If you sell food in a container, PFAS is now your problem rather than your supplier's. That is the part most bakeries and food businesses have not registered. The state laws are written to catch the person who offers the packaged food for sale, and "my supplier never mentioned it" has never been a defence in a consumer protection statute.
The good news is that for most bakery packaging this is a short conversation. The bad news is that you have to actually have it.
What PFAS is doing in a box in the first place
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances are a family of several thousand synthetic chemicals whose useful property is that they repel both oil and water. In food packaging they exist for exactly one reason: grease resistance.
Paper is absorbent. A burger wrapper, a fry bag, a microwave popcorn bag, a molded fibre bowl holding something oily — untreated, these go translucent and then soggy. Coating them with a fluorochemical treatment stops that cheaply and very effectively.
They are called forever chemicals because the carbon-fluorine bond does not meaningfully break down in the environment or in the body. That is the regulatory concern, and it is why the legislation targets intentionally added PFAS rather than a concentration threshold in most states.
Where it shows up — and where it usually does not
This distinction is worth understanding before you start emailing suppliers, because it tells you where to look hard.
Higher risk — grease is the whole design problem:
- Molded fibre bowls, clamshells and plates, particularly compostable ones
- Grease-resistant wraps, liners, sheets and paper bags for fried or oily food
- Microwave popcorn bags
- Pizza boxes with a treated inner surface
- Fry cartons and takeout containers with an added barrier coating
Lower risk — no grease barrier required:
- Plain uncoated folding cartons: cake boxes, cupcake boxes, cookie boxes
- Dry goods and bakery cartons generally
- Corrugated shipping cartons
Lower risk is not the same as none. PFAS has been detected in packaging where nobody intentionally added it, usually through recycled fibre carrying it in from a previous life, or through inks, adhesives and coatings applied downstream of the board itself. Several of the state laws explicitly cover "any component, including coatings, inks and labels" — so a compliant box with a non-compliant sticker on it is a non-compliant package.
The map, as of August 2026
Fourteen jurisdictions now restrict intentionally added PFAS in food packaging. Effective dates below; scope and exemptions vary considerably and this is a summary rather than legal advice.
| State | In effect from |
|---|---|
| New York | December 31, 2022 |
| California | January 1, 2023 |
| Washington | February 1, 2023 (phased by category) |
| Vermont | July 1, 2023 |
| Connecticut | December 31, 2023 |
| Maryland | January 1, 2024 |
| Minnesota | January 1, 2024 |
| Rhode Island | January 1, 2024 |
| Colorado | Phased 2024–2027 |
| Hawaii | In effect, specific categories |
| New Hampshire | In effect |
| District of Columbia | In effect |
| Illinois | January 1, 2026 |
| Maine | May 25, 2026 (plant-fibre packaging) |
Oregon addresses PFAS through its extended producer responsibility framework rather than a standalone packaging ban. Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Massachusetts have had bills at various stages. The direction of travel has been one way for five years, and the sensible planning assumption is that your state joins the list rather than that it does not.
Two practical wrinkles that catch people:
- You are bound by where you sell, not where you are. A Tennessee bakery shipping cookies to a customer in Minnesota is offering packaged food for sale in Minnesota.
- Existing stock is rarely grandfathered. Most of these statutes prohibit sale and distribution from the effective date, not manufacture before it. A pallet bought in 2024 does not become compliant by being old.
The four questions to ask a supplier, in writing
Email, not a phone call. You want the answer in a form you can forward to a state inspector or a co-packer's compliance team.
- "Does this product contain intentionally added PFAS in the board, coating, ink, adhesive or label?" Ask about every component, because that is how the statutes are written.
- "Can you provide a written PFAS declaration or certificate of compliance from the mill?" A supplier who manufactures can usually get this. A trading company reselling anonymous stock frequently cannot, and how they answer this question tells you a great deal about which one you are dealing with.
- "Has this product been tested for total organic fluorine, and can I see the report?" Total organic fluorine is the standard screening method — it catches PFAS arriving unintentionally through recycled fibre, which a declaration of intent alone will not.
- "Will you notify me if the specification or the mill changes?" Compliance is not a one-time document. Suppliers reformulate and switch sources, and the box that passed last year is not necessarily the box in this year's carton.
If a supplier goes quiet on questions two and three, that is your answer. It usually means they do not know what is in their own product, which is common with anonymous imported stock bought through a marketplace.
What about "PFAS-free" claims on a listing?
Treat an unsupported claim on a product page as marketing. The useful version of that claim is a document with a mill's name on it, a date, and a product code that matches what you actually received. Anything else is a sentence somebody typed.
The same scepticism applies in the other direction: "compostable" and "PFAS-free" are not the same statement, and historically a good deal of compostable foodservice packaging was treated precisely because compostable fibre soaks through. Certification schemes have largely closed that gap, but the assumption that green implies fluorine-free was never safe.
Where we stand
Our bakery cartons are plain uncoated paperboard. They carry no grease-resistant barrier treatment, because a cake box, a cupcake box and a cookie box do not need one — that is a design fact rather than a marketing position.
We are currently collecting written PFAS declarations from our mill covering board, inks and adhesives, so that customers who need documentation for a state filing or a wholesale buyer's compliance pack can have it rather than take our word for it. If you need that documentation for a specific product, email us and tell us which SKU and which state — we would rather chase the paperwork for you than have you guess.
If you are buying fry cartons or anything that will hold hot, oily food, ask us the barrier question specifically. It is the category where the honest answer matters most.
A note on what this is
This is a buyer's guide, not legal advice, and state requirements change. Verify the current position for the states you sell into with that state's environmental or agriculture department before you rely on it. The trackers below are a reasonable starting point.
Shop bakery packaging · Request samples and documentation · Cottage food packaging guide