepted lab too.
• Issue the Children's Product Certificate. The CPSC's lead page says you still certify compliance even when a material is exempt from testing, so the certificate covers every piece in the kids' line.
• Read the tracking label rules before you print cards. The small batch page says tracking label requirements apply no matter how small you are.

Testing runs per component and per rule, so a kids' line built from two or three cleared materials is far simpler to certify than one built from a mixed findings kit. The other clean choice is to make adult and teen pieces only and say so plainly on your booth sign and listings.

Which States Limit Lead and Cadmium in All Jewelry?

Minnesota limits lead to 90 ppm and cadmium to 75 ppm in jewelry sold in the state, adult pieces included, and California limits the materials adult jewelry sold there can be made from, caps the lead in some of those materials, and sets its own lead and cadmium limits for children's jewelry. These state laws matter because the federal 100 ppm limit stops at children's products. California first passed a lead limit for jewelry, and DTSC says that afterward "some manufacturers replaced lead with cadmium, which is also toxic," so the state added cadmium limits for children's jewelry too.

Outside those two states, the voluntary guide for kids' pieces is ASTM F2923, the children's jewelry standard, though some states set binding limits of their own for children's products. The CPSC lists it on its voluntary standards page (dated February 23, 2012) and says it addresses cadmium, chemicals in paints and coatings, nickel sensitization, magnets, batteries and strangulation. Federal law does not make you follow it, but it is the checklist a careful kids' line is built against. Other states run their own children's product chemical laws. Washington is one: RCW 70A.430.020, read September 30, 2026, bars selling a children's product or component with more than 90 ppm lead or 40 ppm cadmium, and the chapter's definitions list children's jewelry, meaning jewelry made or marketed for kids under 12, as a children's product. Verify your state's current rules before you sell.

The practical move is at the supplier. Ask for a written lead and cadmium statement on every base-metal component before you buy 500 of them. Minnesota's law names jewelry-making supplies, so a supplier selling findings into Minnesota is held to the same 90 and 75 ppm numbers there.

When Can You Call a Piece Sterling Silver?

You can call a piece sterling silver only when its metal is at least 925 parts per thousand (92.5%) pure silver, which is where the "925" stamp comes from. That definition sits in the FTC's Jewelry Guides, 16 CFR 23.5, as published on the eCFR when we checked it September 30, 2026. The guides set out the FTC's view of what is deceptive. They do not bind anyone on their own, but the FTC can act under the FTC Act when a claim breaks them.

The silver words and what each one needs:

• Sterling, sterling silver, solid silver or "Ster." At least 925/1,000 pure silver.
• Coin or coin silver. At least 900/1,000 pure silver.
• Plain "silver." The guides call the word misleading on its own unless a fineness number of equal size comes right before it, such as "800 silver."
• Silver plated. It has to say plated. The Stamping Act forbids stamping the word "sterling" or "coin" on a plated piece you mail or ship, and the FTC's guides call "sterling" misleading on any piece under 925/1,000 silver.
• Tolerance. The Stamping Act allows sterling to test 4 parts per thousand under the stamp, or 10 when the tested part contains solder.

The mistake to avoid is passing a supplier's word along without checking it. A bulk listing that says "silver tone" or "silver color" is describing a color, not a metal. If your supplier cannot tell you the fineness, describe the color on your tag: "silver-tone brass ear wires" is honest, and "silver ear wires" is a metal claim you cannot back up.

What Do Gold Filled, Gold Plated and Vermeil Actually Mean?

Gold filled means a layer of 10 karat or better gold, mechanically bonded to a base metal, that makes up at least 1/20 (5%) of the piece's total metal weight, while gold electroplate can be as thin as 0.175 microns. Those numbers come from 16 CFR 23.3 and 23.4 (eCFR text checked September 30, 2026), and every gold term needs the karat right before the word gold, at least as large.

Swipe the table to read all three columns.

Definitions from the FTC's Jewelry Guides, 16 CFR 23.3 and 23.4, as published on the eCFR September 30, 2026. Mechanically bonded gold at 1/40 of the weight may also be called gold plate. If a nickel or other base metal layer sits between the sterling and the gold, the guides say to disclose it before you call the piece vermeil.

One detail catches first-time vendors: the guides give examples as low as 9 karat ("9 Kt. Gold"), so a lower karat is not banned. It just has to be stated. What you cannot do is write "gold" alone on anything under 24 karat, or "gold" on a plated chain without saying it is plated. The safe habit for a part-time vendor is to copy the supplier's spec sheet wording onto your tag and listing, karat and plating type included, and to keep that spec sheet on file.

Do You Need a Trademark to Stamp 925 or 14K on Your Jewelry?

You need your name or a registered trademark next to a 925 or 14K stamp once you mail the piece or ship it to another state, under 15 U.S.C. 297, which we read on September 30, 2026. The law applies when a jeweler stamps a gold or silver quality mark on a piece and then sends it by mail, by carrier or across a state line. Before it goes, the piece needs either a trademark "duly registered or applied for registration" within 30 days of the piece entering commerce, or "the name of such person."

The same section says how the name or mark goes on:

• By the same method as the quality mark. If the 925 is stamped, the name or trademark is stamped too.
• At least as large. The lettering cannot be smaller than the 925 or 14K beside it.
• As close as possible. It sits next to the quality mark.

Nothing in that section requires you to stamp a piece in the first place; it sets rules for when you do. Whether initials alone count as "the name of such person" is a question for a trademark attorney, so your full name or a registered mark is the reading the text supports. If you want the registered route, the guide on trademarking a small business name walks through what registration takes. Either way, the fineness under the mark has to be true, because the Stamping Act also bars marks that overstate the gold or silver in a piece.

How Should You Describe Stones, Pearls and Handmade Work?

A $30 pendant set with a lab-grown or imitation stone needs "laboratory-created," "lab-grown," "imitation" or "simulated" right before the stone's name, in letters just as large, under 16 CFR 23.25. The FTC's guides add that "faux" is not an adequate disclosure. The same guides cover the other words that show up on handmade jewelry tags:

• Treated stones. You disclose a treatment when it is not permanent, when it creates special care needs, or when it significantly affects the stone's value. For online listings, the guides say the disclosure goes in the product description.
• Pearls. The plain word "pearl" is only for a natural pearl, one that formed with no help from people. A cultured pearl, grown around a nucleus a person planted in the mollusk, needs "cultured" or "cultivated" right before the word, in letters just as large (16 CFR 23.20). A glass or plastic bead that looks like one needs a qualifier, such as "imitation pearl."
• Real, genuine, natural and precious. None of these can describe a stone that was made in a lab.
• Handmade. The guides say "handmade" means the "entire shaping and forming" from raw materials, such as sheet, wire, metal clay or casting grain, plus the finishing, was done by hand.

That last definition surprises beaders. Stringing store-bought beads on a store-bought chain with a store-bought clasp is real work, but under the guide's wording it is assembly rather than making by hand from raw materials. Our suggestion is "hand-assembled" or "designed and strung by hand," which describe what you did without borrowing the legal meaning of handmade. A pendant you forged from sterling wire is handmade in the guide's sense.

Can You Sell Jewelry Made With Feathers, Shells or Bone?

You can sell a $15 pair of earrings made with shell, bone or feathers from birds the law does not protect, such as domestic chickens, but not jewelry made with feathers of native wild birds, even ones you found on the ground. Chickens are not native wild birds, so by our reading the federal bird law below does not reach their feathers. Found feathers of wild birds look free and harmless, which is why this rule surprises crafters.

Shell, bone and coral raise a different question: which animal. The same fact sheet says the Endangered Species Act can decide whether an item made from an endangered or threatened species may be sold across state lines, and that the CITES treaty requires permits or other paperwork to import or export certain species. The SBA's federal license page lists the import or export of wildlife products as an activity licensed by the Fish and Wildlife Service. For a small vendor, four habits cover it:

• Buy craft feathers from a supplier that names the bird and states it is domestic poultry or another unprotected source.
• Ask where shell, coral and bone came from and what species it is before you buy a bulk bag.
• Skip eagle feathers and parts entirely. The fact sheet lists their sale as prohibited regardless of age.
• Skip elephant ivory, vintage ivory beads included. The fact sheet lists jewelry among its examples of elephant ivory products and says a near-total ban on commercial trade in African elephant ivory took effect in the United States on July 6, 2016.

Do You Need a Business License and Sales Tax Permit to Sell Jewelry?

Plan on a state sales tax registration and, depending on your city or county, a business license, because jewelry is taxed like most other products in the states we checked. Virginia Tax, read September 30, 2026, says anyone who meets the definition of a dealer registers to collect sales tax on "tangible personal property," and the Texas Comptroller describes a 6.25% state sales tax on "most goods," with local add-ons up to a combined 8.25%.

Virginia shows how the rate depends on where the sale happens: 7% in Williamsburg, James City County and York County, 6.3% in eight other localities, 6% across Central Virginia, Hampton Roads and Northern Virginia, and 5.3% everywhere else. Sell a $40 necklace at a market in the city of Fredericksburg, which falls in the 5.3% group, and you collect $2.12 in tax. The 1% grocery rate for food and personal hygiene products does not apply to your jewelry.

Online marketplaces change who collects. Etsy's Fees and Payments Policy, read the same day, says Etsy will "calculate, collect and remit sales tax on your behalf for orders shipped to customers residing in US locations." Virginia Tax says vendors on a marketplace facilitator's platform generally do not collect that tax themselves but "may still need to register" for their own sales outside the platform. Cash and card sales at your market table are your own sales. The plain-language guide to sales tax at farmers markets walks through registering, collecting at your table and filing.

Local licenses vary more than tax rules. Fredericksburg requires every vendor at its city-run market to hold a City of Fredericksburg business license, according to its 2026 craft vendor handbook, with an exception only for qualifying farm vendors. Your city may require a general license, a home occupation permit or neither. Your first-month paperwork usually runs in this order:

• Register for sales tax with your state tax agency. Do it before your first market, since markets like Fredericksburg ask for the number on the application.
• Call your city or county clerk. Ask what a home-based craft business that sells at markets and online needs, and whether selling under a shop name needs a trade name filing.
• Write a materials sheet for each design. List every component, its supplier and its metal or material, so tags, listings and any market question match the spec sheet.
• Decide on a kids' line up front. If you will make pieces for 12 and under, plan the testing and certificate before you buy components.

Once your sales tax registration is in place, the next question is where regulars order between markets without texting you. A Homegrown storefront gives your jewelry customers one link to order and pay for pickup at your table, for $10 a month billed annually.

What Will a Farmers Market or Craft Fair Ask of a Jewelry Vendor?

Expect every market to ask whether you made the piece yourself, and expect some to cap, schedule or jury craft vendors before they approve you. Three 2026 vendor handbooks, all read September 30, 2026, show the range:

• Fredericksburg Farmers Market, Virginia. Its craft handbook lists handmade jewelry as an accepted category. At least 75% of what a vendor sells must be made by the vendor within 100 miles of the market, and up to 25% can be resale products that support the handmade work. Vendors need a city business license and a Virginia sales tax number, and an Art in the Park space runs $35 for a drop-in date or $350 for a biweekly season.
• Bloomington Community Farmers' Market, Indiana. Registered crafts can be sold only in April, May, October and November, and only by vendors who sold at eight markets in the June to September stretch before those months. Crafts cannot "contain a commercially made piece central to the design," so by our reading a store-bought pendant on a chain you strung would not pass.
• Anderson County Farmers Market, South Carolina. It names "handmade jewelry" as an acceptable craft product, as long as it is the crafter's own work made within 50 miles of the county, with no commercial, imported or second-hand items resold.

Those three rules share one idea: the market is selling local, handmade work, and resold findings or ready-made pieces break that promise to shoppers. Keep your materials sheet in your booth bin, because a manager who questions a piece wants to know what you made and what you bought.

When Does Jewelry Income Become Taxable?

Jewelry income is reportable on your federal return from the first sale, and once your net earnings from self-employment reach $400 in a year, you file Schedule SE and owe self-employment tax, according to the IRS self-employment tax page read September 30, 2026. That $400 is profit after costs such as wire, beads, findings and booth fees, not total sales.

If you sell pieces now and then with no intent to profit, the IRS may see a hobby rather than a business. Its hobby fact sheet, FS-2022-38, says hobby income still goes on Schedule 1 (Form 1040), line 8. The questions it asks include:

• Do you run the activity like a business and keep complete, accurate books?
• Do you advertise or promote your jewelry?
• Do you change your methods to improve profit?
• Is it a main source of your income?
• Has the activity made a profit in some years, or do you expect it to?

The hobby versus business guide runs through the full IRS list with examples. Platforms report too. The IRS says a payment app or online marketplace, including a "craft or maker marketplace," must send you a Form 1099-K when you receive over $20,000 in more than 200 transactions in a year, and it may send one at lower amounts. The form changes whether the IRS already has a copy of your sales, not whether they count as income.

Where Should You Sell Homemade Jewelry, and What Does Each Option Cost?

Sell your first pieces in person, at markets and craft fairs, and give repeat buyers an online link, where fees on a $40 necklace run from $1.46 to $4.25 per order before any monthly plan. Craft fairs, boutiques, consignment cases and trunk shows each pay you a different share of the price, and the guide to where to sell jewelry works out what one $30 pair of earrings brings in at all seven places. A market table puts your pieces in people's hands, and the people who come back already own one of them. The question is where those repeat buyers place an order. Here is the full fee stack on a $40 necklace picked up at your next market:

Scroll sideways to see every column.

Fees read on Etsy's Fees and Payments Policy and Etsy Payments Policy, Shopify's pricing page and findhomegrown.com/signup, September 30, 2026. The monthly column uses the annual or yearly plan price. Card processing is figured on the $40 price; Etsy charges its processing fee on the total including tax and shipping, so real Etsy orders run a few cents higher. The Etsy row assumes one $0.20 listing fee per necklace sold. Etsy's Offsite Ads fee of 15% (12% for good once a shop reaches $10,000 in sales over the prior 365 days) applies only to orders that come from those ads and is not in the table.

Here is the arithmetic behind those rows. On Etsy, the $0.20 listing fee, 6.5% of $40 ($2.60) and 3% of $40 plus $0.25 ($1.45) add up to $4.25, and 20 orders cost $85.00. On Shopify Basic and Homegrown, 2.9% of $40 plus $0.30 is $1.46, so 20 orders cost $29.20 in card fees, plus $29 for Shopify's plan ($58.20) or $10 for Homegrown's ($39.20).

The per-order gap comes from Etsy's 6.5% transaction fee and listing fee, which pay for Etsy's search traffic. If strangers in other states find you on Etsy, those fees buy something real. If the buyer is a regular who already knows your booth, you are paying marketplace fees on a customer you brought in yourself.

Give Jewelry Regulars One Link to Order Between Markets

The customers most likely to buy your next pair of earrings are the ones who bought the last pair, and Homegrown gives them one link to order and pay before they pick up at your next market. It costs $10 per month billed annually, with no percentage fees beyond standard payment processing of 2.9% + $0.30 that you pay, so the $40 necklace in the table above costs you $1.46 in fees instead of Etsy's $4.25. Etsy's 6.5% transaction fee and listing fees pay for a national marketplace your local regulars do not need, and Shopify's $29 a month billed yearly buys a full online store with shipping and pickup settings, which is more store than a vendor selling at markets needs.

What fits a jewelry vendor:

• Pickup at your market or your door, with your market added from the 8,800+ markets on file, so a regular can reserve the piece they saw last Saturday.
• Local delivery when you drop orders off nearby.
• Sales tax on storefront orders, which the signup page says is "auto-calculated, auto-filed."
• One storefront link you can print on earring cards and your booth sign.

The honest limits: Homegrown is built for pickup and local delivery, so if most of your jewelry ships to buyers in other states, Etsy or Shopify fits that side of the business better. Customers create a Homegrown account to place a first order. There is no timed drop or countdown release feature for a new collection. Your storefront is listed on the Homegrown marketplace, but plan on most orders coming from people you send to your own link. And Homegrown does not test your pieces, write your Children's Product Certificate or handle tax on sales you make outside your storefront, such as cash at your table.

What Mistakes Trip Up New Jewelry Vendors?

The trouble new jewelry vendors run into usually starts with a word on a tag or a part in a findings pack, not a missing license. Check your table against these seven mistakes:

1. Calling plated chain "gold" or "silver." Without "plated" and the karat, the tag is misleading under the FTC's guides.
2. Stamping 925 on a piece whose visible parts are plated or base metal. The FTC's guides say a quality mark that covers only part of a piece should say which part when leaving it out would misrepresent what the piece is made of, though small working parts such as springs, catches and posts are left out of the silver assay. The Stamping Act bars "sterling" on plated articles you mail or ship.
3. Marketing an adult design to kids. A photo on a child or "perfect for your daughter" in a listing can turn it into a children's product with a 100 ppm lead limit and a certificate.
4. Using found feathers. Molted or road-found feathers of native wild birds are still illegal to possess without a permit.
5. Writing "handmade" on assembled pieces. Use "hand-assembled" when the parts came ready-made.
6. Showing up without a tax number. Fredericksburg requires a Virginia sales tax number from every vendor, and a market that checks will not wait while you apply.
7. Forgetting Minnesota and California when you ship there. Both laws cover jewelry sold into the state, and neither exempts small makers: Minnesota's exemptions do not mention size, and DTSC says the California law applies to businesses of all sizes.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do you need a license to sell homemade jewelry?

You do not need a special jewelry license, and the SBA's list of federally licensed business activities does not include jewelry making. Most sellers of homemade jewelry still need a state sales tax registration, and some cities and counties require a general business license or home occupation permit. A market may ask to see both before it approves your application.

Can you sell homemade jewelry at a farmers market?

Yes, you can sell homemade jewelry at farmers markets that accept crafts, and each market sets its own rules. Fredericksburg, Virginia lists handmade jewelry as a craft category and requires at least 75% of a vendor's goods to be self-made, while Bloomington, Indiana allows registered crafts only in April, May, October and November, and only for vendors who sold at eight of its June to September markets. Expect a handmade requirement, an application fee and a request for your sales tax number.

Do you have to test children's jewelry for lead?

Yes, children's metal jewelry must be tested for lead at a CPSC-accepted lab unless every component is a material the CPSC has already cleared, and small batch registration does not remove that requirement. Cleared materials, such as sterling silver, 10 karat or better gold, stainless steel (except the leaded 303Pb grade), natural stones not based on lead, and untreated wood, are exempt from total lead testing but must still meet the 100 ppm limit. The maker still certifies each kids' piece on a Children's Product Certificate.

Can you stamp 925 on silver-plated jewelry?

No. A 925 stamp says the metal is 925/1,000 pure silver, which a plated piece is not. The FTC's guides call "sterling" misleading on any piece under 925/1,000 silver, and the National Gold and Silver Stamping Act bars marks that overstate fineness and bars the word "sterling" on plated articles sent by mail or across state lines. Describe a plated piece as silver plated. A real sterling piece you stamp also needs your name or registered trademark next to the 925 before it goes in the mail or out of state.

Do you collect sales tax on Etsy jewelry sales?

Usually not on the Etsy order itself. Etsy's Fees and Payments Policy says Etsy calculates, collects and remits sales tax for orders shipped to US customers, and Virginia Tax says vendors on a marketplace facilitator's platform generally do not collect that tax but may still need to register. Sales at your market table or through a storefront you run are your own sales to collect on.

Can you sell feather earrings?

You can sell feather earrings made with feathers from birds the law does not protect, such as domestic chickens, but not with feathers from native wild birds. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service says the Migratory Bird Treaty Act covers feathers of native North American birds, with no exemption for molted or road-killed finds. Buy craft feathers from a supplier that names the bird they came from.

Related Reading

These guides pick up where this one stops, from the booth to the platforms and the tax return:

• How to Sell Soap, Candles, and Non-Food Items at Farmers Markets: which non-food products sell at a market, how to price them and how to set up the table.
• How to Get Accepted Into a Juried Craft Fair as a Food Vendor: how juried fairs review applications and samples, advice that carries over to a jewelry table.
• Sales Tax at Farmers Markets: A Plain-Language Guide: getting a permit, collecting at your booth and filing on time.
• Can You Sell Homemade Candles? Rules, Permits, and How to Start: the product and label rules if you add candles to your jewelry table.
• Can You Sell Homemade Soap? Rules, Permits, and How to Start: the FDA and labeling rules that apply to soap and body products.
• Best Platform to Sell Soap and Candles Online: storefront options compared for vendors of non-food products.

Once your tags say exactly what your metal is and your tax registration is filed, the last step is making reorders easy. Set up your Homegrown storefront, list your three best-selling designs with a pickup spot at your next market, and print the link on your earring cards.