California: Helping the Disabled and the Wine Industry

(Wines&Vines) - An organization founded in 1952 by concerned parents has grown and prospered, offering support, training and employment to developmentally disabled young people and adults as it provides production/packaging services to wineries in the South Bay and Central Coast.

With numerous locations on the Coast and inland from Half Moon Bay, Calif., to Monterey, Calif., Hope Services now brings life skills and career support to some 3,700 individuals with developmental disabilities including autism spectrum disorders, mental retardation, Down syndrome and other related conditions.

Currently working directly with 1.5-million-case J. Lohr, Clos LaChance, Cult of 8 and 100,000-case Concannon wineries, Hope had a booth tucked away in the second-floor exhibit area at the 2014 Unified Wine & Grape Symposium, where employment-development specialist Steve Garcia and colleagues introduced industry visitors to the agency.

Wines & Vines contacted Hope to learn what it delivers to wineries. (Editor's Note: Hope refers to its trainees/employees as “clients;” in this story, wineries that use the services will be referred to as customers or patrons.") According to Dawn Hogh, Hope’s director of development and marketing, the agency has been working with wineries for almost 20 years, providing label removal, labeling, wine-club packaging and shipments, gift packaging and export labeling services.

“Hope has full-time employees at J. Lohr. Other customers are served through production sites in San Jose, Gilroy and Salinas,” she said. A dozen Hope clients are full-time employees at J. Lohr. On average, approximately 30 people are working on various winery-related jobs on any given day. However, she added, some 275 Hope clients area available for these and other production jobs, depending on demand.