How does Memphis licensing work now that the city and county consolidated?

It works in your favor. The Shelby County Clerk issues a single business license covering both City of Memphis and county obligations, so you file once rather than twice as you would in most metros. The structure is $15 at the base plus 0.5 percent of gross receipts above $3,000. Tennessee also requires a Standard Business License if your gross receipts exceed $10,000, which nearly every real cleaning operation will.

What does it cost to form a cleaning business in Tennessee?

An LLC is $300 with the Secretary of State and $20 a year to maintain, which is an unusual combination of high formation cost and low ongoing cost. A corporation is cheaper to form at $100 with the same $20 annual renewal. For a small cleaning company the corporation math looks appealing on fees alone, but the entity choice should follow your tax and ownership situation rather than a $200 difference at formation.

Is cleaning taxable in Memphis given Tennessee's high sales tax?

The service is exempt, which matters a great deal here because Memphis carries a 9.75 percent combined rate on tangible goods, among the highest of any major American city. Janitorial services fall outside it entirely. Anything you sell to a client rather than consume in your own work does get hit at 9.75 percent, so the incentive to keep supplies out of client billing is stronger in this market than almost anywhere.

What kind of cleaning work does the Memphis logistics economy generate?

Volume, at scale, with unusual hours. The FedEx superhub and the surrounding distribution network make this one of the largest industrial floor-care markets in the South, and the work runs on shift patterns built around freight rather than around office occupancy. Ride-on scrubbers and hard floor programs earn their keep here in a way they do not in an office-heavy market. Staffing to a midnight-to-dawn window that never pauses is the operational challenge, not the licensing.

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Cleaning Business Licensing by State

Cleaning Business License in Memphis, TN (2025)

By Opora Editorial Team6 min readUpdated continuously · In Cleaning Business Licensing by State

Two Governments, One Combined Filing in Memphis

Memphis sits in Shelby County, and the city and county have combined their business license administration into a single application at the Shelby County Clerk's office rather than making you file twice at two separate counters. That's a rare bit of bureaucratic efficiency worth appreciating. You still pay both the city and county portions, they're just collected together in one transaction.

The agencies: the Tennessee Secretary of State for entity formation, and the Shelby County Clerk, Business Tax Division, 150 Washington Ave, Memphis, TN 38103, phone (901) 222-3059, for the combined city/county business license.

Cost Table

Memphis, TN cleaning business licensing costs, itemized (2025).
Item	Fee	Issuing authority
LLC Articles of Organization (min $300, $50/member)	$300 minimum	TN Secretary of State
City of Memphis business license portion	$15	Shelby County Clerk, Business Tax Division
Shelby County business license portion	$15	Shelby County Clerk
Combined city + county total	$30	Shelby County Clerk
Certificate of Use and Occupancy (commercial location only)	$69	City of Memphis
State business tax registration	$15	TN Dept of Revenue
Federal EIN	$0	IRS

The $300 minimum LLC filing fee is the standout number here. Tennessee charges $50 per member with a $300 floor, so a single-member LLC pays the full $300 even though the per-member math would suggest $50. That structure makes Tennessee's LLC formation among the pricier state filings in this guide's coverage, even though the local license that follows it is nearly free by comparison.

Step 1: Choosing Your Structure and Filing with the State

An LLC in Tennessee costs $50 per member with a $300 minimum, meaning a solo operator pays the same $300 as a two-member LLC would if the per-member math worked out lower (it doesn't dip below the floor). File through the Tennessee Secretary of State online portal. If cost is the primary concern at the very start, a sole proprietorship carries no state filing fee at all, though you give up the liability shield.

Step 2: The Business License Threshold You Need to Know

Tennessee's business license requirement is tiered by revenue. Below $3,000 in annual gross receipts, no license is required at all. Between $3,000 and $100,000, you need a minimal activity license, the $15 city plus $15 county combination described above. Above $100,000, you need a standard business license, which comes with additional reporting and a business tax return filed with the Department of Revenue based on gross receipts. Most new cleaning operations start in the minimal activity tier and graduate to standard as they scale.

Step 3: EIN and State Business Tax Registration

Free EIN at irs.gov/EIN. Register for Tennessee's state business tax through the Department of Revenue, $15 registration fee, separate from your local license fee. This is Tennessee's version of a business activity tax, layered on top of (not instead of) the local license.

Worked Example: First-Year Cost for a New Single-Member LLC

New operator paying the $300 LLC floor, projecting roughly $40,000 in first-year gross receipts (landing in the minimal activity license tier), home-based, no commercial storefront:

LLC Articles of Organization: $300
Combined city/county minimal activity license: $30
State business tax registration: $15
EIN: $0
General liability insurance, $1M/$2M: roughly $700–$900/yr

Total: approximately $1,045–$1,245 for the first year. Notice the $300 state formation fee is nearly ten times the entire combined city, county, and state licensing cost, an inversion of what you'd see in a state like Massachusetts where the local filing costs more than the licensing itself.

Occupancy and Special Permits

If you lease a commercial location, a storage warehouse or an office rather than working purely home-based and mobile, Memphis requires a Certificate of Use and Occupancy, $69, before you occupy that space for business purposes. Home-based operators storing supplies in a residential garage typically don't trigger this.

Sales Tax on Cleaning Services

Tennessee generally taxes services only when specifically enumerated in statute, and standard janitorial and residential cleaning labor isn't included, so most cleaning invoices carry no sales tax. If you sell cleaning products or equipment as a separate retail transaction, that portion is taxable, and Memphis' combined state and local rate runs 9.75%, among the higher combined rates covered anywhere in this guide.

Insurance Standards

Tennessee requires workers' compensation coverage once you have five or more employees for most industries, though the construction sector triggers at a lower threshold. General liability at $1,000,000/$2,000,000 remains the baseline commercial clients expect regardless of your workers' comp obligation, and healthcare and logistics-facility cleaning contracts around the FedEx hub and the medical district frequently require $2M/$4M.

Union Presence in Memphis

Tennessee is right-to-work, and union density in commercial cleaning here runs on the lower end nationally, though Memphis has a distinct labor history around service-sector organizing (the 1968 sanitation workers' strike remains a significant local touchstone even though it wasn't in the private cleaning sector specifically). Most independent commercial and residential cleaning bids in Memphis today don't intersect meaningfully with union agreements, but large logistics and distribution-facility cleaning contracts occasionally do.

The city's requirements are published in the Memphis Code of Ordinances, which is where the business tax and permit provisions can be confirmed in their authoritative form rather than through a summary. That distinction is useful when a national customer's compliance team asks for the specific ordinance behind a license. For market planning, the Memphis Urban Area Metropolitan Planning Organization publishes regional data covering the Tennessee, Mississippi, and Arkansas portions of the metro, which is the correct frame for a logistics-heavy market where facilities sit across three states.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much is a Memphis business license for a cleaning company?

$30 total, combining the $15 City of Memphis portion and $15 Shelby County portion, filed together through the Shelby County Clerk's Business Tax Division. This applies to businesses grossing between $3,000 and $100,000 annually.

Do I need a business license if my cleaning business makes less than $3,000 a year?

No. Tennessee exempts businesses grossing under $3,000 annually from the local business license requirement entirely.

How much does it cost to form an LLC in Tennessee?

$50 per member with a $300 minimum, filed with the Tennessee Secretary of State. A single-member LLC pays the full $300 floor.

Is workers' compensation required for cleaning businesses in Tennessee?

Generally at five or more employees for most industries, though construction triggers the requirement sooner.

Do I need a Certificate of Occupancy for a cleaning business in Memphis?

Only if you lease a commercial location. The fee is $69. Home-based, route-driven operations typically don't need one.

This guide is part of Cleaning Business Licensing by State in the Operator Blueprint.

How we built this guide

Opora editorial sources from BLS OEWS wage tables, ISSA-447 production rates, NCCI workers' compensation classifications, EPA List N, OSHA 29 CFR standards, and primary state regulatory filings. We don't recycle blog posts — we audit primary documents.

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