Music and art add ‘cool vibe’ to Jojo’s Café

Since it first opened in August 2010, Jojo’s Café on Main Street in Osoyoos has been a popular meeting spot to enjoy a cup of quality coffee or a light meal. It’s a town institution.

Recently, however, Jojo’s has become much more – an important venue for live music and a showcase for visual art.

On a recent Saturday in August, Jojo’s hosted a sold-out solo concert by Gary Fjellgaard, an award-winning, country music singer-songwriter.

Four days later, Twin Peaks, an award-winning roots music duo, again filled Jojo’s.

Then, the following Saturday, the last of the month, Jojo’s held its monthly night of open mic music and art.

Oliver has Medici’s, Keremeos has the Grist Mill, but in Osoyoos, Jojo’s Café has become the spot to see regular live music year round.

The café has come a long way from owner Joanne Muirhead’s original idea of a place where she could indulge her love of baking.

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“When I first started, I thought this is going to be great,” she said. “I’m going to get up in the morning and I’m going to make a batch of cookies, I’m going to make a batch of muffins. People are going to come in and eat them and have coffee and it’ll be nice and slow. And I’ll get to bake all the time.”

But that’s not what happened.

“Now it’s 16 employees and constant,” she said. “We’re so busy all the time.”

Muirhead has been cooking and baking since she was a child, but her initial career path was very different – she worked 10 years as a wildlife biologist.

While working for a company in Prince George, she wrote business plans for others, and ended up doing one for a coffee shop.

“Never, ever in a million years did I think I was actually going to do it,” she said. “I was terrified. It’s a scary thing to open your own business.”

Then one day in 2009, she received a phone call from her sister that changed her life. Their father had collapsed on a hike with a heart attack and died. They were a close family and she was devastated.

At first all she felt was grief, but it shook her world and in the end made her overcome her fears.

“I learned from that whole experience how much fear was controlling my whole life,” said Muirhead. “I’ve always wanted to do so many things and I’ve always been so afraid to do them. I don’t have that fear anymore, because I realize it’s just a stupid emotion.”

Her father’s death also reminded her that she’s not immortal.

“We need to seize every day that we have,” she said.

While walking downtown, she saw that an ideal spot for a coffee shop was available and she grabbed it.

Muirhead says hospitality has always been at the heart of her business philosophy.

“I want to make sure that everybody who walks through the door walks back out happy,” she said. “It’s really as simple as that. Giving people excellent quality, not cutting any corners, being friendly with them and making people feel important and valued.”

Her coffee is excellent quality, organic, fair trade coffee purchased from roasters in Vernon and Rock Creek – and brewed strong.

“I hate going someplace and you get a stupid weak cup of coffee,” she said. “So we don’t serve weak coffee here. It’s the real McCoy.”

Muirhead is also choosy about the staff she hires.

She recently ran an ad in the Osoyoos Times headed: “Wanted: Very happy people!”

The ad puts attitude well above experience.

“If you have a positive, energetic attitude and if you love to serve people, then we want you,” the ad reads. “The rest … well, we can teach you all that.”

Muirhead says this hiring philosophy has led to regular comments from customers about her excellent staff.

“You can learn everything, but if you’re not inherently a happy, enthusiastic, energetic person, then this probably isn’t the right place for you,” she said.

In the six years that Jojo’s has been open, the biggest change has been the role that music and art now play at the café. These, said Muirhead, are her passion.

When an employee suggested concerts, she initially thought she wouldn’t have the time to organize them, but others have stepped up to the plate and done it for her.

The concerts actually started about three years ago, but they were less frequent and it started slowly.

“We had lots of open mics and we really had fun with it and I loved it,” Muirhead said. “Now it’s turned into a pretty big deal.”

Alan Bleiken, who has been booking bands since high school and is one of the Three Amigos organizing Osoyoos Music in the Park, has taken the lead in booking concerts, but others are also involved.

Jim Peltier organizes the evenings of visual art and open mic music on the last Saturday of each month.

The open mic nights are free, and concerts, said Bleiken, range in price from free to $20.

“The maximum that I will ever do a concert for is $20,” said Bleiken. “The reason for that is I want it to be accessible to as many people as possible.”

There’s been a real variety of music, though outside the tourist season Jojo’s has tended toward softer music that’s more accessible to an older population.

This means more country, folk and roots music.

With more people in town for the summer, Bleiken and others have booked rock, jazz, hip-hop and blues for Jojo’s.

“I think it’s a wonderful part of her venue,” said Bleiken. “Joanne is a big supporter of the arts. She’s an artist herself, and she likes to make her venue available to the community for that reason.”

Muirhead says the concerts and art add to the atmosphere of her café, but that’s it.

“This is not a moneymaker by any stretch of the imagination,” she said. “It’s not done for that purpose at all. The biggest thing is it adds a really cool vibe to my shop, because every time something really neat happens at one of those events, I feel that energy gets absorbed by the walls of the coffee shop.”

The full version of this story appears in the September Okanagan Sun.

RICHARD McGUIRE

Osoyoos Times