Today we’d like to introduce you to Joelle Maritza.
Hi Joelle, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
In 2017, when Javier Betancourt could not find any good coffee near his tattoo shop, Ocho Placas Tattoo Company, he opened White Rose Coffee. The first location of White Rose served its purpose for three great years, but after Covid affected both the tattoo shop and coffee shop, Javier used this opportunity to bring his true vision to life. After 20 months of the grueling process that is building a tattoo and coffee shop in the midst of a global pandemic, White Rose Coffee opened its new location with Ocho Placas in December 2021. Now Co-Owned by long-time barista Joelle Maritza, White Rose is Miami’s premiere specialty coffee shop. Serving locally roasted, highly acclaimed Per’La Specialty Coffee, this shop prioritizes serving the highest quality coffee available in a setting that is welcoming unlike any other. Also, home to the Betancourt Gallery, our space is a completely immersive experience through and through. Guests can enjoy an impeccable cup of our specialty coffee while enjoying the art they are surrounded by, both in our gallery setting and our conjoined tattoo shop. We promise to offer an experience not found anywhere else.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
If opening a coffee shop the first time wasn’t hard enough, the second time was 100xs harder. Javier was lucky in the sense that there was an old barn in the location of the first shop, so it was more or less already set up for food service. Our new location was a real labor of love. We basically gutted and rebuilt the bottom level of an entire building, outfitting it to restaurant AND tattoo shop specifications! There would have to be an explanation of the length of an entire book if I started explaining everything that means, but just you can imagine. Plus, it was the middle of Covid! We’ve all also experienced the immense issues with the supply chain, workforce, and inflation happening right now. So basically, every outside force was stacked against us. We also faced the challenge of coming back after we had been closed for so long. Would people care that we reopened? Would we be able to improve drastically enough to make everyone come back? We stayed up so many nights worried about all of these obstacles.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
We wouldn’t exist today as White Rose Coffee without Javier Betancourt and Ocho Placas Tattoo. Javier is a world-renowned tattooer, owner of Ocho Placas Tattoo, which has been the staple of high-end tattooing in Miami for 21 years. Our coffee shop is an entirely unique experience because of the environment we are a part of. Set inside a fine art gallery, conjoined with a modern tattoo shop, a collective like this doesn’t exist anywhere else in the world. On the coffee side, we pride ourselves in serving a technically flawless product. Whether people like our coffee or not is of course subjective, but according to the technicalities set forth by the SCA (Specialty Coffee Association), paired with our Q-Grader’s provisions, we do not serve anything that falls below these benchmarks. This way, we can ensure we are doing all that we can to provide all our guests.
What do you like best about our city? What do you like least?
Miami will always be home no matter how insane it gets in this city at times. Anyone who is from here absolutely hates the traffic, the audacity people have will make your skin crawl, and we can do without the roaches. Aside from that, Miami is the most magical, greatest city in the world. The beach is 20 minutes from anywhere, year-round sunshine and palm trees, we have peacocks and parrots and the cutest lizards you’ve ever seen. The “sazon” of Miami is unmatched and indescribable to a certain point. Nowhere else can you walk into a restaurant and have maybe not the most polite service, but food as good as if it was made by your own grandmother. Everyone here is excited about life, and that excitement can be felt all over our beautiful city. With its quirks and all, Miami is its own beautiful world of sunshine and oranges, and it is our favorite place on the planet.
Contact Info:
- Email: joelle@whiterose.coffee
- Website: whiterose.coffee/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whiterosemia/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/whiterosecoffeemia
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/whiterosemia
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/white-rose-coffee-no-title
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@whiterosecoffee
Image Credits
White Rose Coffee
