Search for advice on selling soap in the UK and you’ll notice something: almost every page that ranks is written by a company that sells safety assessments. The information is usually accurate — but it’s an odd place to learn whether the paperwork is worth it, because the author gets paid either way. This guide is the version we’d want to read: what the law actually requires to sell soap or bath bombs in the UK, what a CPSR genuinely costs (prices checked 7 August 2026 against real assessor pricing pages), and the honest answer to whether a small handmade range still makes sense once you’ve added it all up.
Short version: yes, it can — but only if you design your range around the compliance rules instead of discovering them afterwards.
Selling soap in the UK: what the law actually says
Soap and bath bombs are cosmetics. That surprises a lot of new makers, but the definition in the UK Cosmetics Regulation covers any substance applied to the skin for cleaning, perfuming or changing its appearance — which catches soap, bath bombs, bath salts, body butters, lip balms, scrubs and shampoo bars. Candles and wax melts are not cosmetics (they’re regulated more lightly — see our candle business guide if that path appeals), but anything that touches skin in the bath is.
Two things follow from that, and neither has a workaround:
- There is no small-business, hobbyist or handmade exemption. The government guidance on making cosmetic products available in Great Britain applies to every product supplied to the public — sold at a fair, sold online, or given away as a free sample. Scale is irrelevant.
- Enforcement is real. Failing to notify a cosmetic product is a breach of the regulation, punishable by an unlimited fine in England and Wales (up to £5,000 in Scotland and Northern Ireland) and in serious cases imprisonment. Trading Standards do check craft fairs and Etsy shops.
None of this is a reason not to start. It’s a reason to budget properly, which is what the rest of this guide does.
The five things every product needs before you sell
1. A Cosmetic Product Safety Report (CPSR). Before any cosmetic goes on sale, a qualified safety assessor — someone with a degree in pharmacy, toxicology, medicine or a similar discipline — must assess your exact formulation and sign a report. You cannot self-certify, and “it’s just soap” is not a defence. This is the main cost, covered in detail below.
2. A Responsible Person (RP). Every cosmetic on the GB market needs a named person or company, with a UK address, legally responsible for its safety. For a small maker, that’s you. Your name and address go on the label.
3. A Product Information File (PIF). A file — a folder or a well-organised cloud drive — containing the product description, the CPSR, a statement on good manufacturing practice, and evidence for any claims you make. It must be in English, at your RP address, and kept for ten years after the last batch is supplied.
4. Notification on the SCPN portal. Before first sale, each product must be notified to the Office for Product Safety and Standards via the government’s Submit Cosmetic Product Notification service. You’ll need a GOV.UK One Login, your formulation details, a label image and a photo of the packaging. The good news: notification is free — no registration or submission fee. It’s the one part of this process nobody can charge you for.
5. Compliant labels. Every unit needs: your RP name and address, the ingredients list in INCI format (Latin/scientific names, descending order — your assessor typically supplies this), a batch number, the weight or volume, the function if not obvious, any warnings from your CPSR, and a durability marking (best-before date or period-after-opening symbol). Bath bombs sold naked need this on a tag, wrap or point-of-sale notice.
What a CPSR actually costs (checked 7 August 2026)
Here’s the part most guides are cagey about. Real prices from UK assessor pricing pages, checked 7 August 2026:
- Simple single products start around £55. Phoenix Compliance’s price guide puts a straightforward anhydrous product — a plain soap, balm or oil — at roughly £55 for a single formulation. Other assessors quote around £99 + VAT for a simple single-phase product like a bath bomb.
- Package deals are the smart buy. Cosmetic Safety Solutions charges £180 inc VAT for a package covering one base formulation plus up to eight variants — ideal for exactly the soap-and-bath-bomb use case. Variants added later cost about £25 each in admin fees if submitted within six months.
- Full-service bundles run £130–£210 per product, where the assessor also builds your PIF, reviews labels and files the SCPN notification for you.
- Water is the expensive ingredient. Anhydrous products (soap, bath bombs, balms) usually skip microbiological challenge testing. Lotions, creams and anything water-based need it, pushing costs into the low hundreds of pounds per product.
So the commonly quoted “£60–£150 per product” band is about right — and soap and bath bomb makers sit at the cheap end, because the products are anhydrous and the formulations are simple.
Variants: the rule that decides your whole product range
This is the single most useful thing to understand before you formulate anything. Assessors distinguish between a variant — the same base formulation with small changes for fragrance, colour or decorative enrichment — and a new formulation, which needs a new assessment. Change your lavender bath bomb to a rose one using the same base recipe? Variant, covered cheaply under a package. Change the base — swap bicarbonate ratios, add a butter, go from soap to lotion? New CPSR.
The strategy writes itself: develop one excellent base recipe, get it assessed with eight fragrance/colour variants under one package, and you have an eight-product range for £180 — about £22.50 per product. The maker who launches twelve unrelated recipes pays over £600 for the same shelf presence. Plan the range around assessed bases, not the other way round.
Realistic startup costs for a soap and bath bomb business
Prices checked 7 August 2026; sources noted per row.
| Item | Cost | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Starter ingredients and moulds | From ~£28 per kit | Soap and bath bomb starter kits (base, fragrance, mica, mould) run about £28 at UK craft suppliers; buying components in bulk from suppliers like The Soap Kitchen gets cheaper per batch |
| CPSR — one base + up to 8 variants | £180 inc VAT | Package pricing at Cosmetic Safety Solutions; single simple products from ~£55 elsewhere |
| SCPN notification | £0 | Government portal is free; budget an evening per product |
| Public and product liability insurance | £69–£82/year | CMTIA 2026 rates: £69 for £5m cover, £82 for £10m; covers soap and cosmetics makers, and fairs will ask for proof |
| Labels | Varies | Home-printed on waterproof stock is fine to start, as long as every required element is present |
| Online shop | £25/month | Orbit Solo (£19/month billed yearly) — unlimited products, page builder and SEO tools included; we build Orbit, so read that row knowing who wrote it — pricing here |
Call it roughly £300–£400 to launch legally with an eight-product range, insurance and your own website — less if you start on marketplaces only. Registering as a sole trader with HMRC is straightforward; our guide to registering a business to sell online covers when and how.
Pricing when compliance is a fixed cost
A £180 CPSR feels painful against a £4 bath bomb until you do the division: across 500 units of a range it’s 36p each. Compliance is a fixed cost — it punishes tiny production runs and rewards repeatable bestsellers, which is another argument for a tight range over a sprawling one. Cost every product properly (ingredients, labels, your time at a real hourly rate, packaging, postage, platform fees, and amortised CPSR/insurance) before setting prices — our guide to pricing handmade products walks through the full formula, including the wholesale-margin check most makers skip.
Where to sell soap and bath bombs in the UK
Craft fairs and markets are the classic proving ground — instant feedback, cash flow from week one, and scent sells better in person. Organisers will want proof of £5m public liability cover before you set up.
Marketplaces — Etsy especially, plus eBay and Amazon Handmade — bring buyers but take fees and bury you among thousands of near-identical listings. Note that every compliance requirement above applies on marketplaces too; a CPSR is not optional because you sell on Etsy.
Your own website is where margins and repeat customers live, and where your brand isn’t one search result among hundreds. This is where we’d point you at Orbit — we build it, so weigh that as you like — because the Solo plan gives you unlimited products, a drag-and-drop page builder and free Amazon, eBay and Etsy plugins that sync stock and pull marketplace orders into one place, which matters the first time a bath bomb sells on two channels at once. The broader sequence — niche, brand, product pages, first traffic — is covered in our pillar guide to starting an online store in the UK.
Is a small-scale soap business still worth it?
Honestly: yes, with one condition. The compliance cost is real but front-loaded and mostly fixed — £180 covers a whole range if you plan around assessed bases, insurance is under £85 a year, and notification is free. What kills small soap businesses isn’t the CPSR; it’s underpricing, and treating the paperwork as a reason to stay “just a hobby” forever while competitors who did the admin take the market. If you can’t stomach any per-product assessment cost, candles and wax melts are the adjacent craft with a lighter regime. But if you like this craft, the barrier is genuinely useful to you once you’re over it: every corner-cutter at the fair who hasn’t done their CPSR is one Trading Standards visit away from not being competition.
Questions people ask us about selling soap and bath bombs in the UK
Do I need a CPSR to sell soap at craft fairs in the UK?
Yes. The UK Cosmetics Regulation applies to any cosmetic supplied to the public — at a fair, online, or as a free sample. There’s no exemption for small quantities, hobby sellers or handmade products. Each product needs a CPSR from a qualified assessor, an SCPN notification and compliant labelling before its first sale.
How much does a cosmetic safety assessment cost in the UK?
Checked 7 August 2026: simple anhydrous products (soap, bath bombs, balms) start around £55–£99 per formulation, and package deals covering one base plus up to eight fragrance/colour variants run about £180 inc VAT. Water-based products like lotions cost more — often into the low hundreds — because they need microbiological challenge testing.
Do I need a new CPSR for every fragrance?
Usually not. A fragrance or colour change to the same base recipe is normally treated as a variant, covered under one package assessment or added later for a small admin fee (around £25 within six months, at one major assessor). A change to the base formulation itself — different core ingredients or ratios — is a new product and needs a new assessment.
Can I sell bath bombs made at home in the UK?
Yes — the regulation doesn’t prohibit home manufacture. You’ll need to follow good manufacturing practice (clean dedicated workspace, batch records, consistent recipes) and include a GMP statement in your Product Information File, alongside your CPSR, SCPN notification and correct INCI labelling. Home production is how most UK soap businesses start.
When you’re ready to put the range online, you can start a free 14-day Orbit trial — no card needed — and have a shop live before your CPSR paperwork comes back.