FoodServiceNerd is a free, independent guide to the practical side of commercial foodservice — health-department requirements by ZIP and county, permits and code, the cost to open, financing, food-safety certification, and honest, plain-English equipment decisions. We publish the answers operators actually search for, backed by real data and free calculators.
We are not a store and not a spec-sheet catalog. We don't sell equipment, we don't publish a product catalog, and we aren't owned by a manufacturer or dealer. That independence is the point: we can answer questions a seller can't, including “do you even need this?”
The information operators need is split badly across the web: equipment sellers publish buying guides that steer you toward product, regulators publish dense code, and general business blogs skip the physical kitchen entirely. FoodServiceNerd closes that gap — combining a compliance layer (localized permit and code data), engineering calculators that encode the real math, and decision guides that compare honestly.
Every page is researched from primary sources — the FDA Food Code, EPA and IMC references, NSF standards, manufacturer specification sheets, and official state and county health-department fee schedules. Figures are given as ranges or as dated observations from an official source; where a jurisdiction doesn't publish a number, we say so rather than guess. We never fabricate fees or statistics. Read the full editorial & sourcing methodology.
FoodServiceNerd is published by Resultex Media Group LLC, a Long Island, New York–based company with more than a decade of experience in the foodservice industry. Content is produced and maintained by the FoodServiceNerd editorial team and reviewed against the primary sources listed in our methodology.
FoodServiceNerd is supported by display advertising and affiliate “where to buy” links — if you buy through one we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Those relationships never influence our recommendations or rankings. We keep guidance separate from any commercial relationship.
Spotted an error or an out-of-date fee? We fix these fast — see Contact. This site is educational and is not legal, tax, or engineering advice; always confirm specifics with your local authority.