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Updated October 2026

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What this covers The first entry: methacrylic acid And its exemption is a package, not a formula The second entry: acetonitrile glue removers Which makes bottle size a regulatory decision And the remover has a third paragraph to check Then there is the brush References

Two entries in the federal child-resistant packaging list are about nail products, and both turn on the container rather than the chemistry alone.

What this covers

Nail polish, cuticle oil, nail treatment, nail glue and polish remover. Five leaves across three genuinely different archetypes, which is better taxonomy than most groups in this library get.

The first entry: methacrylic acid

Liquid household products containing more than 5 percent methacrylic acid by weight to volume in a single retail package require special packaging. That reaches nail primers and artificial nail liquids, which is why the paragraph exists.

And its exemption is a package, not a formula

Products applied by an absorbent material contained inside a dispenser, such as a pen-like marker, are exempt, provided no free liquid is within the device and the acid will emerge only through the tip under any reasonably foreseeable use. Same chemistry, different package, different answer.

The second entry: acetonitrile glue removers

Household glue removers in a liquid form containing more than 500 mg of acetonitrile in a single container. That is a mass per container rather than a percentage, so a formula that is fine in a small bottle crosses the line in a larger one.

Which makes bottle size a regulatory decision

Not a merchandising one. Doubling the fill to offer better value can move a product from outside the rule to inside it with no change to the formula at all.

And the remover has a third paragraph to check

Prepackaged liquid solvents for paints or similar surface-coating materials are caught at 10 percent or more of the named solvents under a viscosity limit. That paragraph is about what the product is sold for, so positioning matters.

Then there is the brush

The nail polish shelf here has 28 glass containers and 60 closures, and not one of the 60 is a brush cap. The catalog does hold four, and the brush section says which and why they are not on the shelf.

References

16 CFR 1700.14(a)(29), Methacrylic acid. Liquid household products containing more than 5 percent methacrylic acid by weight to volume in a single retail package require special packaging, except products applied by an absorbent material contained inside a dispenser such as a pen-like marker, provided no free liquid is within the device and the acid will emerge only through the tip under any reasonably foreseeable conditions of use. law.cornell.edu

16 CFR 1700.14(a)(18), Glue removers containing acetonitrile: household glue removers in a liquid form containing more than 500 mg of acetonitrile in a single container. law.cornell.edu

16 CFR 1700.14(a)(15) on solvents for paint or other similar surface-coating material at 10 percent or more benzene, toluene, xylene or petroleum distillates under 100 SUS, and 16 CFR 1700.15, the poison prevention packaging standards: the packaging must keep working in actual contact with the substance and across the openings and closings customary for its size, at not less than 85 percent child-resistant effectiveness without a demonstration and 80 percent after one. law.cornell.edu

Written from federal regulation and from measured catalog data, not from a salon. Whether a formula crosses 5 percent methacrylic acid or 500 mg of acetonitrile is a question about your formula and your container size, and the percentages here are the test rather than the answer. Nothing on these pages certifies a package as child-resistant.