Enchanted Farms Mushrooms opens sporefront at WESST Enterprise Center

A local mushroom store has sprouted in Albuquerque.

The 400-square-foot Enchanted Farms Mushrooms retail storefront launched Thursday at the WESST Enterprise Center, located at 609 Broadway NE. The store offers fresh and dried mushrooms, a hot mushroom tea service, culinary mushroom powders and mushroom-based health products.

WESST, New Mexico’s longtime business support center, opened the 35,000-square-foot WESST Enterprise Center, or WEC, in 2009. The center was created to serve as a mixed-use incubator for local businesses needing lab, retail, industrial or office space.

“We’re helping companies execute their business plans with physical space,” said Mark Gilboard, director of the WESST Incubator.

Enchanted Farms Mushrooms has marked a milestone as the first business to open a retail space at the center. For the company, the move into retail felt like a natural next step — one that had been part of its business plan since joining the WESST Incubation Program in March 2024.

“I think mushrooms are so unique and people who seek out mushrooms have a lot of passion for it, so we just wanted to create a better shopping experience with that,” said Amanda Powers, CEO of Enchanted Farms Mushrooms, whose operations at the center span 2,121 square feet.

Powers started Enchanted Farms Mushrooms in late 2023, following stints in finance, politics, business consulting and professional soccer, she said. Powers helped launch New Mexico United as its first chief operating officer. After leaving New Mexico to help run another soccer club, FC Tucson, Powers returned to the Land of Enchantment looking to start something of her own.

“I guess the inspiration for the business was this passion that I’ve always had in my life of entrepreneurialism, people who are doing things that are not the norm... and are good for employees and the planet,” Powers said.

She landed on edible mushrooms — a food source that reduces blood sugar, reduces inflammation, lowers cholesterol levels and improves memory, Powers said.

Powers started the business out of her basement in Downtown and relied on other mushroom growers for growing blocks — soil and wood that the mushrooms grow in — while she tested the business model. Now, the business is growing 100% of its mushrooms using its own growing blocks and is running its cultivation, farm and manufacturing operations out of the WEC — and now, its own retail shop.

“I didn’t think a year ago I would be having a retail operation here, but here we go,” Powers said.

In addition to consumable mushroom products, the specialty shop sells mushroom-themed apparel, accessories and books. Powers said customers can buy a bag of dried mushrooms for $6 and a one-month supply of mushroom coffee for $60.

The business also offers tours of its farm on Mondays and Thursdays, ranging between $10-15 per person. Powers said the business has hosted schools across the state and has a major lineup of tours for home-schooled children this summer.

Gilboard said working with Enchanted Farms Mushrooms and the growth of the business “has been one of the highlights of recent years at the WESST Enterprise Center.”

The shop is open 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. on weekdays and 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on weekends.