California compliance, informational

Etsy and California Prop 65, a small-seller checklist.

What Prop 65 means for Etsy sellers shipping to California in 2026, the categories where bounty-hunter plaintiffs commonly look, and what a clear and reasonable warning typically looks like in listing copy.

Why Prop 65 matters more for small sellers than the headline numbers suggest

Prop 65 is technically a California state law, but practically it is a private-enforcement law. Most enforcement actions are not brought by California's Attorney General. They are brought by private plaintiff firms acting as bounty hunters, paid through settlement fees and statutory attorney fees. The plaintiff firms send a Notice of Violation, the seller has 60 days to fix the listing or settle, and many small Etsy sellers end up in $1,000 to $25,000 settlement bands even when their actual exposure was minor.

Public filings show roughly 400 or more new Prop 65 Notices of Violation per month in 2025, with more than 1,300 settlements logged in 2024. Many of those notices are sent to individual makers and small Etsy shops. The volume is the reason Prop 65 is a live, recurring concern for small sellers, not a once-in-a-decade legal risk.

The categories that commonly attract attention

Bounty-hunter firms commonly file in product categories with known listed chemicals. The high-frequency categories observed in recent years include:

• Candles and wax melts. Soot, paraffin combustion byproducts, and lead-cored wicks (rare today, still listed).
• Jewelry and small metalwork. Lead, cadmium, and nickel in plated and brass-and-bronze components.
• Leather goods. Chromium and dye chemicals.
• Vinyl and plastic items. DEHP, BPA, and related plasticisers.
• Ceramic and pottery items with glaze. Lead in glazes, especially imported clay.
• Cosmetics and skincare. A long list of named chemicals.
• Soaps and bath products. Diethanolamine, certain fragrance compounds.
• Electronic items. Lead solder, di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate.
• Painted, stained, or coated wood and metal. Various paint and finish chemicals.
• Imported items in any category. Bounty-hunter firms commonly look first at imported components.

What a clear and reasonable warning commonly looks like

Prop 65 commonly expects a clear and reasonable warning before the consumer purchases. On a marketplace listing this typically means the warning block is visible in the listing description, not buried in fine print. The exact format depends on the chemicals and whether you use the long-form or short-form variant. The short form was updated by an amendment that took effect 6 December 2024, and now commonly names at least one chemical.

A common short-form template for a candle listing might look like:

A long-form variant typically names more chemicals and the specific endpoint (cancer or reproductive harm). The choice between short-form and long-form depends on the product. Sellers commonly include the warning at the top of the listing description and on a printed insert in the parcel.

The small-business carveout and why it does not solve the problem

Prop 65 carves out businesses with fewer than 10 employees from some of the warning duties. Most Etsy shops fall under this carveout. However, the carveout does not stop bounty-hunter firms from sending Notices of Violation. The cost of responding to a notice, even one a seller could ultimately defeat, can run into thousands of dollars in attorney fees if the seller engages counsel. Many small sellers settle quickly to avoid that cost.

The practical effect is that the carveout reduces but does not eliminate the risk. Listings with no warning at all in a high-frequency category attract notices regardless of headcount. Listings with a clear and reasonable warning are commonly skipped because the bounty-hunter firms target listings where the warning is missing or non-conforming.

What Etsy and Amazon do, in 2026

Etsy and Amazon do not police Prop 65 the way they police GPSR. Neither marketplace removes listings for missing warnings. The risk is not de-listing. The risk is a Notice of Violation arriving in the mail, with a 60-day clock to fix the listing or settle. Adding a clear and reasonable warning to the description, before the notice arrives, is the most common preventive step sellers take.

Common patterns Stallscore looks for

The Stallscore pre-flight reads your public listing page and notes whether the description contains common Prop 65 warning markers, but only when the listing's category or content matches one of the high-frequency categories. We do not flag every listing as Prop 65 risk. We surface a finding only when the pattern looks worth a review:

• The category or description suggests a Prop-65-prone product (candles, jewelry, leather, vinyl, ceramic glaze, cosmetics, electronics, brass or bronze metalwork).
• The description does not contain the WARNING heading or any of the common Prop 65 warning phrases.

When both are true, the pre-flight returns a high-severity finding asking you to verify whether a warning is appropriate for your specific product. We do not assert that your listing requires a warning. Whether your specific chemistry, exposure, and audience trigger the warning duty is a question only your counsel and your supplier documentation can answer.

Frequent seller questions