Thinking of Selling Your (CP) Soap?

If you are a Cold Process soap maker in Australia and have been thinking about selling your soaps (this even applies to family and friends) you must register with [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

NICNAS is a government body that regulates the sale and manufacture of businesses, companies and individuals who produce/manufacture or work with chemicals in Australia.

SOAP is considered a 'cosmetic', as you use lye (sodium hydroxide) in the process of making the product you are manufacturing a cosmetic using a chemical. This means you have to register with NICNAS, pay your fee of $395 in order to sell your product.

If you do not pay this fee and get caught selling without being registered it is a $14,000 fine!!! Yep, it is a ridiculous price and something we (small business) soap makers have been trying change without any success. A long run battle

I am just letting you all know about this, not to put you off but just to let you all know about it so you don't get in trouble. Even if you plan to sell at the markets or school fetes etc you have to pay. We had a petition awhile ago, and I can tell you it was very unsuccessful. This annual fee even went up from last year.

Please note, this does NOT apply to MP (Melt and Pour) soap makers. Another important note - if you resell CP soaps make sure the person you buy off has a NICNAS registration number.

Sorry for the long winded post, but just wanted to clarify everything for you as the NICNAS website can also be very confusing to go through

Kelly

Awesome, thanks for that info Kelly. I've made it a sticky so it doesn't disappear.

Thanks Ally, I meant to ask for you to make it sticky

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Basically no, you fill the form out and pay the fees list how much your cost of lye/chemicals is per year. Then once the registration is due for renewal you need let them know if anything has changed ie.amount of chemicals etc. There are no rules or guidelines you must follow in regards to storage.

Its pretty simple and straight forward Only having to pay such a huge amount in the first place is the hard part

that's the thing with these agencies huh... no room for reason, just a one-size-fits-all approach.

oh wow... i had no idea there was so much involved!

I also understand that if you import fragrance oils and onsell the products you are required to register so I am asuming that there will be lots of candlemakers out there that are not aware of this.
Costs are so high I am paying 72.00 a month in insurance as well and I can tell you I don't do enough sales to make this and my NICNAS rego back at the moment.

I know exactly what you mean Lynn It's a love job isn't it?

wow, and I thought nappy-makers insurance was expensive (insurance companies don't like snaps and small children).

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Soapgirl that is sooooo true I keep my Etsy store going and going and the sales are slowwwwwwww but I love the people I have met and the chat is fun too :0) I will keep at it even though I sell very little that way!!!!!!

You go to markets and there's always all those people with soap.. I wonder how many of them have gone through the proper channels?

at least if you're only using your own soap you know you're safe, hey?

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Missnatty this is where I am at basically paying to sell soap but do hope one day to build it to a point where I see a return

And people wonder why handmade soap is so expensive... grrrr.. I have often explained some of the hidden costs of soapmaking to people. And it's not just insurance and NICNAS, it's the cost of running a website, time to make the products, label them etc.

Can anyone tell me the approximate cost of pinsurance for a soapmaker?

I'm nearly ready to open shop. I have all the legal "stuff" and licenses in place and am in the process of organising insurance. I don't have an intention to hold a stall or go to markets at this stage, but am just having an online store. That lowers the insurance costs to just Product Liability. Finding a reasonable insurer is proving challenging. Since the law states we have to show all the ingredients in each batch, you can't be sued over a reaction. But you can be sued if your soap leaves a mark of some kind on a towel. It's sad that people's greed motivates them to look for sources of money at the cost of someone's livelihood.