This profile is in active compilation — some details are awaiting a cited source.

Bloom Baking Company is a scratch bakery and lunch counter in the City Market, at 15 E 3rd St, Kansas City, MO 64106, trading since March 2010. It was opened by Janet O’Toole and Stephen Zaragoza, who retired and sold it in early March 2015 to Sarah Darby, a Kansas City native and former registered nurse who still owns and operates it. The business is both retail and wholesale: it sells breads, European-style pastries, custom cakes and a full breakfast/lunch menu over the counter, and it has supplied bread and muffins to neighbouring City Market food businesses since at least 2016. It runs a second staffed location at Lighton Plaza, 7500 College Blvd Suite 135, Overland Park, KS 66210, and has previously operated a downtown Kansas City café and a Kansas City International Airport outlet in the Made of KC Food Hall. Tier 1 — owner-operated, KC-native ownership, family-run, locally sourced.1234567

Description

Bloom occupies a storefront on the south side of the City Market at 15 E 3rd St, a few doors from city-market-coffee. It is a full scratch bakery rather than a pastry case bolted to a café: breads (baguette, brioche, focaccia, honey wheat, jalapeño-cheddar sourdough), European-style pastries and danish, custom cakes and cupcakes, and a breakfast-and-lunch kitchen that runs all day.18

The Overland Park location at Lighton Plaza publishes the fullest first-party item list — breakfast (breakwich, breakfast burrito, scramble bowl, frittata, quiche of the day), smoothies, a coffee programme pouring locally roasted Mother Earth Coffee, and a lunch board built on the bierock, BLT, California melt, caprese, chicken-salad croissant, grilled cheese, reuben, turkey club, turkey pesto panini and tuna-salad croissant, with a weekly rotating soup.9

Wholesale is a real and long-standing part of the business, not an aside. In 2016 the owner described baking muffins for City Market Coffee next door, bread for The Bite’s sandwiches, and bread ordered by chef Michael Foust of The Farmhouse.4 The bakery’s own site carries a Wholesale Orders page and a Micro Market Orders page, both password-protected as of 2026-08-13 — consistent with an active trade channel served through accounts rather than walk-in.2 Retail walk-in is separately and independently confirmed by the City Market merchant directory and by the bakery’s own online-ordering site.108

A note on the lead that surfaced this page: Bloom is not in the Historic Northeast. Its premises are in the River Market / City Market district of KCMO, roughly two miles west of the Northeast’s western edge. No Northeast address, production kitchen or outlet was found on any source in this pass.

Third-party pages that mirror Bloom’s copy under other domains (for example a “bakery-near-me” directory page presenting Bloom as its own listing) are not first-party and are excluded here.

Ownership and history

Founded March 2010 by Janet O’Toole and Stephen Zaragoza in the heart of the City Market. Feast Magazine reported that the pair scaled from one employee to fifteen very quickly to keep up with demand for their made-from-scratch breads, cakes and pastries, and that they worked the business hands-on — O’Toole inside on the register, Zaragoza outside at a folding table handing out bread samples.3

The couple decided to retire and ran a year-long search for a successor rather than simply listing the business. Sarah Darby took the reins in early March 2015.3 Darby is a Kansas City native who lives in Greenwood, Missouri; she grew up helping with her mother’s catering business, and her husband Marshall was described in 2015 as a trained chef (a later profile describes him as a financial-services business owner — see Conflicts below).36 Darby has said she kept the existing staff and recipes, kept Bloom’s flour relationship with Stafford County Flour Mills in Hudson, Kansas, and left the big “B” hanging on the bakery wall.3

Darby’s own account adds a career sequence: roughly 15 years as a registered nurse and healthcare administrator in Kansas City before moving into the service industry and acquiring Bloom in 2015, with two daughters, Violet and Graceanne, who have grown up working in the business. She describes minimal automation and sourcing that supports approximately 25 local businesses.6

Documented expansion, in order:

  • 2016 — hires Abby Samulcek as head pastry chef, adds French macarons and yule logs, launches lunch service and plans dine-in seating; corporate catering described as having flourished over the preceding year.4
  • Downtown Kansas City, 920 Main St Suite 209 — the Kansas City Star reported this location as opened in 2020; Darby’s own profile dates a downtown mixed-use location to 2019.56 Conflict unresolved — see below.
  • Kansas City International Airport, February 2023 — Bloom is one of five locally owned operators in the Made of KC Food Hall, Concourse A near Gate A10, at the new single terminal.76
  • Lighton Plaza, Overland Park, 7500 College Blvd — moved in before Christmas 2023, grand opening 1 February 2024 per the Star; Darby’s profile dates the opening to December 2023.56

Conflicts recorded, not resolved:

  1. Downtown location opening year — 2019 (owner profile) vs 2020 (Kansas City Star).65
  2. Marshall Darby’s occupation — “trained chef” (Feast, 2015) vs “financial services business owner” (CanvasRebel profile). Both may be true across time; neither is reconciled here.36
  3. Location count — press and owner accounts describe four locations as of early 2024, but the bakery’s own website as of 2026-08-13 lists only two (City Market and Lighton Plaza), with no downtown or airport page in its sitemap.562 The status of the 920 Main St and KCI outlets is ****; absence from a website navigation is not evidence of closure and no closure notice was found.

menu_status: partial — the business publishes itemized menus without prices on its own site, and its own Menufy ordering storefront renders prices client-side only. No first-party price list could be captured in this pass.

Sourced items (first-party):

  • Breakfast, served all day — Breakwich (egg, cheddar, bacon on croissant or house-made bread); Breakfast Burrito; Scramble Bowl (GF); Frittata, a weekly crustless quiche (GF); Quiche of the Day. Proteins: bacon, sausage, ham, turkey bacon.9
  • Lunch — Bierock (beef, cabbage, onion baked in a yeast roll); BLT; California Melt; Caprese; Chicken Salad Croissant; Grilled Cheese; Reuben (pastrami, sauerkraut, Swiss, russian on marble rye); Turkey Club; Turkey Pesto Panini; Tuna Salad Croissant; weekly rotating soup.9
  • Bakery case — baguette, brioche, focaccia, honey wheat and jalapeño-cheddar sourdough baked daily; almond croissants, scones, rotating danish, macarons.18
  • Drinks — Mother Earth Coffee (drip, cafe au lait, iced, americano, cappuccino, latte, mocha), Teatulia teas, chai and matcha lattes, smoothies, Lucky Elixir kombucha, cold brew.9
  • Cakes and cupcakes — custom cakes and cupcakes, minimum 48 hours’ notice; buttercream is butter-based and the bakery advises an hour at room temperature before serving.11

Prices: “ on every item. Prices exist on Bloom’s own Menufy storefront but are loaded through an authenticated API that returned no menu payload to an unauthenticated request; aggregator prices (DoorDash, UberEats, Grubhub, Yelp) are excluded by policy as marked-up and unreliable. Price tier $ is a category estimate for a counter bakery, not a verified figure.

Sources

Footnotes

  1. “About Bloom Baking Co. | Artisan Bakery | Kansas City, MO” — bloombakingco.com (own domain) (accessed 2026-08-13). Asserts: “Bloom Baking Company has been providing Kansas City with scratch-made breads, danish, cakes and pastries since 2010”; time-honored recipes and locally sourced ingredients; two locations listed — City Market, 15 E 3rd St, Kansas City, MO 64106 (Mon 8:00 a.m.–2:00 p.m., Tue–Sun 8:00 a.m.–4:00 p.m.) and Lighton Plaza, 7500 College Blvd Suite 135, Overland Park, KS 66210 (Mon–Fri 7:00 a.m.–3:00 p.m., closed weekends); breads, pastries, cakes, full lunch menu and catering. ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  2. “River Market | Bloom Baking Co.” — locations page, bloombakingco.com (own domain), plus site navigation and XML sitemap and bloombakingco.com (accessed 2026-08-13). Asserts: City Market 15 E 3rd St, phone (816) 283-8437, Mon 8:00 a.m.–2:00 p.m. and Tue–Sun 8:00 a.m.–4:00 p.m.; Lighton Plaza 7500 College Blvd Suite 135, Overland Park, KS 66210, Mon–Fri 7:00 a.m.–3:00 p.m., Sat–Sun closed; site navigation carries Wholesale Orders, Micro Market Orders, Catering, Cakes & Cupcakes, Weddings, Seasonal Specials, E Gift Cards, Loyalty Club, Careers and “The Cherry Bomb Coffee Bar”; the Wholesale Orders and Cherry Bomb pages are password-protected; the sitemap lists no downtown or airport location page. ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  3. Feast Magazine — “Bloom Baking Co. Passes the Rolling Pin to a New Owner,” published 2015-04-08 (accessed 2026-08-13 via text proxy; direct fetch rate-limited). Asserts: “Janet O’Toole and Stephen Zaragoza opened Bloom Baking Co. in the heart of the City Market in March of 2010,” scaling from one employee to 15; the co-owner couple retired and ran a year-long search for a successor; “Sarah Darby, a wife and mother who lives in Greenwood, Missouri, took the reins from the couple in early March” 2015; Darby is a Kansas City native and longtime City Market patron who grew up helping with her mother’s catering business; her husband Marshall is described as a trained chef; Darby retained the existing staff and recipes, the Stafford County Flour Mills (Hudson, Kansas) supply relationship behind the “best FLOUR in the city” tagline, and the big “B” on the bakery wall. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5 ↩6

  4. Feast Magazine — “In the City Market, Bloom Baking Co. Hires New Head Pastry Chef,” published 2016-12-13 (accessed 2026-08-13 via text proxy). Asserts: Sarah Darby owns Bloom Baking Co. in the City Market and hired Abby Samulcek as head pastry chef in 2016; Samulcek previously worked at 801 Chophouse, 3 Women and an Oven, and Dolce Bakery in Prairie Village; wholesale relationships — “We make the muffins for our neighbors at City Market Coffee, we bake bread for The Bite’s sandwiches and chef Michael Foust from The Farmhouse orders bread from us”; Bloom had started serving lunch, planned dine-in seating after the new year, was accepting holiday orders for pies, cakes, cookies and dinner rolls, and had a growing corporate catering business; macarons and yule log cakes added. ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  5. Jenna Thompson, “A growing Kansas City bakery adds another location. This one is in Johnson County,” The Kansas City Star, published 2024-01-18 (read via Yahoo News syndication) (accessed 2026-08-13). Asserts: owner Sarah Darby; River Market location at 15 E. Third St. operating 14 years as of January 2024; a downtown location at 920 Main St., Suite 209 opened in 2020; a Kansas City International Airport kiosk; the Lighton Plaza location at 7500 College Blvd moved in before Christmas 2023 with a grand opening on February 1, hours 7 a.m.–3 p.m. Monday–Friday; menu references to cupcakes, macarons, breakfast sandwiches, egg scramble bowls, reuben sandwiches and salads; Mother Earth Coffee and Lucky Elixir Kombucha carried; emphasis on milled flour, local dairy and farmers-market produce. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  6. “Meet Sarah Darby,” CanvasRebel Magazine (owner interview) (accessed 2026-08-13). Asserts: Darby acquired Bloom in 2015 after roughly 15 years as a registered nurse and healthcare administrator in Kansas City; the flagship opened in 2010 as a standalone City Market retail location before her ownership; a second permanent location in a mixed-use downtown Kansas City building in 2019; an American Airlines terminal location at the new KCI airport in February 2023; a fourth location at 7500 College Blvd, Overland Park in December 2023; focus on European pastries, specialty breads and savory options with minimal automation and local sourcing supporting approximately 25 local businesses; husband Marshall is described as a financial-services business owner; daughters Violet and Graceanne have grown up working in the business. Undated interview — dates within it are the subject’s own account. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5 ↩6 ↩7 ↩8 ↩9

  7. “Where to find restaurants, shops at KCI Airport’s new terminal,” FOX4 Kansas City (WDAF-TV), published 2023-02-16 (accessed 2026-08-13 via text proxy; direct fetch returned HTTP 403). Asserts: “From the City Market to KCI Airport, this local bakery is opening a location at the new terminal. Bloom Baking Co. will offer made-from-scratch breads, pastries, cakes and more.”; Bloom Baking Co. is one of five tenants of the Made of KC Food Hall — with Jay “Hootie” McShann’s Blues Bar, Poí, The Hungry Hatch and Bo Lings — located in Concourse A near Gate A10; the food hall is described as restaurants and bars created in Kansas City with Kansas City owners. ↩ ↩2

  8. Bloom Baking Company online ordering — bloombakingcokc.com, the business’s own Menufy-hosted ordering domain (Menufy location ID 25873; page metadata records the point-of-sale integration as Square) (accessed 2026-08-13). Asserts: live online ordering under the business’s own domain; schema.org Restaurant record giving street address 15 E. 3rd Street, Kansas City, Missouri 64106, telephone 8162838437, coordinates 39.1097651 / -94.5826356, cuisines Breakfast/Dessert/Brunch/Bakery/Deli, and opening hours Monday 08:00–14:00 and Tuesday–Sunday 08:00–16:00; own description referencing the chicken steak sandwich, bierock sandwich and French macarons and the River Market location “right off of E 3rd St.” Item prices are rendered client-side from an authenticated API and were not retrievable. ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  9. “Lighton Plaza | Bakery & Lunch Options | Bloom Baking Co.” — bloombakingco.com (own domain) (accessed 2026-08-13). Asserts: full itemized menu without prices — breakfast (Breakwich, Breakfast Burrito, Scramble Bowl GF, Frittata weekly crustless quiche GF, Quiche of the Day; proteins bacon, sausage, ham, turkey bacon; add avocado); smoothies (Peanut Butter Protein, Strawberry Sunrise, Bloomberry, Caramel Apple); “Proudly Pouring Locally Roasted Mother Earth Coffee” with drip, cafe au lait, iced coffee, americano, cappuccino, latte, mocha and syrup flavors; Teatulia teas, hot cocoa, chai latte, matcha latte; Lucky Elixir kombucha, sparkling water, soda, cold brew; lunch (Bierock, BLT, California Melt, Caprese, Chicken Salad Croissant, Grilled Cheese, Reuben, Turkey Club, Turkey Pesto Panini, Tuna Salad Croissant) and a weekly rotating soup. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  10. “Bloom Baking Company” — merchant listing, The City Market of Kansas City (accessed 2026-08-13). Asserts: current merchant listing for Bloom Baking Co at 15 E 3rd St, Kansas City, MO 64106; described as a “scratch bakery located in Kansas City’s Historic City Market” operating since 2010; artisan breads, European-style pastries, house-made quiche, sandwiches (BLT, Cuban, Reuben, turkey club), custom and wedding cakes, and breakfast/lunch catering; City Market main line 816-842-1271; links to bloombakingco.com. Undated listing. ↩

  11. “Cakes & Cupcakes | Bloom Baking Co.” — bloombakingco.com (own domain; storefront powered by Lightspeed/Ecwid) (accessed 2026-08-13). Asserts: custom cakes and cupcakes tailored to the occasion; orders must be placed at least 48 hours in advance; buttercream is real-butter based and should sit at room temperature at least an hour before serving, while cream cheese or Fluff frostings stay refrigerated; a custom cake/cupcake order form is offered. No prices were rendered to an unauthenticated fetch. ↩

See also

Categories

On the record — ks.city/registry/bloom-baking-company · record updated 2026-08-13