Making stuff and selling it is genuinely exciting. Bath salts, essential oil blends, herbal lotions — there’s a whole world of small makers doing this, and a lot of them don’t realize there’s a legal line they can accidentally cross just by describing what their product does.
Here’s the line: the moment you claim your product treats, cures, or relieves a medical condition, the FDA considers it a drug — not a cosmetic, not a candle, not a craft. And drugs have to go through a whole approval process before you can legally sell them. Which means, without that approval, you’re selling something illegal.
The FDA spells it out pretty clearly. Saying your lavender massage oil “relieves muscle pain” or your herbal blend “helps with anxiety” or your sleep spray “treats insomnia” — those are drug claims. It doesn’t matter that your ingredients are natural. It doesn’t matter that they come from plants. The FDA has specifically said that the fact a fragrance or ingredient comes from a plant doesn’t keep it from being regulated as a drug.
And it’s not just lotions and oils. The FDA has issued warning letters to companies selling vaping products and personal aromatherapy inhalers that contain herbal extracts or essential oils and made health claims. Same rule applies.
So what CAN you say? You can describe what the product is — a lotion, a bath soak, a room spray. You can say it smells amazing, feels relaxing, or makes a great gift. What you want to avoid is claiming it does something medical to your body. There’s a legal distinction between describing a product’s general effect on the body and claiming it treats a disease — but for small makers just starting out, the safest move is to stick to describing the experience, not the health outcome.
The FTC also watches this space. Even if something is phrased carefully, if the overall impression of your ad implies a health benefit, regulators can treat it as a disease claim — even without a single direct medical word in your copy.
Bottom line: love your craft, sell your stuff, but keep the health claims off your labels and listings. What your product smells like? Say it. What it cures? Don’t.