What

An artisanal neighborhood market and specialty food shop located in historic Railroad Square, Miracle Plum offers a welcoming space with highly curated pantry items, fresh staples from the dairy and farm, beautiful kitchen wares, cookbooks and magazines.

Why…
did you want to start your business in Santa Rosa?

We (Sallie and Gwen) are both born and raised in Santa Rosa, so opening a business here was obvious for us. We were craving something like Traverso’s—a small market in a downtown neighborhood, a place you could walk to pick up some ingredients for dinner, a nice bottle of wine, something special or beautiful. We wanted to make a place we wanted to go.

How…
did you navigate the permitting process with the city to get Miracle Plum up and running?

With little resources, navigating the city was really challenging. I (Gwen) may have actually cried in the planning office. There were things we didn’t realize we would have to consider to just open our doors, like zoning. Fortunately, pretty early on we were assigned Suzie Murray, and she was incredible. She was such a champion and support for us. She could see what we were trying to bring to the city so she really held our hand and advocated for us when necessary. I’m sure she would just say she was doing her job but it meant so much to us.