The Monkey & the Elephant: Coffeeshop with a mission
The shop is set up to help educate foster children about the ways of business.
Lisa Miccolis was sitting in a coffeeshop in Australia during her many travels. "I had a muffin and an ice tea and I said to myself, 'What am I going to do with my life?'"
She thought about the sense of community she had seen while working as a barista at such Philadelphia shops as Hausbrandt, MilkBoy and Town Hall Coffee. She also thought about a Zimbabwean teen named Ephraim whom she met during a trip to South Africa, following a term teaching with AmeriCorps at YouthBuild charter school in North Philadelphia. Ephraim is an orphan, and had fled his homeland. But in South Africa when he reached 18, the support system had ended.
How about combining the two: putting out-of-the-system foster children to work at a coffeeshop so they could learn about business.
And now, nearly three years after Miccolis founded her first pop-up cafe, she has a permanent home.
The Monkey & the Elephant opened Thursday, Feb. 19 at 2831 W. Girard Ave. in Brewerytown. It's taken the former home of Mugshots and High Point. The shop's name harks back to Ephraim. On some phone calls, she wasn't sure that it was he on the end of the line. She asked him once for the name of his favorite animal. He replied elephant; hers is monkey. This became their passcode.
Miccolis will have five part-time youth employees, whom she will mentor.
Menu is basically limited to coffee for now but is expected to expand.
Miccolis recently was awarded $1,000 from Mutual of Omaha, which is visiting cities around the country to encourage people to pursue their "aha moments."