{"id":44590,"date":"2015-08-24T09:47:28","date_gmt":"2015-08-24T14:47:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/?p=44590"},"modified":"2015-08-27T11:26:12","modified_gmt":"2015-08-27T16:26:12","slug":"yachad-gifts-opens-first-retail-store","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/inspiration\/yachad-gifts-opens-first-retail-store\/","title":{"rendered":"Yachad Gifts Opens First Retail Store"},"content":{"rendered":"

New Store Provides Job Training and Meaningful Employment to Individuals with Disabilities<\/strong><\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"(L-R)<\/a>
(L-R) Brandon Levine and Moishe Hammer prepare Yachad gift baskets for Rosh HaShana as Ava Lang Soffer, creative director and production manager, looks on. (Photo Credit: Bayla Sheva Brenner)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Brandon Levine, a Yachad Gift<\/a>s trainee, stands before a table lined with a dozen wicker baskets. Four floors below him, Coney Island Avenue\u2019s cacophony of honking horns provides an apt accompaniment to busy hands. Brandon sticks a glue dot on the back of a shining gold coffee packet, then attaches the packet to a cookie box, which sits among other treats he already placed in the basket. The glue will keep the carefully arranged bouquet of items intact for their trip to an upcoming Shabbaton, simcha or any other celebratory occasion.<\/p>\n

\u201cI enjoy this work,\u201d says Brandon, 24. \u201cI\u2019m gaining skills. I\u2019m an adult and this gives me practice. Practice makes perfect!\u201d<\/p>\n

For Brandon, who has a developmental disability, jobs are hard to come by. Although he currently volunteers at Parkville Food Center in Brooklyn, he has never had a paid job.<\/p>\n

According to the United States Department of Labor, across all age groups, persons with a disability were much less likely to be employed than those without a disability. Its statistics indicate that 20% of Americans have a disability and nearly 70% of them are unemployed, and a third of those who are only have part-time work.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor all the gains Yachad has made in educating the community to the fact that everyone needs and deserves to feel they belong, when it comes to employment we, as a community and society, have made little progress,\u201d says Dr. Jeffrey Lichtman, international director of Yachad<\/a>, the Orthodox Union\u2019s flagship program of the National Jewish Council for Disabilities. \u201cPeople would sooner write a check rather than give individuals a chance at a job in their stores or corporations. No matter how successful we\u2019ve been, we are not keeping pace with the need.\u201d<\/p>\n

Taking matters into their own hands, Yachad launched Yachad Gifts in 2013. The premise was simple: artisanal gift baskets put together by individuals with disabilities. Most of the workers\u00a0are part of the\u00a0Yachad\u00a0vocational program. Once a week, members from a Brooklyn-based special needs\u00a0agency also come to volunteer.<\/p>\n

To drum up interest in Yachad\u2019s unique service, Stuart Gourdji, manager of YachadGifts.com, took advantage of the OU\u2019s worldwide synagogue partnerships and contacted every shul on the OU synagogue database, advertising the project. As sales continued to increase, Yachad Gifts outgrew its cramped office on Coney Island Avenue in Brooklyn and moved to a more spacious one just a few buildings down, affording them ample room to produce, store and showcase, as well as sell their wares.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong>Creating Jobs \u2013 Building People<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Yachad<\/a>
Yachad Gifts\u2019 sign welcomes Coney Island Avenue\u2019s passersby to visit its store just four flights up. (Photo Credit: Bayla Sheva Brenner)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cYachadGifts.com is the perfect way for us to accomplish multiple goals,\u201d explains Allen Fagin, the OU\u2019s executive vice president and chief professional officer. \u201cFirst, it provides meaningful jobs and vocational training to a number of our Yachad participants. Second, it provides everyone with a wonderful opportunity to support Yachad\u2019s activities and its overarching goal of successful Inclusion. And finally, it is a wonderful way to celebrate a simcha.\u201d<\/p>\n

To date Yachad Gifts has sold approximately 7,000 baskets. <\/strong>As the enterprise grows, so too does its hiring potential, allowing more individuals with disabilities the chance for employment. Opening its doors in August of 2013 with two paid workers and little more than a handful of volunteers, Yachad Gifts currently boasts a staff of nine paid workers, four of whom are Yachad members, and 20 volunteers with disabilities.<\/p>\n

Each workday, Suri Baum, the YachadGifts.com job coach, demonstrates what needs to be done with a particular basket order and helps each worker get started, assisting when necessary. \u201cIt\u2019s a good feeling to teach them something new,\u201d she says. \u201cI can see a change in their skill level. They get to a point where they can independently make the packages.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yachad Gifts offers Yachad members the opportunity to develop skills that can be transitioned into other work environments. They participate in every step of production \u2013 taking phone orders, shopping for the baskets, filling them, taking inventory, restocking shelves and keeping the store clean. Talia Forman, one of the Yachad workers, manages an internal photography booth: she places a gift basket in the proper area and takes photos to be displayed online and in promotional material. Moishe Hammer, a strapping YachadGifts.com employee, regularly delivers gift baskets to the homes of customers who live in the New York City area. Every growing venture needs an enthusiastic salesman and Chaim Goldman, together with a Yachad Gifts staff member, travels to boutiques and kosher supermarkets, encouraging them to display the Yachad-manufactured products.<\/p>\n

Dr. Lichtman explains that having a job is a psychological necessity. \u201cIf a person, no matter his or her disability, is not contributing, it creates a sense of frustration and undermines self-esteem,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Goldman, who also hones his natural marketing savvy selling Yachad Gift Baskets at a stand in front of the Empire Kosher store in Crown Heights, concurs. \u201cIf I didn\u2019t have a job, I\u2019d be stressed out. I enjoy meeting new people, talking with the customers. I\u2019m positive and polite; I say, \u2018excuse me; would you like to take a look at the gift baskets?\u2019 I tell them to come see the retail store. They hired me because I\u2019m the best salesman.\u201d<\/p>\n

When a young adult with disabilities feels that he or she plays a vital part in the working world, it also creates a positive ripple effect on the family.<\/p>\n

\u201cChaim has a job and he earns a salary,\u201c says Goldman\u2019s mother. \u201cIt gives him a sense of normalcy in the otherwise challenged world in which he lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are a stronger, richer community if we allow ourselves to benefit from the many ways in which people with special needs can contribute,\u201d says Dr. Lichtman. \u201cIf we don\u2019t, it\u2019s a waste of a valuable resource. And people with disabilities are a resource. We have to open opportunities for them, even if that means creating opportunities.\u201d<\/p>\n

To place an order<\/em><\/strong>, please visit YachadGifts.com<\/a> or call the toll-free number: 855.505.7500. <\/em>You can also visit Yachad Gifts retail store at 1090\u00a0Coney Island Avenue (4th Floor) Brooklyn, NY, 11230. (between Avenues H and Foster) The store hours are Monday-Thursday\u00a09 a.m. to 5p.m. and Fridays 9a.m. to 1:30 p.m.<\/em><\/p>\n

To find out what it’s like working for Yachad, read this first-hand account<\/a> from Joel Daner Yachad Communal Fellow Stephanie Weprin.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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