How to Start a Bakery in Ontario

The national guide linked below covers the generic spine of starting a bakery business in Canada: the format, business registration and tax, the menu, and hiring and opening. This guide covers only what Ontario adds: the food premises regulation, your local health unit, the municipal licence, and the labelling rules for what you sell. If you have read the national guide, start here. This guide is process information, not legal advice: where a figure was not verified on an opened official page, this guide states a check instead of a figure.

1. Notify your local health unit before you open

A bakery is a food premise, and Ontario requires advance notice. Every person who intends to commence to operate a food premise must give notice of that intention to the medical officer of health of the health unit in which the food premise will be located, under subsection 16(2) of the Health Protection and Promotion Act, and section 5 of O. Reg. 493/17 requires the notice to include your name, contact information, and the location of the food premise, according to Government of Ontario, O. Reg. 493/17: Food Premises. No person may operate or maintain a food premise except in accordance with the regulation, on the same page.

Find your health unit from the bakery's address — the one covering your municipality is the one you notify. Health units run the same process with local timing: all food premises, including those in private homes, must comply with Ontario Food Premises Regulation 493/17, and you must notify your local health unit if you intend to operate a new food business, according to Region of Waterloo, Restaurants and Food Services Health Standards. The Waterloo steps are to contact your municipality about zoning, construction, and business licence requirements, refer to the regulation and the Food Premises Reference Document 2019 for food safety requirements, and notify Public Health with the Food Premise Notification Form, providing a copy of your floor plan, on the same page. Halton Region recommends submitting the notification at least 14 days before opening, and at least 14 days before submitting a building permit application if you are renovating, according to Halton Region, Public Health Notification of Business Opening, Reopening and Renovation. Public Health reviews completed forms and follows up within two business days, and a public health inspector may need to visit the premises, on the same page. Do this before you order equipment or set an opening date: the inspector's pre-opening visit is the point where layout problems are cheapest to fix.

2. Build the premises to O. Reg. 493/17

O. Reg. 493/17 is the rulebook for the physical bakery. Every food premise must be operated and maintained so that the premises are free from every condition that may be a health hazard, adversely affect the sanitary operation of the premises, or adversely affect the wholesomeness of food, according to Government of Ontario, O. Reg. 493/17: Food Premises. In rooms where food is prepared, processed, packaged, served, transported, manufactured, handled, sold, offered for sale, or displayed, the floor or floor coverings must be tight, smooth, and non-absorbent, the walls and ceilings must be readily cleanable and maintainable in a sanitary condition, and the room must be maintained in a sanitary condition so as to prevent contamination of food, on the same page. No room where food is handled may be used for sleeping purposes, on the same page.

The regulation then works through the pieces a bakery build-out must include: equipment, utensils, and multi-service articles; illumination and ventilation; garbage and waste handling; pest control; and sanitary facilities, including the rule that altering floor space or the number of toilets or washbasins needs approval, on the same page. The cleaning and sanitizing part requires equipment for cleaning and sanitizing, sanitization of utensils, mechanical dishwashers where used, and cleaning and sanitizing of surfaces, on the same page. Read the regulation against your floor plan with your health inspector before the build, not after: floors, drains, handwashing stations, and dishwashing layout are expensive to move once installed. The results of any inspections conducted by a public health inspector must be posted in accordance with the inspector's request, on the same page, so plan a visible spot for the inspection notice near the entrance.

3. Get food handler training in place

Training is a staffing rule, not a one-time course. Every operator of a food service premise shall ensure that there is at least one food handler or supervisor on the premise who has completed food handler training during every hour in which the premise is operating, according to Government of Ontario, O. Reg. 493/17: Food Premises. A bakery that sells food for immediate consumption is a food service premise, so this rule applies to your shop from the first hour of the first day.

Food handler training means food safety training provided by a local board of health, an agency of a board of health, or through a program the Ministry has recognized as equivalent to the food safety training standards established by the Ministry, on the same page. Train more than one person: if only the owner is trained and the owner is away, the shop cannot legally operate. Every food handler in the premise must also follow the hygiene rules in section 33 of the regulation — be clean and practise good personal hygiene, wear clean outer garments, take reasonable precautions so food is not contaminated by hair, wash hands as often as necessary to prevent contamination of food or food areas, and be free from any infectious agent of a disease that may be spread through food, on the same page. Food handlers must not use tobacco while engaged as food handlers, on the same page.

4. Hold food at the regulation temperatures and keep the records

Baked goods split into two groups under the regulation: low-risk food, which is food that is not potentially hazardous, and potentially hazardous food, which can support the growth of infectious or toxigenic micro-organisms and requires time and temperature control, according to Government of Ontario, O. Reg. 493/17: Food Premises. Most plain breads, cakes, and pastries are low-risk; anything with cream, custard, meat, or egg fillings that needs refrigeration is potentially hazardous, and your inspector will confirm the line for your menu.

Potentially hazardous food must be kept at 4 degrees Celsius or lower, or 60 degrees Celsius or higher, on the same page. That rule does not apply during periods of time, not to exceed two hours, that are necessary for the preparation, processing, and manufacturing of the food, on the same page. The equipment used for refrigeration or hot-holding of potentially hazardous foods must be of sufficient size to store the food and maintain it at those temperatures, and must contain accurate indicating thermometers that may be easily read, on the same page. Food intended to be distributed, maintained, stored, transported, displayed, sold, or offered for sale in a frozen state must be kept frozen until sold or prepared for use, on the same page.

Keep purchase records: every operator must ensure that records of the purchase of food for use in the premise are retained on the premise at least until the first anniversary of the purchase date, on the same page. That record is also your defence if a supplier issue ever traces back to your shop — file invoices by date and keep them on site, not at home.

5. Sort zoning and the municipal business licence

The province regulates the food premise; the municipality regulates where it can sit and whether it needs a local licence. Contact your local municipality for information about zoning, construction, and business licence requirements, according to Region of Waterloo, Restaurants and Food Services Health Standards. Do this before signing a lease: a unit zoned for retail may not permit a bakery with on-site baking, and a change of use can require a building permit and a zoning check. The building permit side is covered in the construction guide linked below only for the permit mechanics — for a bakery, the practical point is that any renovation to turn a unit into a food premise usually needs a permit application, and Halton Region recommends notifying Public Health at least 14 days before submitting that application, according to Halton Region, Public Health Notification of Business Opening, Reopening and Renovation.

Municipal business licence rules vary by municipality — some require a licence for a food business, some fold it into a general business licence, and fees and renewal periods differ. Because no single Ontario-wide fee or timeline exists, none is printed here: call your municipality's licensing office with the address and the business type and get the answer in writing before you spend on the fit-out.

6. Label packaged goods to federal rules

What you sell loose over the counter and what you sell packaged follow different rules, and the packaged side is federal. All prepackaged products with more than one ingredient must declare their ingredients and components in a list of ingredients, in descending order of proportion by weight, according to Canadian Food Inspection Agency, List of ingredients and allergens on food labels. Food allergens, gluten, and added sulphites must be declared, and added sulphites at levels of 10 parts per million or more that are not already required to be shown in the list of ingredients must be declared by their prescribed source names, on the same page. A cross-contamination statement may be declared when, despite all reasonable measures, there is unintended presence of food allergens in the food, on the same page.

One exemption matters for a retail bakery: prepackaged products that are packed on retail premises from bulk are exempt from declaring a list of ingredients, including in-store baked breads, on the same page. If you voluntarily show a list of ingredients on an exempt product, the prescribed source names for allergens, gluten, and added sulphites present must be declared in it, on the same page. Mandatory information on consumer prepackaged food must be in both English and French, so budget for bilingual labels from the start rather than reprinting them later. If you also sell wholesale to grocery stores or ship outside Ontario, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency must be notified and federal licensing rules apply — raise that with the agency before taking wholesale orders, because the retail rules in this guide do not cover it.

Figures this guide does not state

• Municipal business licence fees and timelines. Licence requirements, fees, and renewal periods vary by municipality and were not verified for any single municipality on an opened official page for this guide, so none are printed. Get them from your municipality's licensing office for your address.
• Health unit notification lead time as a legal deadline. The regulation requires notice before you operate; the 14-day figure is a health unit recommendation, not a statutory deadline. Confirm your own health unit's recommended lead time when you file.
• Food handler training course fees. Training is available from local boards of health and ministry-recognized programs, but no fee was verified on an opened official page for this guide, so none is printed. Check your health unit's program.
• Front-of-package nutrition symbol. Packaged foods that meet or exceed thresholds for saturated fat, sugars, or sodium may need a front-of-package nutrition symbol, but the requirements were not verified on an opened Canadian Food Inspection Agency page for this guide, so no threshold or date is printed. Check the agency's labelling pages before designing packaged labels.
• Whether a baker needs trade certification. Baker is a trade in Ontario's skilled trades system, but its compulsory or voluntary status was not verified on an opened official page for this guide, so no claim is printed. Check the Skilled Trades Ontario trades directory before hiring on that basis.

Related guides:

How to Start a Bakery Business in Canada, How to Start a Home Bakery Business in Canada, Food Truck Permits and Licences in Canada, How to Register a Business in Ontario, and How to Register for GST/HST in Canada.

Sources

• Government of Ontario, O. Reg. 493/17: Food Premises — notice of intention to operate, operation and maintenance, temperatures, food handler training, food handler hygiene, purchase records —
• Region of Waterloo, Restaurants and Food Services Health Standards — notify the health unit, contact the municipality for zoning and licensing, floor plan with the notification form —
• Halton Region, Public Health Notification of Business Opening, Reopening and Renovation — 14-day recommended notification lead time, two-business-day follow-up, inspector visit —
• Canadian Food Inspection Agency, List of ingredients and allergens on food labels — ingredient lists, allergen and sulphite declaration, in-store baked bread exemption, bilingual labelling —