Asked about the challenge of operating a store on State Street in the current economy, Amy Cooper, the owner of State Street’s Plum Goods Store, says, “I’ve always had the ability to see the best in any argument — I have known how to maximize the strengths and minimize the weaknesses.” Bucking the recent trend of unsuccessful retail, Amy recently expanded her gift store with more real estate to include clothing — she just opened a little Plum Goods in the Funk Zone’s Waterline Project. Plum Goods carries handcrafted, fair trade, local and recycled products. “Santa Barbara is the perfect place for a store like this,” Amy shares enthusiastically. “Beautiful things made with integrity.”
There’s a lot of positivity and good vibrations while you sit to chat with Amy. “When I decided to open Plum Goods in October 2010, everyone thought I was insane,” she says. She’d never been in retail. She’d never been a buyer. But she wanted to create an environment. “I needed to go big or not try it at all,” she explains.
She came from the Bay Area. She went to college for about two years and decided to take a year off and get a real job as a receptionist for the PR company PBN. Soon after she started, she found herself writing press releases. She finished her degree in communications at Mills College in 1991, but continued working in PR. She got a job at Kamer Singer communications, where one of her big clients was the San Francisco Marriott. She was only 24 years old. Charles Schwab hired her in 1995 to work on a million-dollar campaign to help their employees understand the overall vision of the company. “I was good at selling someone else’s business,” she confides.