Free Reference · Northeast Ohio

Cleveland Foodservice Guide

A free reference site for people running kitchens in Northeast Ohio: who licenses you, what opening costs, how inspections work, and the records the food code requires you to keep.

No Signup · No Email Gate · Nothing on It Is for Sale
Open the Guide →Read the Editorial Policy

Why We Built It

The Answers Are Public. They're Just Scattered.

Dean Supply has sold to Cleveland kitchens since 1950, and operators ask us the same questions every week — which health district licenses me, what will this build-out cost, what am I supposed to have on file when an inspector walks in.

The answers are public, but they are scattered across a dozen agencies. The guide puts them in one place, with the rule cited on the page so you can check it yourself.

Conflict of Interest

We Sell Many of the Things the Guide Covers.

That is a conflict of interest, so the guide works under rules we published and can be held to:

  • Directory listings run alphabetically and placement is never sold
  • Companies that compete with us are listed on identical terms
  • There are no rankings in any category we sell into
  • The guides link to agencies rather than to products

If you find a page that breaks one of those, the policy says to tell us, and we would rather fix it than have the rules be decorative.

Start Here

Six Places to Begin

Who licenses you Ten health districts license food operations in Northeast Ohio. Which one is yours depends on your municipality, not your county. Your opening path Every step from registering the business to the final inspection, in the order they actually have to happen. Work out your risk level Ohio sets it from the single highest-risk thing you do. It decides how often you are inspected and what the license costs. The records you have to keep Printable logs and forms, each one carrying the rule behind it. Every log downloads as a spreadsheet too. Your kitchen Answer eight questions about your operation and it builds a reference for your address, your licensor and your risk level. All the guides Licensing, liquor permits, hiring paperwork, workers' compensation, insurance, allergens, warewashing, closing or selling.

What's on It

Inside the Guide

50guides on licensing, inspections and running the place
10licensing agencies mapped to the towns they cover
115local vendors across 32 categories — repair, hood cleaning, grease hauling, pest control Openings and closings tracked across Greater Cleveland

Cleveland Foodservice Guide

Open It. It's Free.

No signup, no email gate, and nothing on it is for sale.

Open the Cleveland Foodservice Guide →

Questions about anything in it, or anything else — call us at 216-325-0994, or come see us at 3500 Woodland Avenue.