Persona Wood Fired Pizzeria

I wanted this to be 5 stars. I WAS ROOTING FOR YOU! WE WERE ALL ROOTING FOR YOU!
There, now that’s done…
Firstly, the staff was excellent. Patient, friendly and happily overlooked my loud kids. And good LAWD what a pizza crust. Damn son. Chewy! No wait, crispy! So so perfect. And, did you know your pizza is done in like, 2 minutes? Very very cool.
But then… things aren’t cool. Things are lacking. I don’t want to say salt but I feel like the sauce needed a boost. And, while the ingredients are obviously fresh, everything sort of just sits there instead of mingling and creating an experience.
All the correct pieces are here, at Persona, but they aren’t totally in their correct places. I’ll give it another go, maybe try a different combo of things but I’m going to shop my taste buds around a little more first.

The pizza was still good.
I’m detracting stars due to the lack of hygiene and lack of comfort in the restaurant most of the time I come in here.
Went in today and both doors were open. It was about 45 degrees outside and raining so the majority of the customers were freezing while trying to eat. Also, flies were buzzing around constantly due to the doors being open. Not exactly inspiring my confidence in them.
I might come again and get my pizza to go but that’s not ideal.

A new take on fast food! The brick oven-​fired pizzas take no more than a minute or two to cook but taste like gourmet pizzas after they’re fired. It’s like the Chipotle of pizza only much higher quality ingredients and no stomach issues afterward. You pick your ingredients and they add toppings and fire up the pizza in front of you.
I ordered a margherita pizza and added extra cheese (unfortunately, they like other gourmet pizza places like to scrimp on the fresh mozzarella medallions rather than a using healthy amount that covers the entire pizza). So I planned accordingly and just asked for shredded mozzarella as an extra topping. The pie itself was tasty, reasonably priced, and the crust had that fire-​baked taste that elevates it to the next level above standard pizza. I was impressed. I think my pizza would have been around $ 8 if I hadn’t added another topping, but even so, it was much cheaper than other restaurants boasting woodfired pizza (standard around here seems to be $ 11-​$ 14 for this kind of pizza).
It’s definitely a more casual atmosphere but in a good location downtown. This is a good option for people looking for tasty brick oven/​woodfired pizza downtown that doesn’t put such a huge dent in your wallet. I dropped one star because I think it’s silly that they don’t put more mozzarella as standard on their margherita pizzas, but overall, still a great option and I recommend it.

Fresh, Tasty, Affordable Pizza! Friendly and patient staff who love to make the right pizza for you. Since people can get to choose from a decent variety, I’d suggest you to drop in a little earlier than the usual lunch hour on working days, the line builds up real quick!
The seating space is limited, please do reserve in advance if you have a group of 4 or more.

Best wood fire pizza I’ve had in a long time
Waiting in line for Pliny the Younger and got hungry so decided to get the Carne pizza. $ 11 and 90 seconds later I had a meal for two. Cooked to perfection and devoured this pizza once the box opened.
Definitely gets 5 stars as everyone who likes pizza should give this a try.
If I had one critique it would be to sprinkle more cheese on the toppings before going into the oven.

This is a relatively new restaurant located conveniently on 4^th street downtown. It is very casual, as with most California restaurants. I love how you can choose your own fixings for their wood fired pizzas, and it is ready within minutes! They also have a diverse menu which you can order pizzas and salads from. They also have some awesome beer on tap!
When you create your own pizza, you can choose from a variety of sauces: marinara, margherita sauce (a bit sweeter than marinara), an olive oil base, and pesto. They also have several cheeses and many toppings!
The disappointing part about this place is the lack of flavor from the toppings. We decided to create our own pizzas and did one vegetarian with pesto and various veggies, and a meat one with sausage, olives and mushrooms. The meat one was quite tasty, and the sausage was seasoned nicely. However, the vegetarian pizza tasted very bland. We had a lot of toppings on there including caramelized onions, kalamata olives, pesto and peppers so there was no reason it should’ve lacked flavor. Plus, I worked at a pizza joint for 5 years so I know what toppings make for a delicious pizza!
The flavor of the crust was scrumptious, and the dough tasted very fresh. It is a thin pizza, with a soft, doughy crust that is charred on the surface. The pizza is so thin, though, that you toppings tend to fall off before they reach your mouth, which can be frustrating! It just seemed to get soggy very quickly.
The idea of seeing your pizza made and cooked in front of you is wonderful, and it takes barely any time.
The customer service was excellent. This is a self serve type of place where you order and pay at the register, but one of the employees came up to our table to make sure we were doing alright. All of the staff were very friendly, helpful and attentive.
The reason I can only rate three stars for them is because of how many other amazing pizzas are available in Sonoma county. Wood fired pizzas are extremely popular is this area, and there are many restaurants that have more flavorful and unique toppings. Since this place specializes in pizza, they should be excelling at it, and they honestly pale in compassion to many other places in the area.
I would come back because it was very easy to find a seat, good location, the food comes out fast, great beer, and friendly staff.

Review is for the Pizza only, and it is excellent. When I saw the assembly line construction, figured it was going to be a disaster, but totally proven wrong. Sauce and dough is amazing and ingredients are fresh. Will go back for lunch.
An area for improve is the atmosphere. Would give it 1 or 2 stars not factored into the review. Felt like I was taking my girlfriend to a cheap cafeteria, but with very good food.

What a wonderful addition to downtown Santa Rosa. Had a great time with a wonderful group of friends and it was just delicious. Loved that oven — made great crust.

Well it all sounds better than it actually was. I love thin crust pizza, but the crust should be crispy — it was not. Had both a red sauce base and the pesto and they just did not have a lot of flavor. Salad we had was great with a good flavor, but overall pretty disappointing and much better local options.

Simply stated I’d love to give this place a 3.5 but I have to go with a 3 because the overall food was good, but not great. We ordered (3) pizzas, the Carne (pepperoni, sausage, sopreseta and garlic), a custom (marinara, fresh mozzarella, basil and sun dried tomatoes, a straight up pepperoni, and a gluten free pizza margherita style. We also ordered the burrata with tomatoes (and arugula) salad and mixed green with blue cheese.
All of the food was decent. The salad greens seemed fresh but not overly flavorful. The prices on the salads were great, $ 7 and $ 4 respectively. The pizzas were $ 7.95 then $ 1.25 for each additional topping. They have a fancy Coke machine that dispenses all types of soda and water from a single tap. The service was good in this order/​pickup environment.
A few service notes, they did not have gluten free ready and made us wait around 20 minutes to get a pie, but they did not charge us for it (good accommodation). The self serve plates were all wet but the brought over dry plates without question. They should also have a low cost ($ 3) plain fresh flat-​bread option. This would compliment their burrata salad quite well. I would say they service overall was excellent I just wish the food tasted better. I have not been to Pieology but that would be the logical comparison.

Love this place. Great Pizza in super hot oven was ready before we poured three waters and a soda.
Four of us ate at 7pm, busy and still we had great pizza and done in under 20 minutes. Great for lunch or Dinner.
If you like spicy sausage it’s great, otherwise choose another topping. They offered meatball which was less spicy sausage, but didn’t feel the same ordering meatball in red sauce. I went with spicy and loved it.
See you in early 2016 Persona.

This place is awesome! They had a lot of selections you can create for a personal pan pizza or they have great options for specialty pizzas. I got the buffalo bleu and it was amazing!
You order what you want at the counter and they make it right in front of you and then put it in their oven. Doesn’t take long at all; super fast service.
The staff is really nice as well and the location is conveniently on the corner where you can find plenty of parking.

First of all, the people who work there are extremely nice. They were fun and seemed like they loved their job. Definitely aimed to please. Especially Nick. He made our experience even better.
We ordered the Margarita pizza which was alright but what we loved was the Chipotle pizza and the beet salad. YUM! We would recommend that.
We will be back!

Great pizza at a reasonable price for a quick lunch. I am a huge fan of the margarita, and I’m a creature of habit, so that is the one I typically get. Great salads too, the ceaser is delish.
Fun to watch them make the pizza right infront of you, it’s hot, fresh and lovely.
And the coke machine is pretty neat too.

Delicious pizza! Friendly staff! Clean restaurant! Good beer selection!
Seriously, what else do you need? We drove from Sacramento to Santa Rosa back on the 29^th specifically to eat and drink at Russian River Brewing. Well, we got there around 11:30 and there was already an hour + wait and a long line outside. I have to be in the mood to stand in a line that long in the sun for food and beer, and I was not in the mood. I’m sure they’re great, but we’ll try again another time.
As we turned to check out our other options, we saw Persona on the corner and it looked very inviting. Pizza is almost always a good option.
We shared the pesto pizza with mushrooms and sausage and ordered a couple of beers. The pizza was delicious and had that wood fired oven char and flavor. The toppings were fresh and the beers were cold. As good as it gets? Absolutely!
The staff were really friendly and I hope this place takes off for them. It seems like they are off to a good start. Our total for one pizza and 2 beers was $ 22.24 before tip. GREAT place!

Totally awesome pizza place, new to Santa Rosa. Assembly line style. You start with 12″ of dough, 00 milled flour sourced from Italy. Then you can pick a special or choose to build your own from a vast array of toppings. Once they are done making your pizza you move to the pay station. Pizza then goes into a 800 degree stone oven and is cooked in 90 seconds!!! Thats Hot!
$ 12 for my specialty pizza I ate 3 slices and had 3 for lunch the next day, great deal!

Here is what I liked and disliked:
Liked:
Clean restaurant
Reasonable prices
Marinara sauce on the pizza was tasty
Personalized salad was tasty
Clean bathroom without graffiti and the tables were clean and inviting
Disliked:
Charred pizza. I don’t like a charred pizza. Black is black and burned is burned. I am char-​adverse. This is an awkward situation because, at a restaurant, you have to presume that if something is on a plate, it’s intentional. (There are exceptions to this, of course: a cockroach being one of them). However, at a place like this pizza restaurant, you have to assume that however the pizza looks, it’s meant to look that way. The owner/​chef is very aware of how a pizza should look when it comes out of the oven and when they put it on the plate and send it out to the dining room, it is done with conviction; with deep belief in the pizza that they’ve created.
Noisy – by 11:30am it is difficult to have a conversation. All the surfaces are hard — the floors, walls and tables, so there is nothing to absorb sound. Thus, everyone talks louder creating a noisy atmosphere.
As the restaurant is new, I will plan to return in the near future to see what has changed.

Wow. Wow. Wow.
THE HANDS DOWN BEST personalized pizza you can eat.
Feel out the menu first. You might enjoy one of their own signatures.
I never knew mozzarella could have such flavor! Great meat selections and just made well.
Make your own salads too!

I am one happy gal!
Let me share why I gave this place 5 stars.
Star #1 is simply for the environment. I enjoy the vibe of downtown Santa Rosa and a corner spot with open-​window seating is just the place for me. The décor engages my eyes without being over whelming. The food prep line was like a decoration as well because everything looked so good!
Star #2 was earned for the friendly staff. From the gentleman preparing the dough to the young man clearing our plates, to the cashier, to the owner… everyone we encountered was helpful and engaging. We are easy-​to-​please customers but we provided several teaching opportunities from the owner to his staff. (Such as, asking for extra basil and them having to figure out what to charge or asking to sample the different pizza sauces, using a «coupon» from the soft opening, etc.)
Star #3 — the prices are great! The other two pizza places down the street might have their strengths but for someone who loves brick/​wood-​fired, I’m only comparing to those in Santa Rosa. (Rosso, Jackson’s, Cibo Rustica) I am *thrilled* to have a restaurant where I can go spur of the moment, casually dressed, and spend half the amount and still get a GREAT pizza. I was in an iced tea mood but I’m happy there are plenty of wine and beer offerings as well.
Star #4 is for the taste! Though toppings are plentiful, we chose two «basic» pizzas. I went with the Margherita and hubby had pepperoni. The pepperoni were beautifully crisp on the edges and the crushed tomato sauce base was a good compliment! My classic Margherita had just enough fresh mozzarella though I did ask for a bunch more basil because I love it added after the firing.
Finally, the 5^th star was for the PERFECT char on my crust. Edges and bottom had the kiss of an 800* oven. The rustic nature of the pie meant some spots were thicker than others yet the dough was cooked through just right and provided enough bubbles to make me happy. :)
I felt the need to high-​five the owner for making this place happen!
Can’t wait to return. :)

Watch out Rosso Pizzeria, there’s a new worthy competitor in town! Persona pizza makes a «pie» as artisan and scrumptious as Rosso (Santa Rosa’s premier pizza, well loved by local connoisseurs). And the kicker? Persona pies cost 30% less money!
Opening night, July 15, 2015. The owner & CEO is in the house guiding the staff. If they have grand opening jitters, it doesn’t show. The preparation line is spotless and pretty. All the toppings look first rate. The hand thrown dough has the look of perfect plasticity. Pliable looking, you can see that the dough has the right amount of bounce. (Yeah, I’m Italian, a great cook and I notice s**t like that).
Though the owner, Glenn, admitted that the wood fired oven was not quite hot enough at 795 degrees, the pie exited the oven in about 100 seconds with a bubbly crust edge and just the right amount of char on the bottom. When the oven gets more heat up time to reach 975 degrees the pizzas will probably emerge after 80 seconds of cooking and the center of the pie will be less soggy. Just like pizza in Naples, Italy.
Okay other facts: One size only, about 12 inches. Plenty for one person. Or even two people if you get a nice healthy salad. Salads look crunchy fresh. Prices again are so low you wonder, «How do they do it?»
Several wines on the menu. I like the Chianti. Several beers on tap.
All employees are clean cut, clear eyed and bushy tailed, happy to be serving. Enthusiasm is the operating word.
This place is a great addition to the Santa Rosa pizza landscape. Blows Mary’s, La Vera, Pieology outt’a the water. Those other places are in the minor leagues compared to Persona.
I’m gonn’a have my next birthday party here, you should have yours here, too.