California Prop 65 Notice & Disclaimer
California consumer information
California Proposition 65 Notice & Disclaimer
Seeing a California Proposition 65 warning can feel concerning. We want to make the information easier to understand, provide useful context without minimizing California's requirements, and help customers make informed choices with confidence.
A note to our customers We appreciate the opportunity to explain these warnings clearly. Proposition 65 uses a California-specific exposure-warning framework. A warning is important information to review, but it is not, by itself, a finding that a product is unsafe, defective, adulterated, unlawful, or out of compliance with federal or non-California standards. The details depend on the chemical, exposure, product, use, applicable threshold or exemption, and the law then in effect.
What Proposition 65 requires
California's Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986, commonly called Proposition 65, generally requires a business to provide a clear and reasonable warning before knowingly and intentionally exposing an individual in California to a chemical that California has listed as causing cancer, birth defects, or other reproductive harm, unless an exemption or other legal exception applies.
Proposition 65 is an exposure-warning law, not a general product-ban law. California maintains and updates the Proposition 65 chemical list, and the rules governing warnings, safe-harbor methods, exposure thresholds, exemptions, and business responsibilities may change over time.
When a warning may be needed
A Proposition 65 analysis is product- and exposure-specific. Depending on the facts, a warning may be required when a product, its use, or another covered activity can expose a person in California to a listed chemical at a level or in a manner for which no applicable exemption or safe-harbor determination removes the warning obligation.
Businesses may use the safe-harbor warning methods and content established by California regulations, or another warning method that is legally sufficient. ZNF may choose the warning format, wording, placement, delivery method, and supporting compliance controls that it reasonably determines are appropriate for the product, channel, customer, transaction, and law then in effect.
What a Proposition 65 warning means — and what it does not
We understand that warning language can sound strong. A Proposition 65 warning should be taken seriously and reviewed in context, but the warning itself does not establish every fact about a product's overall safety, quality, legality, or regulatory status.
A warning can mean
The business has determined that California warning requirements may apply to a listed-chemical exposure, or has chosen to provide a warning as part of a legally supportable compliance approach.
A warning does not automatically mean
The product is unsafe, defective, contaminated, adulterated, illegal, recalled, or out of compliance with federal or non-California law, or that ordinary use is known to cause a particular health outcome.
Likewise, the absence of a Proposition 65 warning should not be interpreted as a representation that a product contains no listed chemical at any detectable level or that no exposure can occur. Warning obligations depend on the governing legal standard and facts.
Foods, botanicals, and naturally present trace constituents
California's Proposition 65 list includes naturally occurring and synthetic chemicals. Foods, agricultural products, botanicals, minerals, marine-derived materials, and other natural ingredients can contain trace constituents influenced by soil, water, air, geology, growing conditions, processing, or other environmental and supply-chain factors. Depending on the ingredient and source, trace constituents can include naturally present or environmentally introduced metals and other substances that also appear on California's list.
Natural occurrence is a legally significant concept in some Proposition 65 contexts, but it is not a blanket exemption for every chemical, product, exposure, or use. Whether a warning is required must be evaluated under the then-current law and facts. Likewise, terms such as “natural,” “organic,” “minimally processed,” or similar descriptions do not mean that a product is necessarily free of every Proposition 65-listed chemical.
Natural and minimally processed ingredients can also vary by crop, season, geography, lot, and supplier in color, aroma, taste, density, particle size, granularity, moisture response, and other physical or sensory characteristics. Such variation alone does not establish contamination, adulteration, defect, or a Proposition 65 violation.
Our approach to quality and transparency
Quality matters to us. ZNF's quality and compliance practices may include supplier qualification and documentation, specifications, traceability controls, internal review, certificates or records supplied by qualified parties, and internal and/or third-party laboratory testing where ZNF determines those measures are appropriate for a particular product, risk, supplier, or legal requirement.
Testing and quality controls have practical limits. No sampling or testing program can establish the absence of every substance in every unit, lot, exposure scenario, or future regulatory context. Test methods, detection limits, sampling plans, laboratories, specifications, and legal thresholds may differ. ZNF therefore does not represent that a Proposition 65 warning is unnecessary solely because testing, supplier records, federal compliance, or prior results exist.
A Proposition 65 warning does not displace ZNF's quality standards. It is a California-specific disclosure that may apply in addition to other quality, labeling, safety, consumer-protection, contractual, and regulatory requirements.
Warning language you may see
California adopted amendments to its safe-harbor warning regulations that became effective January 1, 2025. Among other changes, the amended short-form warning format identifies at least one listed chemical and expressly permits short-form warnings for food. Transition provisions apply to certain products and online warnings.
For illustration only, where lead is the identified chemical and both cancer and reproductive-toxicity endpoints apply, warning language may appear substantially as follows under the current food-warning framework:
CALIFORNIA WARNING: Consuming this product can expose you to lead, which is known to the State of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm. For more information go to www.P65Warnings.ca.gov/food.
WARNING: Can expose you to lead, a carcinogen and reproductive toxicant. See www.P65Warnings.ca.gov/food.
6.1 Transition to the amended short-form rules
Under the 2025 amendments, the former short-form warning content may continue to be used for qualifying products manufactured and labeled before January 1, 2028, subject to the regulation's transition provisions. Separate transition rules can apply to online warning updates. Because a product's manufacturing, labeling, sales-channel, and notice history can matter, legacy language should not be copied forward without confirming the applicable transition rule.
Website, catalog, checkout, and marketplace warnings
Proposition 65 warning obligations can apply to internet, catalog, marketplace, and other remote sales to California. Where a warning is required for a product sold online, the warning must be associated with that product and displayed or linked in a manner that provides the legally required pre-purchase notice. A warning is not made sufficiently prominent merely by placing it somewhere on a general website that the purchaser must search to find.
- ZNF may display warnings on product pages, product-detail areas, labels, checkout-adjacent interfaces, catalogs, marketplaces, or other legally sufficient locations.
- Third-party platforms may control portions of layout, typography, link behavior, localization, and presentation. ZNF may use available platform tools, feeds, notices, and other methods to support compliance.
- Where product information is provided in another language and California law requires the warning in that language, the applicable warning should also be provided in the required language and format.
- If product facts, chemical listings, exposure information, warning rules, or platform capabilities change, ZNF may revise, replace, add, or remove warning content at any time to the fullest extent permitted by law.
A warning appearing on a label, product page, marketplace listing, or other point of sale controls over a general example on this explanatory page with respect to that specific product or transaction, unless applicable law requires otherwise.
Wholesale, private label, repackaging, resale, and downstream responsibilities
Proposition 65 assigns warning responsibilities within the supply chain and permits certain responsibilities to be allocated by written agreement, subject to mandatory law. Business customers who manufacture with, formulate, blend, process, repackage, relabel, private label, advertise, list, distribute, transfer, or resell ZNF products can create or assume independent duties that differ from those applicable to ZNF's original product and sales channel.
To the fullest extent permitted by law and the applicable ZNF agreements, a downstream commercial customer is responsible for the California compliance decisions within its control, including its finished product, formulation, packaging, label, claims, warnings, website, marketplace listing, distribution chain, and customer geography. A downstream business must not remove, obscure, minimize, or alter a ZNF-supplied warning in a manner that causes noncompliance.
Additional allocation, indemnification, defense, notice, recordkeeping, cooperation, insurance, dispute-resolution, and survival provisions may apply under ZNF's Terms of Use and separate commercial agreements, subject to non-waivable law.
Relationship to federal, other-state, and international laws
Proposition 65 is a California law. It operates alongside, rather than as a substitute for, other potentially applicable federal, state, local, and non-U.S. requirements concerning food, dietary supplements where applicable, labeling, contaminants, advertising, consumer protection, accessibility, import/export, customs, product safety, and chemical disclosure.
- Federal law. Compliance with FDA, USDA, FTC, or another federal framework does not automatically establish a Proposition 65 exemption, safe harbor, or complete defense.
- Other U.S. jurisdictions. A California warning does not mean that another state requires the same warning, and it does not replace any separate state or local requirement that validly applies.
- International transactions. A Proposition 65 warning is not designed to satisfy a foreign country's labeling, chemical-disclosure, food-safety, accessibility, consumer-protection, customs, or import requirements. Mandatory law in the applicable jurisdiction controls to the extent it validly applies.
Nothing in this Notice is an admission that every U.S. state or foreign law applies to every ZNF transaction. ZNF reserves all lawful jurisdictional objections, exemptions, defenses, threshold limitations, and other protections, while recognizing that non-waivable rights and duties remain controlling where they validly apply.
Accessibility, inclusive access, and alternative formats
ZNF wants this information to be usable by as many people as reasonably possible. This page fragment is designed toward WCAG 2.2 Level AA using semantic headings, keyboard-accessible links and disclosure controls, visible focus, responsive reflow, readable spacing, high-contrast support, reduced-motion support, and links that do not rely on color alone.
ZNF's broader accessibility commitments, support process, and accessibility contact information are described in the Accessibility Statement. This design benchmark is intended to support compliance efforts under applicable U.S. accessibility law, including the ADA where applicable, and relevant international accessibility requirements that may apply to ZNF's services.
If you need this Notice in an alternative format or encounter an accessibility barrier, please email accessibility@znaturalfoods.com or call 1-888-963-6637. We welcome the opportunity to work with you on a practical solution.
How this Notice fits within the ZNF legal framework
This California Proposition 65 Notice & Disclaimer is part of ZNF's integrated legal framework and should be read together with the complete policies published in the ZNF Legal Hub, each as amended from time to time.
If there is a direct conflict, the Terms of Use control with respect to arbitration, class-action waiver, governing law, venue, limitation of liability, warranty disclaimers, evidentiary standards, survival, and other general risk-allocation matters to the fullest extent permitted by law. This Notice controls with respect to its Proposition 65-specific explanatory disclosures, subject to applicable law and any more specific product-, transaction-, warning-, or written-allocation requirement.
Nothing in this Notice waives, limits, or overrides a non-waivable right, duty, remedy, regulator process, or enforcement mechanism. Nothing here creates a private right of action, warranty, guarantee, or third-party-beneficiary right where applicable law does not otherwise provide one.
Updates, evolving requirements, and future changes
Proposition 65 is dynamic. California can add or remove chemicals, revise safe-harbor levels, amend warning methods and content, change supply-chain rules, or issue new guidance and interpretations. Product formulations, suppliers, sources, labels, packaging, marketplaces, intended uses, scientific information, and exposure assumptions can also change.
As of this Notice's August 24, 2026 update, OEHHA is conducting an Omnibus 2026 pre-rulemaking process concerning potential amendments to the Proposition 65 regulations. Pre-rulemaking drafts and workshop proposals are not the same as final, effective regulations. ZNF will evaluate final adopted requirements if and when they become legally effective and may update this Notice, product warnings, commercial documents, and compliance processes accordingly.
ZNF may revise, supplement, replace, relocate, or withdraw this Notice or related warning language at any time to reflect changes in law, regulation, official guidance, chemical listings, enforcement, product facts, testing, suppliers, sales channels, platform rules, accessibility requirements, or business operations. Where applicable law requires additional notice, consent, a transition period, or a different effective date, ZNF will follow the requirement that validly applies.
Important limitations, no professional advice, and reservation of rights
This page is provided for general informational, educational, transparency, and compliance-support purposes. It is not individualized legal, medical, nutritional, toxicological, exposure-assessment, laboratory, customs, import/export, or regulatory advice. No statement on this page should be interpreted as a product-specific exposure assessment, safe-harbor determination, legal opinion, guarantee, warranty, certification, or representation that a product is “Prop 65 compliant,” “Prop 65 free,” or free of listed chemicals at any level.
If you have personal health, pregnancy, dietary, allergy, medication, sensitivity, or exposure concerns, consult an appropriately qualified healthcare professional. Businesses making California compliance decisions should consult qualified legal counsel and, where appropriate, qualified toxicology, exposure, laboratory, or regulatory professionals familiar with the specific product and use.
ZNF does not waive any exemption, safe-harbor argument, allocation right, statutory defense, contractual protection, jurisdictional objection, evidentiary protection, or other right available under applicable law. ZNF's decision to provide a warning does not constitute an admission that a warning was legally required, that an exposure exceeds any particular threshold, or that a product is unsafe or unlawful.
Contact information and official California resources
14.1 Z Natural Foods
Z Natural Foods LLC
5407 N Haverhill Rd, Unit 336
West Palm Beach, FL 33407
Customer Care: Orders@ZNaturalFoods.com
Phone: 1-888-963-6637
Commercial / Bulk Sales: BulkSales@ZNaturalFoods.com
14.2 Official Proposition 65 resources
For current California law, chemical listings, regulations, warning guidance, and official notices, consult the California sources below. External resources are controlled by their respective publishers and may change independently of ZNF.
