Amazon Handmade Insurance: Coverage for Makers Selling on Amazon
On Amazon Handmade there is no factory behind you. You are the manufacturer, and this guide covers what that means for product liability, your workshop and Amazon’s insurance rule.
On Handmade, the maker is the manufacturer
Amazon Handmade is built around the person who makes the product. Amazon describes it as a store for approved makers and collaborative groups such as cooperatives, nonprofits and charities, selling goods that are handcrafted, hand-altered, hand-designed, repurposed or upcycled. Every seller applies through a maker application that asks about the products and the production process, and mass-produced goods are kept out.
That design has an insurance consequence. A reseller can point to a brand further up the chain. A Handmade seller is the chain. You chose the materials, built the product, wrote the instructions and sold it, so when a candle tips, a necklace clasp gives way or a wooden toy splinters, there is no factory to share the claim with. Product liability lands squarely on you.
We work with hundreds of Amazon sellers, and makers are often the last to buy coverage because their volume feels small. Volume has little to do with it. One serious injury from one item produces the same lawsuit whether you sold ten pieces or ten thousand.
Amazon’s insurance rule applies to makers too
Handmade sellers register as Professional sellers. Amazon waives the monthly Professional fee for approved makers after the first month, and charges a referral fee of 15 percent or 30 cents per unit, whichever is greater. A Professional account comes with the same Business Solutions Agreement and the same insurance rule as any other seller: commercial liability within 30 days of passing $10,000 in gross proceeds in a month, or sooner when Amazon asks.
The November 2, 2026 change reaches some makers regardless of sales. Amazon’s enhanced-safety categories include children’s products and cosmetics, so a maker of baby blankets, teething toys, soap or lip balm needs the $1 million policy from that date whatever the monthly sales. Handmade lists Baby, Beauty and Personal Care, and Toys and Games among its categories, which puts many makers right in that group. Check the insurance notice in your Seller Central account to see which of your listings Amazon flags. Our Amazon seller insurance requirements page sets out the limits, the additional insured wording and the certificate steps.
What makers make, and what goes wrong
Handmade products touch bodies, homes and children, and each kind has its own claim pattern. Candles and wax melts bring fire and burn claims. Soaps, balms, bath bombs and other personal care products bring skin reactions and allergic responses. Jewelry brings cuts, small parts that children swallow and, in children’s pieces, questions about lead and cadmium. Furniture and home decor bring tip-overs and collapses, and baby items bring the choking, strangulation and suffocation hazards that federal rules treat most seriously.
Regulators do not wave makers through. A maker of children’s products counts as a manufacturer under the federal rules and must issue a Children’s Product Certificate. The CPSC’s small batch registration gives qualifying makers, under its inflation-adjusted revenue cap and with no more than 7,500 units of a product a year, relief from third-party testing for some rules, but a certificate is always required and the product must still meet every rule that applies. For cosmetics, the federal Modernization of Cosmetics Regulation Act of 2022 exempts certain small businesses from facility registration, product listing and manufacturing practice rules, though the exemption stops at products used around the eyes, injected, taken internally or meant to alter appearance for more than 24 hours.
Underwriters ask about this paperwork because it shows how carefully a product is made. Keep ingredient lists, supplier safety data sheets, batch records, any lab results and photos of your labels and warnings in one folder.
Home-based production and the homeowners gap
Most makers work from a spare room, a garage or a backyard studio, and many assume the home policy protects the shop. It protects far less than they expect. Homeowners forms hold business property to a small special limit, often leave out outbuildings used for a business and exclude liability arising from business activity, which reaches the products you sell. Our guide to homeowners insurance and an Amazon business walks through those limits one by one.
Makers carry exposure that resellers do not. Kilns, torches, soldering stations and wax melters raise the fire risk at the house itself, and an insurer who learns after a fire that the garage was a candle workshop has hard questions to ask. Tell your home insurer about the workshop, and put equipment, raw materials and finished stock on a business policy. Materials count as much as finished goods: a fire that takes $8,000 of silver, beads and fabric stops production just as surely as one that takes the finished pieces.
Some insurers offer a home business endorsement, but its eligibility rules often bar personal care makers, and it seldom carries the additional insured wording Amazon expects. A Business Owner’s Policy, or general liability with products coverage beside a property policy, is the usual answer for a maker on Amazon.
Custom orders, helpers and craft fairs
Personalized orders are a Handmade strength and a quiet source of risk. When a buyer asks for a longer chain on a child’s necklace or a different finish on a cutting board, the change is yours, and so is the question of whether the piece stays safe. Keep a record of custom requests, and turn down the ones that make a product less safe.
Makers who bring in help change the picture too. Handmade’s application asks whether you work alone, with a small team or as a collaborative group, and an employee in your studio brings workers’ compensation into the conversation. Makers who also sell at craft fairs, markets or boutiques get certificate requests from those organizers and shops, and one general liability policy answers them all when the application lists every channel.
Getting a quote as a Handmade seller
Underwriters price a maker on the product, the materials and the process. Bring a list of what you make with annual sales for each item, the materials and where you buy them, your safety data sheets and test results, photos of labels and warnings, where you produce and store goods, who helps you and every channel you sell through, including Etsy, fairs and wholesale.
We look at the workshop, the stock and the products together, so property and liability fit the way you actually work. Our product liability insurance page explains the core coverage, and the Amazon seller insurance hub links guides for each product category.
A few useful answers
Common questions
Do Amazon Handmade sellers need liability insurance?
Yes, once gross proceeds pass $10,000 in a month or Amazon asks. From November 2, 2026, makers in enhanced-safety categories such as children’s products and cosmetics need the $1 million policy regardless of sales.
Does my homeowners policy protect products I make at home?
Not for product claims. Home policies exclude liability arising from business activity and hold business property to a small limit. A business policy answers for the products and the workshop stock.
I make children's items in small batches. Do I still need testing?
You need a Children’s Product Certificate either way. Registering with the CPSC as a small batch manufacturer can relieve you of third-party testing for some rules, but the product must still meet them all.
Can one policy handle my Handmade, Etsy and craft fair sales?
Often, when the application lists each channel. General liability with products-completed operations can follow the products to each place you sell them, and the policy terms set where it applies.