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Bitty & Beau's Coffee to open downtown Annapolis shop; Coming in July, business hires workers with disabilities

Maryland Gazette - 4/20/2019

Coffee with a mission is coming to Annapolis.

Bitty & Beau's Coffee, a Wilmington, North Carolina business, is opening up a new location in the previous location of Starbucks on Dock Street.

Bitty & Beau's is a business dedicated to hiring people with intellectual or developmental disabilities. Founders Amy and Ben Wright started the business in January 2016, and named it after her son, Beau, 14, who along with his sister Bitty, 9, has Down syndrome. For Beau's 12th birthday, the Wrights added Bitty's name to the business.

Amy, Bitty and Beau announced the Annapolis store via Facebook last week. The Annapolis store will open in early July.

The Wrights decided to head north, said Amy Wright, and landed on Annapolis because it's a place people like to visit. Part of the mission of Bitty & Beau's is to reduce harmful stereotypes surrounding people who have disabilities - and a coffee shop in a tourist town is an ideal setting.

"I think one of the problems that faces people with disabilities is people who are typically developing make judgments because they haven't spent time with them," she said. "We think to erase all the stigma, you have to spend time together."

Nineteen people ran the first store in Wilmington which has since moved and expanded to serve as the Bitty and Beau headquarters. Wright opened Charleston and Savannah stores in 2018. The business employs more than 60 people across all the stores.

The Annapolis store will hire about 20 people with disabilities, as well as managers. Employees with disabilities work alongside those without, Wright said.

The jobs pay above minimum wage and offer opportunities for raises and promotions, Wright said.

Only about 19 percent of people with disabilities in the United States are employed, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, less than one third the rate of people who do not have disabilities.

"It is a serious problem," said Megan Rusciano, an attorney with Disability Rights Maryland. "People with (intellectual and developmental disabilities) here in Maryland are not employed at the same rate as people without disabilities and that is tied to stereotypes and stigmas about their employability."

Historically, people with disabilities have been hired in segregated conditions, for little pay, Rusciano said.

"Competitive integration is where we're striving to go," Rusciano said, "but visibility is also a key issue and getting people without disabilities to be partners with people who have disabilities is very important."

Federal law emphasizes employees with disabilities should be hired in jobs that are typical of the communities where they live, and where they will interact with people who do not have disabilities, as any employee without a disability would. The Bitty & Beau Coffee shops are competitively integrated, Wright said, and they have not had difficulty complying with any federal or state statutes at their other locations.

The Wrights have been advocates outside their work with the stores. Ben testified before U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging in 2018 against social and cultural barriers to employment for people with intellectual or developmental disabilities.

With their business, the Wrights are trying to make a point: that people with disabilities can run a successful business and save for a future.

twitter.com/DTOhl

Credit: By Danielle Ohl - dohl@capgaznews.com - twitter.com/DTOhl

Caption: Employees gather for a group photo at Bitty & Beau's in Charleston, South Carolina. The coffee shop will open a new store in Annapolis this summer.

Courtesy Photo / HANDOUT

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