We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Yuval Ofir. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Yuval below.

Yuval, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s jump to the end – what do you want to be remembered for?
One of the principles that has driven me the most when making decisions for the direction I take my company, Yo Miami, has been: Who will this impact and how? Whether it’s my clients, the creatives I work with, or the general public that will interact with the project, I try as much as possible to make it a net positive for all involved. In the long term, I hope to contribute to creating a more equitable and sustainable ecosystem for creative professionals here in South Florida, and beyond.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
Yo Miami was born out of founder Yuval Ofir’s passion for art, entertainment, and his hometown. Over the past decade he’s organically grown a reliable network of creatives including artists, comedians, musicians, breweries, chefs and more. Ofir simplifies the process of developing and communicating your vision, pairing you with the right creatives to bring your ideas to life.

The company tackles anything and everything creative, handling projects from concept through design and implementation. We have experience with producing: murals, logos, graphics, signage, events, branding, activations and more. Yo Miami also produces a number of recurring events throughout South Florida, helping to foster the equitable growth of the creative professional community.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
In 2019 I made the very hard decision to begin transitioning away from my secure job running the family business, with a deadline of the end of the year to fully leave my position. So in January 2019, I found myself producing 8-10 monthly events, in addition to our mural productions and various other projects. Then came March and the pandemic-related lockdowns, which saw all our recurring events (and revenue) fall off completely. I had to find ways to adapt, including shifting focus more on our mural projects, artist studio rentals at our coworking space in Little Haiti (Yo Space Gallery & Studios), as well as doing a lot of work refining and updating our online presence and marketing strategies. Thankfully I was able to weather the storm, and have picked back up on the event side of things since venues began opening back up midway through the past year, now with a stronger position internally to manage them from.

What else should we know about how you took your side hustle and scaled it up into what it is today?
Initially I started Yo Miami as an outlet (aka a facebook page when those first came into existence) to share with my friends and personal network events and venues that I was going to myself. With time, I started gaining followers outside my own personal network and at that point I realized there was the potential to establish a formal company and try to make something more substantial out of it.

One of the early projects that I look back at as a milestone was producing the Parking Garage Mural Project for Whole Foods Market when they opened in Downtown Miami. It was a big project for a big client at the time, and I learned a lot of lessons, both about managing many artists at once, and also what to ask for from clients to make sure I can deliver results that are up to my standards.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.yo-miami.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/itsyomiami/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/itsyomiami
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/69402977/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/itsyomiami
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/channel/UCPS2-oBZ_OKvew8_WFB6BbA
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/yo-space-miami
• Other: For Yo Inspiration: https://podcasters.spotify.com/podcast/7zsWBZU1DWBVSpnBHcXGue My Little Town: https://podcasters.spotify.com/podcast/7aawsogDqx97VxJ1ZmANAt