Sales tax in California for med spas
California taxes retail sales of tangible goods, not services. The CDTFA’s beauty-shop guide lists facials, laser treatments and hair removal as nontaxable; neuromodulators, fillers and microneedling follow the same logic. There is no stand-alone cosmetic-procedure tax.
Retail is taxable, and California gives no break for over-the-counter drugs — Regulation 1591 exempts medicines only when a physician prescribes or furnishes them — so sunscreen is taxed like a serum. The statewide rate is 7.25% and district taxes stack on top: Irvine and San Diego sit at 7.75%, and on October 1, 2026 Los Angeles County moved from 9.75% to 10.25% countywide, with Pasadena and Long Beach at 11.00%.
You are the consumer of supplies and pay tax at purchase, plus use tax on a laser bought tax-free out of state. Medicines sold to a physician for treating patients are exempt; devices and supplies are not, so we check how each distributor charges California tax on injectables.
Worked example at Los Angeles’s 10.25%: a $600 neuromodulator treatment, a $150 serum and a $45 sunscreen on one ticket. Only the retail is taxed: $195 × 10.25% = $19.99; ticket total $814.99. The seller’s permit is free; most practices file quarterly, returns are due the last day of the following month even with no sales, and prepayments start at $17,000 of monthly taxable sales. Our med spa sales tax guide covers packages.
Who can own a med spa in California (CPOM and supervision, summarized)
A summary of Medical Board of California guidance, not legal advice. Business and Professions Code §2400 bars corporations and lay entities from practicing medicine, and the Board says laypersons may not own any part of a medical practice. Its cosmetic-treatment FAQ says cosmetic medical services must be offered through a physician-owned practice or professional medical corporation with a physician majority shareholder. Under Corporations Code §13401.5, registered nurses (including nurse practitioners), physician assistants and a few other licensees may hold a combined stake of at most 49%.
So most non-physicians own a management services organization: an ordinary LLC that supplies space, equipment, non-clinical staff and marketing to the physician-owned corporation under a management services agreement. The Board lists what the MSO may not touch — medical records, clinical hiring, coding and billing, equipment and drug decisions — and SB 351, effective January 1, 2026, put that list into statute for private-equity-backed deals. Your attorney sets the fee; we book both entities as written.
On delegation, physicians may inject neuromodulators or direct RNs and PAs to inject under their supervision; medical assistants may not inject, and estheticians and LVNs may not fire lasers. RNs work under standardized procedures, and §2242 requires a prior examination — the “good faith exam” — that cannot be handed to the RN. Confirm with a health-care attorney licensed in California.
State business taxes for a California med spa entity
California taxes personal income at 1% to 12.3%, plus 1% over $1 million, so K-1 income lands on a Form 540; then the Franchise Tax Board taxes the entity.
An LLC pays the $800 annual tax by April 15 for a calendar year, profitable or not; the first-year exemption expired after 2023. It also pays a fee on total California income — gross receipts, not profit: $900 at $250,000, $2,500 at $500,000, $6,000 at $1,000,000 and $11,790 at $5,000,000, estimated by June 15 with a 10% penalty for underpaying.
An S corporation, including the professional corporation, pays 1.5% of California net income with an $800 minimum; a new corporation skips the minimum in year one. A C corporation pays 8.84%, so the S election is close to automatic.
In an MSO structure the LLC fee runs on the MSO’s own gross income — management fee plus retail — while the professional corporation pays 1.5% on what is left after that fee. The fee is set at fair market value, but a tier boundary at $1,000,000 swings the LLC fee by $3,500. For owners above the federal SALT cap, the pass-through entity elective tax (9.3%, extended through 2030) lets the entity pay state tax deductibly; the June 15 prepayment is at least $1,000 (see our tax deductions guide).
Payroll in California for injectors and front desk
Register with the EDD within 15 days of paying more than $100 of wages in a quarter. For 2026 the new-employer unemployment rate is 3.4% on a $7,000 wage base ($238 per employee), and the Employment Training Tax adds 0.1% on the same $7,000. State Disability Insurance is withheld from the employee at 1.3% with no wage cap, so an injector earning $120,000 sees $1,560 withheld. California withholds personal income tax, with a state DE 4 beside the W-4.
Workers’ compensation is mandatory from the first employee. Overtime is daily: time and a half after eight hours in a day, double time after twelve, and premium pay on a seventh consecutive day. Commissions count in the regular rate, so an injector’s ten-hour day earns overtime on her blended rate, and Labor Code §2751 requires a written commission plan with a signed copy and receipt.
California is stricter than the IRS common-law test: a worker is presumed an employee unless all three prongs of the ABC test are met, and an RN injector doing your core service fails prong B on its face. Injectors are W-2. How we structure injector pay covers the math.
Registrations, filings and deadlines checklist for a California med spa
Fees checked in October 2026; licensing rows summarize, not advise.
| Item | Where | Fee / due date | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Form the entities (MSO LLC; professional medical corporation) | Secretary of State, bizfile Online | Articles of Organization $70; Articles of Incorporation $100 | SOS fee schedule |
| Statement of Information | bizfile Online | LLC $20 every two years; corporation $25 yearly | SOS FAQ |
| $800 annual tax, LLC fee, 1.5% S-corp tax | FTB Web Pay | LLC tax April 15; estimated fee June 15; Forms 568 and 100S March 15 | FTB |
| Seller’s permit (retail) | CDTFA online services | Free; quarterly returns due the last day of the following month | CDTFA Pub. 73 |
| Employer payroll tax account | EDD e-Services for Business | Within 15 days of $100 of wages; 3.4% UI + 0.1% ETT on $7,000 (2026) | EDD |
| Workers’ compensation | Private carrier or State Fund | Required from the first employee | DIR |
| Fictitious Name Permit (brand-name practice) | Medical Board of California | $50 initial, $40 renewal every two years | MBC |
| Med spa facility license | Medical Board of California | None; supervision and delegation rules apply | MBC FAQ |
Cities add a business license, measured by gross receipts in Los Angeles and San Francisco; the federal side is in our opening checklist.
How we work with California med spas from Tampa
Onboarding is remote: a 20-minute fit call, then read-only access to your bank, processor and POS. We pull exports from Boulevard, Zenoti, Aesthetic Record, Vagaro, Mindbody, Nextech or PatientNow into QuickBooks Online, split revenue by service line and retail, map each retail sale to its district rate, and close the books by the tenth business day. Tampa is three hours ahead, so your morning is our midday; we keep call slots open through 7 p.m. Eastern.
We file the CDTFA returns, Forms 568 and 100S with the $800 payments and estimated fee, EDD wage reports and the federal returns for both entities. You keep the local pieces: the California health-care attorney who drafts the management agreement, Medical Board compliance, workers’ comp and the city business license. Monthly engagements start at $1,500; see pricing, the med spa service page or request a fit call.
A California example
Illustrative only: a single-location Irvine practice — a physician-owned professional corporation (S corporation) plus an NP-owned MSO LLC — with $1,500,000 of combined revenue and five employees.
- Sales tax. The MSO sells $150,000 of retail skincare at Irvine’s 7.75%: $11,625 for the year. Tax on $1,350,000 of treatments: $0.
- Entity taxes. The MSO’s total income is $150,000 of retail plus a $900,000 management fee, $1,050,000, so it owes the $800 annual tax plus the $6,000 LLC fee; at an $800,000 fee, total income of $950,000 would sit in the $2,500 tier. The professional corporation nets $100,000 after the fee and pays 1.5%, $1,500.
- Payroll taxes. The first injector, paid $110,000, costs 3.4% × $7,000 = $238 of unemployment tax plus $42 of federal FUTA; $1,430 of SDI (1.3%, no cap) is withheld from her pay. All five employees: $1,190 of state unemployment tax.