Country Time Lemonade Will Pay Legal Fees for Unlicensed Lemonade Stands | Hacker News Reader

Country Time Lemonade Will Pay Legal Fees for Unlicensed Lemonade Stands

mymoneyblog.com

231 pointsca98am79174 comments

You wouldn't know lemonade stands were shutdown if social media didn't expose it. But what it should be is a lesson for cities to adopt a young entrepreneur license for like $10/year. There will always be some angry a-hole who will call the cops or HOA idiot whining.

My suburbia neighborhood there were people who wanted to share books with people freely in a small mailbox near the curb, like a mini-library. Someone started whining and the city was like "it's illegal to have such a structure" so once it hit the news people went crazy over the stupidity of the cities response.

I always stop for the bad lemonade at these stands, even tell these kids how to market better with better signs that you can read. I remember knocking on doors selling vegetable seed packets, shoveling snow and whatever to make a few bucks to really appreciate the dollar. I think it's a great PR idea, definitely a creative video, and everytime they intervene it's another story.

> My suburbia neighborhood there were people who wanted to share books with people freely in a small mailbox near the curb, like a mini-library.

You mean a Little Free Library? https://littlefreelibrary.org/

They have some good tips on the website navigaing zoning rules: https://littlefreelibrary.org/deal-zoning-regulations-spence...

We have these all over my city in Canada. I'm not sure if they're exactly Little Free Library. I went to a small town in the country the other day and they had a "pantry" with which you could exchange preserves.

You got to remember why these rules were put in place: because assholes and scam artists abused the rules and ran rampant in neighborhoods in the 90s. I remember having to fend them off often times felt like multiple times per day in the summer -- always coming to me with some pyramid scheme, MLM pitch, or simply hounding me to buy garbage I didn't want. Naturally, those homeowners that came before you petitioned their local governments to do something about it, and so now maybe we have overcorrected some and it's time to bring it back to balance.

I was alive in the 90s. What you describe did not happen anywhere that anyone ever heard of.

I grew up in he 90s and I can confirm OPs story. I can also confirm we just let dogs outside without watching them or even putting them on a leash.

> I can also confirm we just let dogs outside without watching them or even on putting a leash.

As a bicyclist in the 90s... yeah, I remember that. It kinda sucked.

They even made a video game about you where you had to deliver newspapers while avoiding being attacked by unleashed dogs. Remember Paperboy? :)

That came out in 1985...

Yeah, so? The point still stands. In any case, the most widely played version was the NES version which was released in 1989. That's close enough to the 90's to not make a marked difference in the point.

Yeah. So, if this happened in the 90's, it can't have inspired the video game. If it also happened earlier, it could have inspired the video game, but it is irrelevant that a later version was more widely played...

In case it isn't clear: This was absolutely a problem for cyclists before the 90s, too.

Way too early for me :-).

I was also alive in the 90s, and can confirm it did.

It, in fact, still happens today in places where permit laws are not required or not enforced.

So was I, and it didn't happen where I lived. Sure, an occasional door-to-door salesman or Jehovah's Witness would show up, but nothing over-the-top.

I can't speak to the street vendor laws, but I can say in general, laws usually have a bit of wiggle room, which is the very reason things go to a judge or county clerks office. Law enforcement usually have enough wiggle room to allow for common sense and good human decency to fit in.

When people see these things happening, it usually just takes reminding city hall and the police chief that the laws are flexible so that they can avoid having their tax payers and constituents despise them.

So where you alive, as an adult, in the 90's or just warped opinion of the 90's based on what you were told.

I do not remember these hoards of MLM people....

Further the internet is likely the larger cause of any drop in this type of door to door selling than the laws that prevent kids from having a stand to sell flavored sugar water.

A hoard is a stash of valuable goods, and a horde is an invading group. It's easy to confuse them, don't worry.

> I always stop for the bad lemonade at these stands, even tell these kids how to market better with better signs that you can read.

I recently had some kids come to my house and sell some crap I didn’t want, but I bought enough anyway so that each kid got a little change from it, to encourage them and hopefully nurture their entrepreneurial spark.

I’d happily do this more often but it’s rare to see stuff like that around here.

I don't think the issue is just one that young people experience.

There's an active fight against entry-level entrepreneurship in terms of fees just to start a business that may not be profitable enough (at least in the short term) to justify the fees.

I get why some of the laws exist - for food, fear of health risks, for business more generally, fear that taxes won't be paid or people will be inconvenienced by street vendors. But they are onerous and we'd be better off without them, in my opinion. Let people start small businesses and don't require licenses or fees until they make a threshold above a living wage (30k or so / year).

>There's an active fight against entry-level entrepreneurship in terms of fees just to start a business

This is illustrated well if you peruse the internet fora used by Uber/Lyft/rideshare drivers.

Some locations require no licensing at all. Some require just supplemental insurance. Some pile up city/state/local/inspection/insurance fees in the hundreds of dollars just to get started.

In Las Vegas, there are annual state and county licensing fees totaling about $225. But a rideshare driver picking someone up at the airport and taking them to MGM, for example, only makes about $3.00 after expenses for what can easily be 45 minutes of time spent (staging + travel + loading + unloading + return to staging).

Yes, the problem is really the amount that rideshare drivers make in some cities. But that's a discussion for another time. The point is that all the licensing fees are a barrier to entry for a job that's supposed to be entry-level.

Taxi where initially regulated back when they where horse and buggies to for two main reasons. Reduce traffic on public roads, and increase daily incomes by reducing numbers of drivers.

Ride sharing services don't really change anything it's still extra traffic and over time horrid wages.

$4/hour isn’t going to be sustainable even if there are no barriers to entry. If it paid properly the barriers could be overcome. There’s a small range of pay where it works only if the barriers are gone, but let’s aim above that range.

I like the spirit. But oh my do food vendors have a perfect front for cooking the books and never making 30k.

But they can do that anyway, even if they have all the licenses and other folderol.

Regulations exist mainly for protection of establish businesses to prevent new entry and limit competition, not for safety or taxes even really. This is especially true when talking about zoning, building and health codes which are largely designed to make it very very expensive to start new business to limit competition

See Institute for Justice on going lawsuits on behalf of Food Trucks in many cities. It has nothing to do with Public Health, and everything to do with protectionism

> But what it should be is a lesson for cities to adopt a young entrepreneur license for like $10/year.

What happens when the lemonade stand with a $10 licence poisons people? https://foodsafetyinfosheets.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/6-1...

Death from norovirus is rare, but it does happen.

https://www.cdc.gov/features/norovirus/index.html

> CDC estimates that each year in the United States norovirus causes 19 to 21 million illnesses, 56,000 to 71,000 hospitalizations, and 570 to 800 deaths.

You have the same problem with people having parties and accidentally poisoning their guests.

At most, you can have a proviso in the license that they have to display a notice that the stand is not inspected or regulated by the health department.

What happens when a lemonade stand with a $300 license poisons people? What distinction are you trying to draw here?

The lemonade stand with a $300 license is inspected several times a year and awarded a health score, and the employees are required to undergo food safety training. They are also running a real business that required a real investment, so they should be more risk averse.

I don't know if the risks from kids running lemonade stands is high enough to justify regulation, but presumably all the above makes a business with a $300 license less likely to poison customers.

> ... so they should be more risk averse.

It lessens risk, but doesn't eliminate it, so the original question still stands: what does happen when the $300 license holder poisons someone?

The victim sues and gets a pay out for their losses from the food vendor's public liability insurance that is a requirement of the licence.

Requiring liability insurance is entirely orthogonal to the cost of the business license. A locality could hand out business licenses for free and require liability insurance.

You seem to be forgetting the whole point of this thread--a proposal for $10 licenses that kids can afford.

There's no point in making a license affordable for kids if they still need to have completely unaffordable liability insurance.

It's pretty clear that when the OP suggested a $10 license they were also suggesting removing other regulatory costs. The proposal is useless otherwise.

you're buying powdered lemonade from kids. If you can't identify the risks involved in such a process, maybe you shouldn't be doing other things in everyday life like driving...

I mean, there's a significant amount of the population that isn't capable of passing a driving test but that we as a society still let buy food on their own.

We usually let them drive, too :-(.

and they seem to get through life without debilitating food poisoning, so maybe worrying about food poisoning via a child's powdered lemonade stand is a bit excessive.

Well, they get through life without debilitating food poisoning in large part because of existing government regulation regarding selling food....

It feels weird to have a regulation that does nothing.

If you're going to regulate do it well, but also proportionately.

If you're not going to regulate don't regulate, but provide some education.

There's no point in providing toy registrations.

A $300 license for a one- or two-time pop-up lemonade stand hardly feels proportionate.

The distinction is not cost. People preparing food for public consumption should have their facilities inspected and receive proper training on safe food handling and storage.

Nah. I'm perfectly content to eat in my friend's uninspected home, or judge random street vendors by sight and/or yelp.

I suggest you travel more broadly. I'm guessing you've never been to a part of the world with a vibrant street vendor scene, because once you have, you weep over the sad sterile* world we've legislated here in the US.

* Excepting the mass salmonella poisonings we get from large-scale mechanized food preparation.

Africa and SE Asia have a massive problem with food-borne illnesses and deaths related to it. You can take a look at the WHO's numbers, as they track food-related illness around the world [1].

Results start on page 61 and are broken down by region. They report impact of food-related illness in terms of years of life lost. America, Canada, W. Europe, and Australia are in the range of ~10 years lost per 100k people to food related illness. Africa is around 1200 per 100k and SE Asia is at 800 per 100k.

http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/199350/97892...

So maybe America is a "sad, sterile" world, but it's also legislated away something that remains a major problem in plaguing the rest of the world.

Maybe I'm misreading this, but page 78 seems to be the money shot and it's 35 for the US, 40-50 depending on what part of Europe you're in, and 140 for Mexico - which I consider to be the gold standard for street food.

There's also a huge problem inferring that health inspections and street vendor licensing have anything to do with the results. Mexico is probably no different from Thailand in this regard, and yet there's a 10X difference in years lost. I'll bet there are stronger correlative factors of climate (tropical = more parasites and diseases) and quality of public drinking water. Rich northern countries score better than equatorial countries on these benchmarks too.

It's quite a stretch to say that folks are going to start dying left and right if the health board takes a day off. I'd be perfectly happy to live with the health inspection regime (and the rich food culture) of Mexico, especially if it's combined with our public water and sanitation system.

The biz license doesn't include training.

It could pay for inspections and/or enforcement of employees' food-handler certification, which is sort of a reasonable point, but lemonade is an extremely low-risk food.

I think that most people know that little kids are disgusting and covered in germs and viruses. People buy the lemonade because they want to support the kid, not because of the quality of the beverage.

Last summer I noticed several of the lemonade stands in my neighborhood had bottles of hand sanitizer and that the kids were actually using it. Maybe there is some level of awareness out there.

At least little kids will usually wash their hands because their parents tell them to. High school cheerleaders with no oversight are a different story.

>>But what it should be is a lesson for cities to adopt a young entrepreneur license for like $10/year.

why even $10/yr, why should they even need to ask or notify the government at all?

The solution is to repeal the laws that makes these things illegal in the first place

This. It shouldn't be too hard to carve out some exception that covers 99.999% of toy businesses run by kids.

Normal people doing normal people things shouldn't have to ask the government for permission.

The problem is we have shifted from a society there the government needs to provide a valid, and direct rational public safety reason to make regulations, to one where everything is defacto illegal unless it is explicitly authorized, permitted, and approved by government.

that is not a free society, even though most people consider it to be

Uh, no, we haven't.

Running a business is a thing that's been debated and found to be something that on the whole should be at least lightly regulated. Businesses that sell goods intended for human consumption are additionally regulated by health codes, for good reason. The fact that a proprietor is a kid is irrelevant to the reasons behind why those codes were enacted in the first place.

You can go create a business right now online that sells widgets or services or something without a permit, provided you pay your taxes due on it. The IRS even has a classification for self-employment for that express purpose. If you are selling something that is covered by some other regulation, you'll need to comply with those, but those regulations were also debated and enacted at some point because it was deemed necessary by the legislative body that enacted them. Whether you agree with that body is another issue, but it doesn't amount to "everything is defacto (sic) illegal unless it is explicitly authorized, permitted, and approved by government."

Business licenses for even mundane things have been around for well over a hundred years, particularly in cities. So generic complaints about over-regulation have little historical resonance. Not only did those debates happen, as you say; they happened a very long time ago.

But a child's lemonade stand, AFAIK, never required a business license. That's new. I don't know if laws, enforcement practices, or public awareness have changed, but I don't get why people insist on defending it.

My guess is that enforcement has changed, and that's partly because of the push to take discretion (de jure and de facto) away from agencies to minimize prejudiced, unequal enforcement of the law. One of the takeaways is that, because the laws were always more strictly enforced against disfavored classes, the privileged are finally getting a taste of the mundane, prosaic injustices minorities have always faced. That doesn't excuse the injustices, but it hints at why it may be difficult to address them--permitting a white kid to sell lemonade at the end of his driveway also permits a black kid to sell Coca-Cola on the street corner, which might cause consternation among some people (think of recent SF ordinances taxing soda).

What's probably more accurate to say is that a child's lemonade stand always required the same license, but the law was never enforced (as you point out the enforcement disparity that has always existed.)

You have a very rose colored, and academic view of government which completely different from of how regulations work and are passed in the actual real world

Which point precisely do you disagree with and how do you support that view? Simply saying somebody is wrong is easy.

All of it, the idea that we "debate then pass" Regulations have been proven to be false by more than a few studies where by it has been shown the public opinion has almost no impact on what laws and regulations actually get passed or not.

The idea that we had some kind of philosophical debate and from that we choose that business should "lightly" regulated as no connection to reality or how business regulations actually came about in history nor would I classify today's business regulations as "light"

I also disagree that there are "good reasons" behind the health codes when large part of them are passed not for health reasons but for Protectionist reasons to keep out new entrants into the market (see my comments on Food Trucks as an example of this)

One would have to be a ardent supporter of Authoritarianism to believe that we have anything remotely approaching freedom in modern society, that goes for any nation. yes some nations are more oppressive than others, and places like the EU and the USA may be among the most free nations when compared to the others, but that does not make them "Free", just means they are less oppressive.

What people identify as freedom today is not freedom at all

> My suburbia neighborhood there were people who wanted to share books with people freely in a small mailbox near the curb, like a mini-library.

Hah. There are hundreds, probably thousands of these all over northwest Seattle. They're called "little free libraries" or something. I don't really see the appeal and have only seen one family checking out the contents of a little library (ever). But as things go, it's harmless.

I dropped off a few books this weekend to one, and when I went by a couple hours later 2 out of the 3 were gone. So at least someone is using them!

It isnt the jerks who call the cops. It's the jerk cops who listen to them. Like street hockey, this is an area for police discretion, a chance for them to deal with dangerous situations but generally take a hands off approach. That cops abuse that small trust is 100% on them. Want to stop them? Have the mayor give them an award for thier dedicated service ridding the streets of children running lemonade stands. Nobody wants to see that when they google themselves.

I walk past a bookshare box on my way to work. Ill post a pic in a coupls hours.

> Have the mayor give them an award for thier dedicated service ridding the streets of children running lemonade stands.

It's just as likely that someone with the mayor's ear has complained and caused him to lean on the cops.

Maybe that could cause the cop to lose his job and pension. With the growing lack of reason and consistency in Western society, almost nothing would surprise me anymore.

Have you ever heard of a cop losing his job and pension in the US? It happens, but extremely rarely, and requires a bit more than this. Police unions are strong and protect even poorly-behaved members.

To do that you need them to break rules. The rules say no lemonade stands. So any sanction needs to come throught public shaming, not anything they could take to a tribunal.

I am a strong supporter of public shaming, in some cases it's almost become our last hope.

Shame on you destroying other people's lives!

Ha-ha only serious: public shaming, also known as "bullying" in the age of the internet is a growing problem, and is turned to in more and more cases, from the trivial to the non-politically correct.

Public shaming in a village context allowed for the possibility of a reboot by moving to the next village.

Where's the next village in the age of the internet?

Yep, I always buy the lemonade. I usually surreptitiously dump it out after I've gotten out of sight, but I buy it. :-)

Should young entrepreneurs be exempt from health code too?

It's pretty fucking rare for lemonade stands to be shut down due to lack of a "business license".

They're shut down due to health non-compliance. Whether those health restrictions are too strict or lax has very little to do with the age of the person in or out of compliance.

Do you have any sources for what you're saying?

I have read dozens of examples of lemonade stands being shut down because of the lack of a business license.

I have not read any mentioning health code non-compliance.

FWIW - you put water and powder in a large cup with ice cubes, then pour it into smaller cups. Not sure you need a 60 minute health inspection for something like that.

You could probably inspect a kid's lemonade stand while standing in one spot. You could have volunteers in red berets do the inspection. I assume there are hygienic ways to dispense Country Time Lemonade and other ways. The differences might not be obvious to an amateur. But we're not talking about dairy or meat or eggs. Country Time should also diagram a model lemonade stand that is simple to set up and safe when operated properly.

You could, put it's not the way the health department works - I've owned a number of businesses that require a health inspection both at setup and randomly. Takes hours each time with lots of paperwork.

In my town, "concession stands" are exempt from restaurant health codes. Probably that way in many places.

...An interesting question, but I'm leaning towards "yes."

1. Our immune systems are pretty good. Much better than is generally appreciated.

2. People usually buy lemonade from lemonade stands to support the kids, not for the taste.

We have rules in place for a reason, so we can live in a civil society.

Also, in this case, so people don't get sick from drinking contaminated beverages.

There are safe places to have a business located, and on the corner of a neighborhood street where bad drivers are cutting corners, texting, and going too fast is NOT one of those places.

Sure - there were the "good old days" - but thankfully humans have the ability to learn as time goes on, and to determine what is safe and what is not.

HOA idiot? Those idiots chose to live in the neighborhood they live in and pay those huge HOA fees for a reason - so that they can make sure neighbors abide by rules even if there are many rules they don't like themselves. It creates a status quo so everyone can live in peace.

My HOA keeps trash cans off streets, RVs from staying parked in front of our houses, junk from being in the front yard, dogs from barking constantly, etc. I've been fined for leaving my trash can out too long. Fine, but I won't do it again. It's also stopping my neighbor from letting his kids drive their ATV on the sidewalks and on our driveways and through our yards.

The lemonade stand is a thing of the past because it's just not safe, not a good idea, not a registered business, not policed by the FDA.

I get it. I'm such a stick in the mud. But I also think that rules need to stay in place and be enforceable in order to have a civil and safe world for humans to continue to enjoy.

> There are safe places to have a business located, and on the corner of a neighborhood street where bad drivers are cutting corners, texting, and going too fast is NOT one of those places.

As a parent, this is something that I care deeply about. If this is a consistent issue in your neighborhood, I strongly encourage you to contact your local police department. This type of driving in a residential area is significantly more dangerous to the community than a lemonade stand could ever possibly be.

We have local police perched around our neighborhood probably once or twice a week. In our little niche of the USA it's almost like nobody cares. Cops seem to just hand out some warnings or flash their lights. I've even called police about issues and they've told me over the phone, exactly this: "well, this IS North Idaho." It's incredibly irritating.

Do you find that the world has gotten more civil in the time interval since lemonade stands started getting banned?

I have no idea in regards to lemonade stands. But I do think that rules and laws have made for a more civil society, it's just a matter of keeping up with change that's become a problem. More guns, more violence, more media, more tech, more vehicles, more densely populated areas, less law enforcement for the number of people, etc, and so on. We just can't keep up, and if we start dropping rules for the little stuff, that will begin to catch up with us too.

We had someone run a lemonade stand in the neighborhood for a couple weeks last year with a sign that said all proceeds were going to support a certain "charity". There was absolutely no oversight to see if that was happening or not, or if it was just a ruse. They sat on the busiest corner. Cars couldn't safely get through. Hearsay has it that they DID shut it down - I'm not sure if it was the HOA or police in this situation though.

This seems to be PR move since not a lot of people can participate and only $300 of the legal fees are reimbursed:

> Open to legal residents of the 50 U.S. (including D.C.), who are the parents or legal guardians of a child 14 years of age or younger operating a lemonade stand. Program ends 11:59pm ET on 8/31/18 or when $60,000 worth of offers have been awarded, whichever comes first. For complete Terms and Conditions, including status of available offers, and all other details, visit countrytimelegalade.com.

> [From the article]: You can’t even be 13 or younger to participate due to child privacy laws

Nevertheless, aren’t there any laws that help such “hobbies“ (considering how little money that should make, and that underage children are voluntarily “working”, one can’t really call it a “business”.

Well, if my anecdotal experience -- literally just a few minutes ago -- is any indication, it's a brilliant PR move. I read the story to my wife this morning and she said "Awww, and I just purchased Country Time Lemonaid" and went on and on about how cool it was that they were doing that.

I suspect that cases of government bureaucracy interfering with children's lemonaid stands is a pretty rare thing. I don't have any evidence handy but my suspicions originate from the fact that whenever some child's lemonaid stand gets shut down it seems to make its way into newspapers all throughout the country -- if it were a common occurrence, it wouldn't be newsworthy. So it's an easy win - it drums up some happy feelings for the kool-aid equivalent of lemonaid, reminds government bureaucrats that there are better uses for their resources and might result in them having to spend $300, maybe $600 dollars in related complaints if I'm correct about its rarity.

It definitely doesn't hurt their image, but it also informs the public about an issue they care about. There is only so much they can do, especially because of child privacy laws. But it's getting the word out about regulation they deem unnecessary.

I haven't seen a lemonade stand in a long time, but I would cross two streets to support a little entrepreneur.

>only $300 of the legal fees are reimbursed

How much do you think these permits cost? At $25 each, 2,400 kids could take advantage of it. They're unlikely to be $300 on average.

>You can’t even be 13 or younger to participate due to child privacy laws

This is true of everything on the internet. The intent is for the parent to be the one signing up, as it explains in the next sentence.

If you've been fined for failing to obtain a business license, is the gist of what they're doing, not paying for the license.

They're doing both.

>There are two ways to enter: (1) If your child received a fine for operating a lemonade stand without a permit during the 2017 or 2018 calendar year, take a photo of the fine and a write brief description of what your child's lemonade stand means to him or her, in his or her own words. (2) If you are seeking reimbursement for a permit, follow the instructions to upload the image of the permit for 2018 and a brief description of what your child's lemonade stand means to him or her, in his or her own words.

https://www.countrytimelegalade.com/public/fulfillment/rules...

I don’t think it’s just about being a business - it’s also about not being inspected properly for health reasons isn’t it? The same problems exist I believe for volunteers who prepare food for homeless people.

I don't think I'll ever really understand this law. If you invite someone into your home for a meal (that you don't charge for), you're not subjected to health department regulation. How exactly is it different to prepare food for homeless people in your home? What if you invite them for dinner instead of taking it to them? Why are you subject to regulations in one scenario but not the other, given that the end goal is identical - to give away food to people who want to eat.

Genuine question... I don't get it.

Food regulations are for health. When you feed your own family and friends, fine. When you ramp up to feeding dozens or hundreds, then you can make a whole community sick with one mistake in the kitchen.

Its a practical threshold to help avoid spread of disease. Not an ivory-tower absolute. Local municipalities can and do vary on the details.

Okay, I understand this point.

But I also see community events where they grab half a dozen barbecues and feed thousands of people. Untrained volunteers manning the barbecues, that haven't been inspected and lord knows when they were last cleaned. Nobody seems to care, in fact most people in the community seem to love these, me included - paying for the possibility of getting sick just because "barbecuueeee." </homer>

There seems to be extremely large grey areas where enforcement turns a blind eye, no matter how the regulations are written. I'm not complaining by any means, I love community barbecues and social events and I would hate to see health regulators interfering with their spirit, but it seems as though they pick and choose what they enforce and ignore based entirely on the mood of the supervisor on any given day.

> but it seems as though they pick and choose what they enforce and ignore based entirely on the mood of the supervisor on any given day

More charitably, I'd say they use their professional judgement and assess risk.

I would agree - more charitably :P

I say this as a dispassionate observer - sometimes it seems their professional judgment is less professional and more emotional and their risk assessment based on whether or not they'll catch hell for ignoring it or if anyone will care.

In theory, and at least in my area, you can/should get a temporary permit. My fire department had to do so in order to sell hotdogs at a fundraising bazaar.

I agree... but as they say the gap between theory and practice is less in theory than it is in practice.

>Food regulations are for health.

Some of them maybe, but like with almost all regulations today they have been expanded far far far beyond what is needed just for public safety.

I will need to see if I can find the story again, but I remember a video outlining how the government health inspectors shut down a cheese making outfit because it did not comply with health codes due to the process, and when they switch to the "approved" method the cheese ended up being harmful to eat where it was not under the original process that was not allowed by government.

Further the regulations on feeding homeless are just a method to shut down charity because the city does not want homeless people in their town, these charities keep them around so if they shut down the charities feeding them the city believes the homeless will move on... (or die they don't really care as long as they do not have to see them)

It varies greatly depending on the local jurisdiction but the two most common factors for if you need a health permit are - Are you charging for the food? or Is the size of the portion over a specific size (commonly 2oz).

I have a line of BBQ rubs and sauces. In my area, if I got to a retailer and hand out free samples of product (for example BBQ sauce on pulled pork) then there is no health permit required. However if I sell BBQ sandwiches then a health department permit (and the associated inspections) are required.

In some areas I would be able to sell samples without a permit as long as they were 2oz or less. That is how many chili or "people's choice" type competitions work.

The laws aren't about protecting the honeless against unsafely prepared food. The purpose of the laws is to make it more difficult to provide meals to the homeless.

Localities that pass them do so to encourage the homeless to move to another jurisdiction where they can more easily get food.

The chances of improperly producing lemonade that also doesn't have a bad taste seems de nullis. It's like banning you from putting on a band-aid on a friend, because that's practicing medicine.

New from Johnson & Johnson: "Band-Ade! Tired of all those lonely nights in jail because you helped a friend with a bandage? Here at J&J we've established a legal fund to ensure..."

> improperly producing lemonade that also doesn't have a bad taste

You can't taste food poisoning. Go smell a fresh chicken. It smells like chicken, even if it's riddled with campylobacter or salmonella.

> The same problems exist I believe for volunteers who prepare food for homeless people.

Let's be honest, cities don't want volunteers feeding the homeless because they want them in someone else's back-yard, so they'll use any regulatory tricks and fines they can (inc. arresting the volunteers) to stop it.

in most localities the police won't even stop unless someone calls. usually you see that in a HOA but in the one I am subject to they just asked them to be in the cul de sac, it would only shut down when you guessed it, some anonymous neighbor called the cops.

so yes you can also lay claim to health issues but let us be honest, you don't have to drink it to play along. as long as its obviously just kids having fun and not parents exploiting kids for cuteness to get money where is the harm.

the occupational other license requirements in the US is just insane.

I suspect you are correct - I seem to recall that the last time this landed in the national news it was specific to health code, not business permits.

Not just a PR move but a BRILLIANT one! For a commitment of $60,000 in $300 chunks they are going to get millions of dollars worth of free advertising in the form of news stories.

You (and the author) are misunderstanding the age requirements. It's _only_ open to kids 14 and younger, it just legally goes through their parents. I don't think kids 15 and up are usually the ones running lemonade stands.

Of course it'a a PR stunt. And it's a damn good one.

> who are the parents or legal guardians of a child 14 years of age

Essentially confirming that the parent/guardian is over 13 for privacy reasons (you'd certainly hope they would be in any case), not the child operating the stand.

It's perhaps one of the most blatant PR moves there is, and it's an incredibly good one.

Of course it’s a PR move. Who would ever think it’s not?

Definitely a PR move. What 14 year-old is running a lemonade stand? I would guess there will be zero claims made.

Is the system Working As It Should when a 6-year-old has to lawyer up?

The system is made to make everyone a criminal, so that the full power of the Law can be used at any moment's notice against you if needed. We are literally producing dozens of thick volumes of new laws every year that citizens are not supposed to ignore, so there's that as well.

America, land of the free ...

Where do you draw the line. Equal protection is far more important than ensuring 6 year olds access to the free market.

Would Starbucks be immune from health inspections and the other standard obligations of running a food business if they simply put a 5 year old as a figurehead CEO and had the COO run the ship?

I'm not trolling. A company is obligated to maximize shareholder value within the law. It's like AAPL and GOOGL's tax maneuvering with the double Irish/Dutch sandwich techniques - unless they are illegal a company can be sued for not doing them.

edit: seriously, and how do you define "stand" ... can a 6 year old have a fleet of food trucks? what if they unintentionally (or intentionally, if you actually have spent time with 6 year olds...) adulterate the food and harm people? Can they be tried as adults? This is a silly controversy to whip up indignant people that aren't willing to think the issue through sufficiently. It's below the dignity of this forum, such as it is.

edit 2: to explain to downvoter(s) ... part of the obligation of writing laws is to prevent abuse. It's hard, and you have to consider aggressive seekers of loopholes. In a better world, and with better people you'd avoid having any law in the first place and leave it to the discretion of local authorities. But if that's the case, the downside is silly exceptions like this when local authorities judgement is something you disagree with.

> Equal protection is far more important than ensuring 6 year olds access to the free market.

We don't have equal protection for children under the law. Children aren't culpable for many criminal offenses and have reduced culpability for most others.

> Would Starbucks be immune from health inspections and the other standard obligations of running a food business if they simply put a 5 year old as a figurehead CEO and had the COO run the ship?

The 5 year old wouldn't be able to perform any legal actions as an executive of the company, so that's not an issue.

I think a sole proprietorship with no employees run by a 6 year old should have a degree of latitude. There's no situation I can imagine where a C-corporation or organization with employees would be off the hook, no matter how old their mascot is.

If anything he got off easy, think about all the patents he is probably violating.

If you can get a patent for "Combination hamburger and hotdog bread bun" I don't see how anybody can be safe. You need a lawyer to walk across the street.

https://patents.google.com/patent/USD584478?oq=hot+dog

What's wrong with that design patent? It seems both unique and non-obvious to me, if a bit silly. I would be very surprised if its issuance put any existing bun manufacturer into infringement.

What’s wrong with you? Sticking together a hamburger bun and a hot dog bun should not be patentable. How is that non-obvious?

"Easy" and "obvious" are very different things. Making a bun in that shape may not be difficult, but presumably no prior art exists — nobody's ever done it before, at least in public. The patentholder is not a patent troll, but an entrepreneur working on international franchising for the 'hamdog' concept. Silly yes, terrible business idea definitely, misuse of the patent system no.

[0] http://wnep.com/2016/09/22/meet-the-hamdog-a-hot-dog-and-ham...

[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2016/09/21/the-hotdog-and-hamburger-uni...

> Making a bun in that shape may not be difficult, but presumably no prior art exists — nobody's ever done it before, at least in public.

There should be a distinction between "trivial, but no one ever wanted to do it" and "wanted, but no one knew how to do it". There is no remotely rational case that granting a patent in the former situation would ever bring any net value to society to offset the cost. (Even just considering the paperwork involved, never mind the cost in liberty from barring everyone else from doing something this obvious without begging for permission.)

You mean protecting wealthy incumbents? I'd argue it is working as it is designed to ("should" is a whole different barrel of fish).

I've lived in both the US and EU, and counter-intuitively the amount of incumbent regulatory capture* in the US seems worse, even though one would assume it would be quite the other way around.

The US has a population that is "anti-regulation" and a pro-capitalism agenda. You'd think it would result in a highly competitive landscape, but instead it results in many duopolies.

*Edited

The term I think you're looking for is "regulatory capture":

https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2012/06/22/155596305/epis...

> amount of incumbent regulatory protectionism

Call it what it is: Crony Capitalism. Lobby all you can to cement your market position and prevent competition. Works pretty well, because politicians are corrupt and like to be showered with lobby money.

Utah has passed legislation to protect lemonade stands and other childhood businesses. This has spurred weekend child entrepreneur markets.

See https://fee.org/articles/lemonade-stands-legalized-in-utah/

I remember getting outraged by some outrage-inducing article a few years back, but after seeing the kids in my neighborhood year after year now I wonder, was that just a viral exception? What percent of unlicensed lemonade stands get shut down these days anyway?

Every time I see one of those outrage inducing articles, I assume there was a lot of backstory missed and this is just how the situation bubbled up.

For example, if a neighbor calls in a kid's lemonade stand, I'm assuming that neighbor has had multiple issues with that family and can't make any headway, so shit just blows up. I'm not saying it's right, but I doubt someone just wakes up and says "HELL NO!" to an 8 year old's 3 hour project on the sidewalk.

I see you have little experience with Suburbia...

Your chances of living next to one of those people are pretty low, but it's a big country, and there are a lot of busybodies just waiting to trounce someones fun.

First, no, there are people like this all over the place. I could tell you stories forever.

Second, even when there is "backstory" a lot of it exists only in the mind of that neighbor. I met one of my neighbors when they came over to complain about "all the parties" at my house. The house had been vacant for the eight months I owned it, at least. (I was actually concerned people were using it, but there was no evidence to support it.)

> I'm not saying it's right, but I doubt someone just wakes up and says "HELL NO!" to an 8 year old's 3 hour project on the sidewalk.

That's exactly what happens, though. There are busybodies, who missed their true calling as bureaucrats, all over the place.

Oh yes. Sometimes they also don't like the garden flamingoes, or people drying their laundry. There is a simple joy to be had, I suspect, in buying a shed load of the flamingoes and planting them all over the lawn :)

No one likes governments that picks on kids to make sure they pony up hundreds of dollars for a business license fee. Yet somehow those governments exist. They make the news for the same reason murderers make the news, not that they're common, but that they exist.

The bureaucrats who didn't tell the busybody to screw off (in more a appropriate bureaucratic fashion) are just as much fault as the busybody.

It's a regional thing, we have bake sales all the time around here and no one checks with the food inspectors. If you get sick, you deal with it (public shaming works fairly well). Most folks around here just assume its something you do when growing up.

I recall when I was a kid we had a sort of circus event, we as kids created different events on our own. One event toss a coin onto a small saucer. Another I recall was a 2x4, nail, elastic and clothespin "gun" to shoot at cans (this was Canada so no gun culture).

You would have to pay to toss the coin or shoot a can. I think there were various prizes to win such as comic books and candy. None of it for charity this was pure capitalism.

What's funny is we were all little bastards we'd rub the plate with butter to make it slippery and nail down a can or two so it wouldn't move.

I think that's the interesting anthropological slice: Leveraging paranoia about government meddling in our lives to sell product. Encryption/security products do this, too, of course, but they don't appeal to the mainstream. The mainstream isn't sufficiently vexed for security beyond passwords and brass keys to be a product, only those with enough to protect. OK, maybe a techie familiar member installs a doorbell cam.

But in this case, they're betting distrust of the government has become a motivation within the mainstream.

>What percent of unlicensed lemonade stands get shut down these days anyway?

Is the lemonade stand in some upper class suburb where children should be accompanied at all times?

Are the neighbors busybodies?

Do the neighbors and or town government have a bone to pick with whoever's kids have a lemonade stand?

Is this in a region where calling the authorities over minor transgressions is socially acceptable?

Do the local authorities readily enable this behavior by never using their discretion to not enforce something?

If the answer to the affirmative is all of the above then I think a visit from the authorities is highly likely but most people wouldn't let their kids run an unlicensed lemonade stand in that kind of neighborhood in the first place.

I don't think most jurisdictions even have a license that's applicable to and appropriate for a lemonade stand. It's not like it's a serious commercial operation.

I think the main point should be, this article is essentially viral news clickbait that's empty of any valuable content. (I clicked the "flag" button, and if you agree, you should too)

HOA is a metaphorical termite. If you are planning on buying a new house buy into some old neighborhood. It i not worth dealing with them just for the sake of someone cutting your grass once a week.

HOAs hire someone to cut your grass?

I thought they just send you increasingly nasty letters and/or fines if you forget to cut your own grass. Or if you remember to cut it, a bit late, but forget to inform the HOA that you've done so. They might even find a half-dozen different ways to describe "didn't cut the grass" so they can have you in the queue for multiple escalating situations.

I moved into a rental house with an HOA in a place where even the roads were private. Across the street lived the president of the HOA. Her daughters were off at college, but their cars were parked in front of their house for months without moving. The streets were small and parking was only allowed on that side of the street.

Faster forward four years, I parked my car in front of their house for a period of two days because I had gotten a new car but had not yet sold the old one and had nowhere to put it. On the second day I got an unnecessarily nasty (it got strangely personal), unsigned (zero contact information; no names), non-letterhead letter from "the HOA" saying that police had been notified about my car and that it would be towed after 72-hours. This was a nice car, not an eyesore; and they had to know it was my car at that point.

I briefly considered writing a letter to all the HOA members warning them about someone "impersonating the HOA". I also thought about having my lawyer draft a nasty letter to the HOA. Instead, I just kept my car parked on either end of their house every two days until I moved out (taking a photo each time, which at some point they must have seen me do), even though I had some other options. Had they simply knocked on my door and asked me about it, that wouldn't have happened.

I agree the HOAs are often completely terrible. There are, however, some benefits.

For example, cities often require that HOAs for newly built subdivisions are responsible for certain types of utility and sidewalk maintenance because maze-like/fractal-like subdivisions mean maintenance of these things are incredibly expensive and cost more to maintain than what the city receives from that subdivision in terms of taxes.

As with many things, it goes both ways.

One of the neighborhoods in my town had a neighbor run a Nazi flag up the flagpole in his front yard, just because some homeowners are real-life edgelords. They would have appreciated having a blanket HOA rule about maintaining property values and "eyesores" to fall back on, because in the absence of such, it turned out to be pretty difficult in the American legal environment to find anything with which they could compel him to take the flag down.

On the other hand, I've seen a different neighborhood try to use the local covenants to ban a backyard solar farm, because they argued solar panels are uniformly an eyesore. Tools are tools; people use them.

> it turned out to be pretty difficult in the American legal environment to find anything with which they could compel him to take the flag down.

Pretty difficult? It should be impossible. Remember that pesky constitutional amendment that guarantees free speech? It applies.

It does apply, but it's unclear whether it leads to optimal outcomes.

Germany has outlawed public displays of Nazi symbols; it doesn't have the problems of overt fascism that the US is currently struggling with. Perhaps it has merely replaced them with covert fascism, and perhaps this is merely correlation that doesn't imply causation. But I get the distinct impression that such is not actually the case; that legal disapproval of naziism in Germany re-enforces general disapproval.

Plus, America's First Amendment doesn't uniformly guarantee freedom of speech. Hate speech, for example, and incitement to riot, are two categories that are generally not considered protected. I don't think flying a Nazi flag falls under either of those (though if one really squints hard, it could set a person up for much worse---the US negotiated a peace with Germany after World War II, but not with the Nazi party. One could make a claim that flying an enemy flag on American soil is tantamount to claiming that territory has been conquered, which opens the situation up to military intervention ;) ).

> Hate speech, for example...

Of course that's protected. The only thing that isn't protected is a clear and timely threat like your example of inciting a riot.

Any HOA that tried to keep him from flying said flag would have a hard time defending its actions in court.

Never too early to teach kids to fight the overbearing regulatory state.

Is this "real"? The website for it seems kinda silly-ish.

https://www.countrytimelegalade.com

inciting civil disobedience for corporate purposes. What could go wrong?

Are we slowly conditioning our children to take up arms to defend corporations against "we the people"?

seriously? the blame is on government, local or otherwise, for criminalizing safe, voluntary interactions. requiring licenses of children operating a lemonade stand is indoctrinating a serious level of statism, which historically has had far more victims.

you want a stupid little law like that overturned get a petition and take it to your local city counsel.

Also, I still love that Geico Ice T Lemonade commercial. One of the very very few commercials I enjoyed.

I'm almost 40 years old, grew up mostly in the burbs, and I never ran a lemonade stand, nor have I ever in my entire life seen kids running a lemonade stand.

I'm betting this hasn't really been a "tradition" since the 1950s.

Get a paper route - at least then you won't be giving anyone food poisoning.

Wow they really go after ANY small businesses, don't they!?

take it for what it is folks, a good promotion.

Is there a link to something better than a blog?

As a UK person without context of the background, this was a little hard to make sense of.

AFAICT there's some gig economy company called Country Time Lemonade who have managed to get a workforce of child labour for free, and yet it is the stall (small business) that requires a permit and so the startup behind it is offering refunds on the permit fees?

What have I got wrong?

Country Time Lemonade isn't a "gig economy company". It's a powdered lemonade product that's been for sale for a long time. https://www.amazon.ca/Country-Time-Lemonade-Drink-82-5-Ounce...

There's a long "tradition" of kids setting up a little lemonade stand on the side of the road and selling glasses of lemonade for 50 cents or whatever to get a bit of extra spending money during their summer break from school. This is typically just a random table from their parents house, a sign made out of a sheet of paper, and pitchers of lemonade.

Related: is anyone old enough to have played this game on their old Apple computer?

https://archive.org/details/Lemonade_Stand_1979_Apple

Yes! I played through it on an emulator with my kids a few months ago.

Yep, had that on my one 5 1/4" disk I got from a friend in school. Didn't know these games were in color until I was in college many years later (only ever saw green screens).

There was a lawn mowing game I loved as well. Plus all the classics (Bard's Tale, Ultima, Wizardry, etc).

It's a tradition that goes way back => https://goo.gl/eFuf6M

Man... the lemonade price inflation! :D

I remember having to sit through Little House on the Prairie because my mom loved that show. There wasn't anything a penny couldn't buy apparently.

Country Time sells powered lemonade in US supermarkets.

Separately, there’s a US tradition of children setting up lemonade stands to make pocket money during the summer. Typically parents help buy the supplies, the idea being that the kids are learning to work for money instead of being just given it outright.

Some US cities have strict permit requirements for selling food & beverage which has lead to silly looking photos/stories of police giving 10 year old kids tickets.

This is basically a publicity stunt by Country Time lemonade.

Well, since you asked.

What you have wrong: First, it's Country Time Lemonade. Second, they are far from a gig economy company or a startup - they're a Kraft brand since 1975, selling powdered lemonade. Third, they don't get a workforce of child labor for free - kids have enjoyed setting up lemonade stands to learn about business for many, many years, so it's by far more fun and education than work.

What you have right: They are offering refunds on the ridiculous permits that buck tradition and only serve bureaucratic government overreach, not the community.

Country Time Lemonade is a lemonade company, who primarily sell lemonade in powder form to mix with water.

Lemonade stands are a cliche way for kids to make money in the United States, however, it is technically illegal without a permit (though I've personally never heard of a kid getting shut down).

Country Time is a popular choice for kids making lemonade stands because it's cheap and easy.

Country Time Lemonade is starting a legal defense fund of sorts to help kids fight back after they get their lemonade stands shut down.

Here are a few kids getting shut down: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3171665

https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/08/03/the-inexpli...

Country time lemonade is a lemonade mix brand. In the US anyone constructing a stand on their own property to sell/attempt to sell lemonade (or anything) without permission from the government is illegal. So, an 8 year old is bored, puts out a table and tries to make a couple bucks off his neighbors, he is technically breaking the law. They frequently get shut down (or even ticketed). Country Time is attempting to get some good press by saying they will help people avoid legal fees

> They frequently get shut down (or even ticketed).

I do not think this is correct for any commonly accepted definition of the word "frequently."

I doubt any stats on this exists, so I'm referring to my own anecdotal experience. In my small hometown in northern NJ, they did, in fact, shut them down frequently. Unless you can prove otherwise, I am not sure the point of your comment.

As another UK person, lemonade stands are a suburban thing kids run for pocket change, like you see in the movies all the time. Sounds like local officials are getting bureaucratic and shutting them down.

I think the first paragraph pretty clearly explains the problem:

Are you thinking of helping your kid setting up a lemonade stand this summer? Apparently, some young entrepreneurs are getting shut down due to a lack of small business permits.

When I saw these in films I always imagined the parents had a lemon tree or were just buying lemons for their kids. I also thought it was just a cheesy plot tool rather than an actual thing,

What I didn't imagine was that this involved people purchasing a powdered mix from a multinational and selling that (as seems to be the case according to other comments).

It doesn't necessarily — see the classic game Lemonade Stand.[0][1] But powdered lemonade is probably the most common form of (non-alcoholic) lemonade consumed in the US nowadays.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemonade_Stand

[1] http://www.coolmath-games.com/0-lemonade-stand

For people who live in areas where citrus will grow, picking your own lemons is the way to go, because powdered lemonade (and Country Time specifically) is disgusting.

But there usually aren’t many lemons on the trees during the summer months in the US, so people opt to have their kids sell cheap, over-sweetened powdered beverage. It’s the American way!

Nothing. You nailed it!

...well, give it a few years and you'll be right.

"Big company subverts local ownership of governance with massive amounts of money."

I'm not sure if this is a feel-good success story or a case study in the flaws of capitalism in an increasingly-connected global society.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com