Project, Inc. Turns 60!
Project, Inc.’s 60th Birthday party was held at The Pageant in April. The evening featured entertainment by the Spontaneous Nugent Band, a silent auction, a mystery gift table and a performance by Reggie & The Hip Hop Mamas!
Project, Inc. is featured in the 2017/2018 edition of Sophisticated Giving.
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Who We Are: Project, Inc. is a sheltered workshop with a social mission to provide meaningful long-term employment for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities in an environment fostering positive social interaction and friendships. Lives are transformed with the pride and dignity experienced as the workers accomplish their jobs at Project, Inc. We have 92 certified workers with a waitlist of 35 individuals hoping to be hired. We are like a family to those whom we serve in that the average length of time our current roster of workers has worked here is 21.6 years! Project, Inc. is the region’s oldest sheltered workshop, and for almost 60 years we have impacted the lives of thousands of individuals in the local St. Louis community through serving adults with intellectual disabilities, their families, and the 200 local businesses who have partnered with us.
What We Do: We provide jobs for those unable to work in the competitive job market due to the severity of their intellectual disabilities. We specialize in quality work, fast turn times on critical jobs and fulfillment, and have offered business solutions for over 200 local St. Louis companies for almost 60 years. We perform custom packaging, assembly and inspection services such as pharmaceutical repackaging, food retail packaging and repackaging, assembling and packaging premiums and specialty items, assembling promotional and sales kits, high-speed shrink wrapping, assembling intricate and dimensional items, printing of address labels, assembling of gift packages and bags, boxing, barcode labeling, and bagging/sealing. We also perform quality assurance jobs for assembling parts and components, labeling parts, parts packaging, and pharmaceutical inspection and packaging services.
Why We Are Important: We are important because we transform lives. We serve a population of individuals, those who due to the severity of their intellectual and developmental disabilities, are certified by the Department of Mental Health and Vocational Rehabilitation as being unable to work in competitive or coached employment. These are adults typically left out of society, either in adult day care or at home with a family member. We empower them, through a job in a nurturing environment, to experience self- worth and find a sense of purpose for their lives. Our 92 certified workers, labeled as “mentally retarded” in former years, can have many overlapping conditions not readily accepted in common society such as Autism, Down syndrome, Schizophrenia, and various physical disabilities. The jobs and environment we provide for our workers are the actual accommodations necessary to transform the lives of those we serve, those for whom there is no other accommodation such as a wheelchair, ramp, hearing aid, pair of glasses, or a pill that will “fix” their disabilities.
How We Impact The Community: Project, Inc. is unique in that our earned revenue model supports and sustains our social mission. Together, these dual missions make a material impact on the St. Louis region. We employ and give meaning to the lives of those who have been certified as unable to work in competitive or coached competitive environments. Our certified workers not only find economic worthiness and a sense of belonging to society, but their family members are freed to pursue the workforce themselves, rather than be full time care providers. Further, the state, through tax payer funds, will pay over $80 per individual on a daily basis to the adult day care providers, the place where most of our workers would be if not here, in sharp contrast to the $19 per day per worker supplemented to the sheltered workshops in the state. In conjunction with our social mission, we provide business solutions for the over 200 local companies we have partnered with in our almost 60 years, thereby generating revenue for the local economy.
How You Can Help: Project, Inc. welcomes contributions for unrestricted funds that can be applied to operating expenses or equipment purchases. Donations for the endowment being created are also accepted to ensure that we will be providing employment for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities another 60 years. Please call Alisa Goessling at 314.647.3300 to discuss the various opportunities and ways to help!
Project, Inc.
2828 Brannon Ave.
St. Louis, MO 63139
314.647.3300
Facebook: Project, Inc.
CEO: Matthew Burridge, matt@projectinc.org
Director of Development: Alisa B. Goessling, alisa@projectinc.org
Board of Directors
President: Mike Minkler
2018 President: Erica Orrison