Starting a business here

Most people who want to start something are not short of money or of will. They are short of knowing which office issues what. This says who issues it, and where to ask.

This is not legal or tax advice. Every requirement below names the office that issues it and links to that office's own page, with the date we last checked. Rules change — check the page before you rely on it.

The four steps every business takes

Decide whether you need to form a company. If you will trade under your own legal name as a sole proprietor, you register nothing here. If you want an LLC or a corporation, or want to trade under a different name, that is filed with the Secretary of State.
Ohio Secretary of State
Ohio has no state business licence to buy or renew. If you have been told to get one, you have been told about another state. What Ohio has instead is the vendor's license in step three and the city income tax in step four, and neither is what people mean by a business licence.
Open the official page ↗
Get an EIN — the federal tax number for the business. It is free, it is online, and it usually takes minutes.
Internal Revenue Service
Free
Open the official page ↗
If you will make taxable sales, get a vendor's license. In Ohio this IS your sales tax account — there is no separate sales tax permit. It costs $50, it comes from the county auditor where your location sits, and you need one for each fixed location.
Franklin County Auditor
$50
The fee rose from $25 to $50 in April 2025, so older advice and older relatives are wrong about the number. And do not assume a service business is exempt: Ohio taxes fewer services than goods, but landscaping and lawn care, building maintenance and janitorial work, and employment services are all taxable here — trades this community works in.
Open the official page ↗
Work the city income tax into your prices before you quote anybody. Columbus charges 2.5% on the net profit of a business operating in the city, and every suburb charges its own at its own rate.
City of Columbus Income Tax Division
This is the step people from Nevada skip entirely. Ohio has a state income tax and a city income tax on top of it. If you live in Whitehall and work in Columbus you will file two municipal returns, not one. Finding this out in April, after a year of pricing as though it did not exist, is the expensive way to learn it.
Open the official page ↗

Where people here have started

← All trades

Notary and document help

Easy to begin

Notarising signatures, and helping people fill in forms and translate documents. Low cost to start, and the bilingual part is the whole business.

$200 – $800rough, to open the doors — not counting what you live on until it pays

What you need

The Secretary of State commissions all notaries in Ohio. Since the Notary Modernization Act took effect in September 2019, every application, renewal and update must be submitted electronically.
Ohio Secretary of State
Notary commissioning moved from the county courthouse to the Secretary of State in 2019, so anyone who tells you to go to the common pleas court is out of date. And read the entry above before you open a notary business: an Ohio notary commission gives you no authority whatsoever over immigration matters.
Open the official page ↗
Ohio has no document preparation service to register as. There is nothing to sign up for. Preparing immigration or other legal documents for a fee, if you are not an Ohio-licensed attorney, is the unauthorized practice of law under Ohio Revised Code 4705.07.
Board on the Unauthorized Practice of Law of the Supreme Court of Ohio
Being a notary does not give you this authority and specifically forbids claiming it. Ohio Revised Code 147.142 bans a non-attorney notary from advertising as an immigration consultant, from taking money to represent anyone in immigration matters, and from using the words notario or notario publico in any advertising — by name, in any language. The Supreme Court of Ohio has already enjoined a Columbus firm for preparing immigration forms. The lawful routes are an Ohio-licensed attorney, or a DOJ-accredited representative at a recognised organisation.
Open the official page ↗

What to buy

A notary stamp and journal
The bond, from any surety company
A printer and a scanner

Checked September 3, 2026

Or look at another trade:

People here who do this work

Members of this board who file these forms for a living. Sefer has not checked their credentials — ask them directly.

Already running one? List it