Pickles are one of the few canned foods many states let you make at home and sell at a market, because a pickle with enough acid, at an equilibrium pH of 4.6 or lower, keeps botulism from growing. The details are set by your state. Wisconsin lets you sell home-canned pickles and other acidic fruits and vegetables at farmers markets and community events with no license, as long as you take in less than $5,000 a year from them, put up a sign, and label every jar with your name and address, the canning date, a set statement, and the ingredients. Minnesota allows home-canned pickles at pH 4.6 or below too, canned in Minnesota, with its own label and sign, after the yearly registration its cottage food law asks for. Whichever state, test the pH of every batch and write it down. At the stall, the work is the usual: bring what you'll sell, price for the time it takes, and watch the cap. In the example below, a Wisconsin canner works out how many more market days of pickles its cap allows.
The short version
- Pickles at pH 4.6 or lower can often be home-canned and sold at markets; check your state.
- Wisconsin: farmers markets and community events, under $5,000 a year, a sign, and a label on every jar.
- Minnesota: pH 4.6 or below, canned in Minnesota, with the label, the sign and the yearly registration.
- Test and record each batch's pH; a pH meter beats strips for a number you can write down.
- Bring what you'll sell; quarts and pints sell at different speeds.
- In Wisconsin, track the year's pickle sales against the $5,000 cap.
- TaroStack keeps each batch's lot, canning date and pH. More below.
What the stall needs
| Item | Wisconsin | Minnesota |
|---|---|---|
| Sign | "These canned goods are homemade and not subject to state inspection." | "These products are homemade and not subject to state inspection." |
| On each jar | Name and address, canning date, "This product was made in a private home not subject to state licensing or inspection.", ingredients | Name and registration number or address, canning date, ingredients and allergens, "These products are homemade and not subject to state inspection." |
| Where | Farmers markets, community or social events | As the cottage food law allows, after registering |
| Limit | Less than $5,000 a year from these sales | The cottage food law's yearly limit |
The rest of Wisconsin's home food rules are in Wisconsin cottage food law, and Minnesota's in Minnesota cottage food law. How to test pH is in pH testing for acidified foods.
The rules
| Rule | Where |
|---|---|
| Wisconsin | Home-canned pickles and other processed vegetables or fruits at an equilibrium pH of 4.6 or lower, sold at a farmers' market or a community or social event in Wisconsin, under $5,000 a year, with the sign and the label (Wis. Stat. 97.29(2)(b)2) |
| Minnesota | Home-canned pickles, vegetables or fruits at pH 4.6 or lower or water activity 0.85 or less, canned in Minnesota, with the sign and label (Minn. Stat. 28A.152) |
Pickles kept in the refrigerator, and anything sold to stores, follow different rules, which are in pickle business license. This is general information, not legal advice.
An example: a Viroqua canner and the cap
Driftless Crumb, the made-up home baker and canner in Viroqua, Wisconsin, I use in these examples, sells pickles at the Saturday farmers market under Wisconsin's home-canned exemption:
| Product | Price | Cost a jar | Bring | Expect to sell |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dill pickles, quart | $9.00 | $2.80 | 24 | 18 |
| Dill pickles, pint | $6.00 | $1.70 | 30 | 22 |
| Bread-and-butter pickles, pint | $6.00 | $1.75 | 20 | 14 |
| Dilly beans, pint | $7.00 | $2.10 | 16 | 10 |
A market day brings about $448 of pickles and leaves $299.70 after the jars and the $15 stall fee. September's four markets sold $1,748, and the year's pickle sales reached $3,950. That leaves $1,050 under the $5,000 cap, about 2.3 market days at this pace, so the pickles go to every other Saturday through October and stop there, while the kringle carries on. Next year the canner is pricing a shared kitchen license, which is in how to rent a commercial kitchen.
Get the planner
Download the pickle market planner. Three sheets: the market day, with each jar's price, cost, how many to bring and how many you expect to sell, and the sales, what's left and sell-through filled in; a season log of what each market sold; and the $5,000 cap, with the room left and how many market days of pickles that is. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.
Where this stops working
The planner tracks dollars. The jars need more: which batch each one came from, its canning date and its pH, so a question about a jar at the market can be answered from the label, and the year's total stays honest.
How TaroStack does it
TaroStack keeps each batch's lot, canning date and pH, and counts what's left after market.
Each canning a batch. A canning of dill pickles is a batch from its recipe, with its lot and canning date, taking cucumbers, vinegar and jars off stock.
Your own fields. A field of your own on the batch record holds the pH reading, so every lot has its number.
Counts with no signal. What's left on the table at the end of the market can be counted on a phone with no signal.
| The job | Notebook | In TaroStack |
|---|---|---|
| pH of each batch | A page in the canning book | A field on the batch record |
| Canning date on each lot | Marker on the lid | The lot's date |
| Jars left after market | Counted in the car | A count on a phone, offline |
Recipes, batches and counts are on every plan, from $49 a month. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.