For people starting out in Launceston and the north: a preserves kitchen at home, a coffee van, a table at Harvest on Saturday mornings, a new practice or a founder testing an idea. We register the .com.au in your name, put an email address on it and build the first site, and nothing is paid until you've approved the draft.
If your business starts with food, something baked, pickled or brewed in a home kitchen and sold at a market or from a van before there's a shopfront, the north has its own rules and markets for that. If it's a service covering a stretch of the Tamar or the Midlands, the questions change. Either way, a first site has two things to answer quickly: what you make or do, and how someone gets it.
At Harvest, the person behind the table grew, baked or brewed what's on it; that's how the market works. Your website can carry the same idea: a photo of you, a few lines on how you started, and where the work happens. When someone tastes your chutney at the market and looks you up that evening, that's the page they're hoping to find.
If you show where you cook, show it as the council expects it. The City of Launceston's minimum for a home food kitchen includes a double bowl sink, separate storage for the business's food, and household pets kept out of food preparation and storage areas at all times. A picture of the dog beside the bench is better kept for the about page.
A van's patch depends on how it's registered: some can trade across Tasmania, others notify each council they work in (the rules are below). The site should list the towns or council areas you cover and this week's stops, so a regular in Legana or Longford knows whether you're coming. Send the changes by email and we'll update the page.
Customers who meet you once a week want a way to buy in between: a gift box at Christmas, a standing order, a dozen jars posted to a cousin in Melbourne. An order request form that lands in your inbox is enough to start. When the range settles, an online store can replace it, and the form's questions tell you what the store needs.
For a cleaner, tutor, gardener or mobile groomer starting out, "Launceston" isn't specific enough. Say whether Riverside and Legana, Prospect Vale and Hadspen, or Perth, Longford and Evandale are on your list, and how far up the Tamar you'll go. A customer out of town can see straight away whether to call, and you avoid enquiries you'd have to turn down.
If you're building a product rather than a local trade, mentors, program staff and early customers will look you up before they reply. One page that says what the product does, who it's for, how far along it is and how to get in touch answers most of what they'll ask. The words are yours; we lay them out so they read quickly on a phone.
The state-wide basics, briefly. Our page for new Hobart businesses sets out the Tasmanian pieces: Business Tasmania's free New Business Support advice (up to two hours for people planning a business or with an ABN under 12 months, on 1800 440 026), and the planning exemption for working from home, which allows up to 40 square metres, no staff other than residents and one small unlit sign. Those state-wide provisions have applied in Launceston for longer: the Tasmanian Planning Scheme took effect here on 29 July 2022, more than three years before it reached the City of Hobart. The rest of this section is about the north.
Local help. The City of Launceston runs Business Connect, a hub of small business information with a mailing list and regular free events. Past sessions include a starting-a-small-business workshop run with Futures Isle and The Project Lab, a session on starting a home-based food business, and workshops on digital strategy and digital marketing. The van Diemen Project, on Level 1 at 7-11 Quadrant Mall, gives free to low-cost advice, mentoring and workshops to small businesses and entrepreneurs, and one-on-one digital advice for a small fee through its Digital Solutions Program. It hosted a Tasmanian Small Business Expo at Du Cane Brewery on Elizabeth Street on 17 March 2026, free to attend. Founders with a product in mind can also look at Enterprize, which keeps a coworking hub in Launceston as well as Hobart and runs Elevate, its 15-week incubator.
Food from a home kitchen. The City's food business page splits home kitchens in two. If you'll handle potentially hazardous food, you need a Food Business Registration before you begin; if you won't, you don't register, but you must notify the council before you start. Applications go in at least 14 days before the date you want to open, an Environmental Health Officer inspects and approves the premises before you operate, and if essential works aren't finished, further inspections and re-inspection fees can follow. Planning approval may also be needed, and building and plumbing approval if there are works. Registrations can't be transferred and expire on 31 July each year, two months later than in Hobart. A stall at an event or market needs its application in at least 10 working days ahead, along with the organiser's permission.
Vans and trailers. A mobile food business that handles potentially hazardous food is registered by the council where it's based, and with that state-wide registration it can trade throughout Tasmania, subject to planning, traffic, event organiser and landowner approvals. One that sells only food that isn't potentially hazardous doesn't register, but it has to notify the council in every municipality it trades in, because the Food Act 2003 makes no provision for a single state-wide notification. A van of that kind working Launceston, Legana and Prospect Vale would be notifying three councils: Launceston, West Tamar and Meander Valley.
Harvest, the region's food name, and working with us. Every Saturday from 8.30am to 12.30pm, Harvest Launceston fills the car park at 71 Cimitiere Street, rain, hail or shine. Discover Tasmania describes its principle: the people who produce the food sell it, growing, baking, pickling or brewing their own products from Tasmanian produce, and the market's site invites new stallholders to get in touch. Since November 2021 Launceston and Northern Tasmania have been a UNESCO Creative City of Gastronomy, so a new producer here is starting out in a region that promotes itself through its food. We're an Adelaide team on Hutt St and work with northern Tasmanian businesses by phone and email; Adelaide is half an hour behind Launceston all year. Our current clients are in SA, NSW, VIC and QLD, and none of them is in Tasmania yet.
Tomi's Bobcat and Excavation works in the Bega Valley in NSW and Golden Years Aged Care Support in northern Adelaide. Neither is in Tasmania, and we don't know how new either business was when we started. Each shows one thing a new Launceston business usually needs: plenty of photos of the work, or a clear page about the person behind it.
One page for a bobcat and excavator business: three service sections, a 42-photo gallery that swipes on a phone, a rotating set of testimonials, a contact form with its own thank-you page, and tap-to-call. Swap the earthworks for jars, loaves or bottles and the same layout suits a producer.
Visit the Tomi's Bobcat site (opens in a new tab) See it in our portfolio
In-home support for older people, on six pages: nine services explained on one page, an about page on the founder, an enquiry form with a referral option for aged care providers, large readable text and tap-to-call on every page. A new practice or service business can follow the same pattern.
Visit the Golden Years Aged Care site (opens in a new tab) See it in our portfolio
“…Salem walked us through everything, gave us a fixed quote so we knew exactly what we were paying, and turned around the build faster than we thought possible.”
★ 5.0 from 33 Google reviews (opens in a new tab)
See all 14 recent client sites in our portfolio.
$399
One page with what you make or do, photos, market days or service towns, hours and an order or enquiry form, set up with your .com.au and business email.
Our suggestion for a producer with a range
$899
A home page, a products page with photos (and prices, if you publish them), and a page on who makes it and where. Room for a short list of the markets and shops that stock you.
$1,499
For a launch with more than one strand, such as retail plus wholesale, or a café with catering: a page for each, a stockists list, a gallery and a news page for markets and events.
Once the council has approved you to operate. The City asks for your application at least 14 days before you want to start, and an officer inspects the kitchen before you begin. We can build the site in the meantime, showing your range with a sign-up for launch news, then turn on ordering when approval arrives. A simple order request form suits a short range; an online store is $799 for up to 25 products with one payment gateway.
What a stall can't: the full range, how to order between Saturdays, whether you post or deliver, and the story of who makes it, which suits a market built on producers selling their own food. If you trade at other markets as well, a short list of dates keeps regulars following you; email us the changes and we update them under hosting.
Yes, by day if you can. Where you can trade depends on your registration: a registered mobile food business can work throughout Tasmania with the right permissions, while one selling only food that isn't potentially hazardous notifies each council it trades in. The City of Launceston's environmental health team can tell you which applies. We'll show your weekly stops and the towns you cover.
Yes. Begin with an order request form that comes to your inbox, then move to an online store once your range settles: $799 for up to 25 products, one payment gateway and basic order management, or $1,999 for unlimited products, multiple payment options, customer accounts and advanced shipping. Say clearly where you post to and how long delivery usually takes.
Business Tasmania on 1800 440 026 for free New Business Support advice, the City of Launceston's Business Connect events, and the van Diemen Project in Quadrant Mall for low-cost advice and digital help. We stick to the website: arranging your words and photos into pages, registering your domain and setting up your email.
By phone and email: a call about what you'll sell and where, your words and photos by email, then a draft link to check on your phone. Change it as often as you need; you pay once you approve it. We reply within 24 hours, and Adelaide is half an hour behind Launceston year-round.
Tell us what you'll make or offer, where you'll sell it, and when you hope to start. We'll check the .com.au, quote the pages and build a draft that you pay for only once you're happy with it.
We reply within 24 hours. Prefer email? info@webcraftstudio.com.au