A Beloved East Bay Jam Maker Is Closing Shop After 15 Years

It all started with a plate of cream cheese, pepper jelly and crackers. Trying that classic appetizer for the first time during a Thanksgiving feast in 2008, Dafna Kory remembers thinking it was “the most amazing thing ever.” Afterwards, when she wasn’t able to find a local source for jalapeño jam, she simply decided to make her own.

For Kory, that first batch of spicy-sweet pepper jam wound up setting her whole life on a new course: She started making jam obsessively out of whatever fruits she was able to forage in her Berkeley neighborhood. In 2010, she left her career as a video editor and started what would quickly become one of the Bay Area’s most beloved jam companies: INNA Jam.

Now, 15 years later, that jam journey is coming to an end — but not because the company is struggling for business, Kory stresses. She’s simply decided it’s time to move on. INNA will continue making its fruit-forward organic jams and shrubs (drinking vinegars) at its small production facility in Emeryville through the end of September. And then it will close its doors for good.

The Bay Area has never had any shortage of acclaimed jam makers with broad cult followings, like Berkeley legend June Taylor, a longtime hero of Kory’s. When INNA burst onto the scene in the early 2010s, Kory recalls, “I think the thing that set me apart was the simplicity of my jams.” Other jam makers who had deep culinary backgrounds often seemed most interested in coaxing out surprising flavors by combining multiple fruits or layering them with other ingredients. Kory, on the other hand, “came to it from a love of fruit.”

What that meant, practically, was that she always tried to make each jam the purest possible expression of a specific fruit varietal — i.e., not just strawberry jam but a limited edition jam highlighting the floral juiciness of a Seascape strawberry. She understood, and loved, the bright Hawaiian-punch sweetness of a Flavor King pluot, the honeysuckle perfume of a Blenheim apricot, and the sticky, caramelly richness of a Black Mission fig (a jam Ina Garten herself declared her favorite).

Most of INNA’s jams have only three ingredients: the fruit itself, fruit pectin and organic cane sugar. It’s an approach that has resonated with the farmers market fanatics in the Oakland/Berkeley area, in particular. Even the minimalistic packaging Kory designed was meant to highlight her approach: a transparent jar with almost no label to speak of, so you could see exactly what you’d be getting.

“People would always say it reminds them of the jam that their grandma or aunt or mom used to make, in its freshness and clarity,” Kory says.

Maybe the most unusual thing about INNA’s impending closure is that there is no sad story that precipitated it — no COVID-era sales plummet or evil landlord hiking up the rent. Instead, she just talks about how physically and mentally taxing it has been to run a small food business for 15 years. “As truly wonderful as this work is, it’s time for me to take a break and to do something else to take it down a notch,” she says.

Kory actually announced the news last September, a full year before she planned to shut her doors, so longtime customers could stock up on their favorites if they wanted to.

“I don’t take it lightly that you’ve welcomed the food we make into your homes and lives,” she wrote in a farewell letter to customers. “I would love this final year to be a celebration — an opportunity to enjoy the ephemeral deliciousness of the incredible fruit we are so lucky to preserve, for just a little bit longer.”

What she’s most grateful for, she says, is how she’s been able to spend 15 years making something that’s just “a nice part of people’s day.” For her personally, it’s the only job she’s ever had that’s allowed her to express every part of herself — developing recipes, working on the production line, handling shipping and customer service, doing graphic design, and collaborating with farmers. “It was thrilling and hard and beautiful and everything I ever wanted,” she says.

Still, Kory doesn’t see herself reopening INNA, or starting any other kind of food business, in the future. Most immediately, once she ships out her final jars of jam this fall, she says she’s going to focus on supporting other small business owners. About 12 years ago, she started a community forum called Provender Social Club that provides resources and peer support to small food businesses. It now has more than 1,200 members. For now, Kory wants to expand that platform, particularly in terms of helping fledgling food entrepreneurs with their bookkeeping.

If she does make jam in the future? It’ll just be for fun — and it won’t be for a while. “I think I’ve eaten enough for a lifetime,” Kory says, laughing. “I look forward to eating fresh fruit.”

INNA Jam will be open — and making jam — through the end of September. Customers can order online for nationwide shipping or in-person pickup at the company’s Emeryville production facility (1307 61st St.). INNA’s jams and shrubs will also continue to be sold in grocery stores in the Bay Area and beyond until they sell out completely — almost certainly before the end of the year, Kory says.