Interview
A catering business offering meaningful employment to young adults of all abilities — Zera Café
MaRS and CIBC Inclusive Design Challenge 2021 Winner
Organization:
Zera Café
Website:
https://zeracafe.ca/
Your name?
Eve Rochman
Your role at the organization?
Founder and Director
More than just a source of income, there is an opportunity for structure, socialization, life skills development, a sense of accomplishment and being part of the community.
Let’s hear your origin story! How did you get into this work?
After many years working in Information Technology, I felt ready for a change and decided to go back to McGill University to pursue a graduate diploma in the management of health and social services. When I was finally done, I wasn’t quite sure what service I wanted to work on.
It was actually my kids’ involvement as a buddies and mentors for children with Neurodevelopmental disorders and neurodiversity (NDD) that inspired me. It was through the program they volunteered for that I learned about the challenge that young adults over the age of 21 face when school has ended and it’s so difficult to find a job.
In doing my research, I read about similar organizations to ours in Toronto, Israel and the US . I discovered that cooking (which happened to be my hobby) could be a very gratifying and meaningful job for many, and when I pitched the idea to people in the NDD community, I was so positively supported and encouraged to follow through and build out the idea.
What does your organization do? What makes this important?
Zera Café offers meaningful employment to young adults of all abilities. Our employees prepare and cook meals that are sold on our e-commerce site and delivered weekly by volunteers.
This employment is important, because especially in young adulthood, a job sets the tone for the rest of the person’s life. More than just a source of income, there is an opportunity for structure, socialization, life skills development, a sense of accomplishment and being part of the community.
How does your organization support inclusive and accessible hiring for people with disabilities?
Zera Café specifically prioritizes hiring people of all abilities. We work with a supported employment job placement agency which helps us take on new employees by doing an initial accompaniment and also helps us with available salary subsidies.
We make sure that we set up each of our employees to succeed by individually and appropriately challenging them to be as independent and accomplished as possible. We support their success and growth by accommodating and adapting our tasks, work hours, instructional material and most importantly, each of our employees is supported by a volunteer job coach.
What keeps you going (other than coffee)? What are you most proud of so far?
What keeps us going is the positive impact this employment has on not only the employee, but on that employee’s family and community. I am so amazed by how capable, loyal, grateful and hardworking each of our employees is. I am proud of their accomplishments but more importantly, our employees are doing meaningful work that is authentically challenging to them. As a result, they feel proud of themselves.
Seeing this enterprise grow bigger and stronger each week is thrilling and I am proud of the fact that despite the challenges of COVID, my lack of experience in the field, that with a little love and compassion (and plenty of volunteers), anything is possible.
You were one of the winners of the MaRS & CIBC Inclusive Design Challenge! How will this win help you build on your mission?
Money is always good… We desperately needed to stay afloat. As well, the networking and advising potential is very exciting.
What’s the best way for people to support you?
Order from us, volunteer with us.
