Startup Spotlight: New Rockland County retailer celebrates entrepreneurs and consumers with disabilities
Independence Café ”” A Unique Boutique, Rockland County”™s newest retailer, opened on July 1 within the Bridges Welcome Center at the Palisades Center in West Nyack.
The nonprofit Bridges is one of 41 Independent Living Centers (ILC) operating in New York under the auspices of the state”™s Education Department. According to CEO and Executive Director Carlos Martinez, the ILCs aim to empower individuals with disabilities to make independent decisions while working to ensure they can achieve equal access to any opportunity they wish to pursue.
“We”™ve always had a hunger for entrepreneurial activities,” Martinez said. “We started a café in 2015 that”™s located at the county courthouse in Rockland that”™s a grab-and-go café to serve the patrons of the courthouse with breakfast and lunch items, coffee, doughnuts and pastries.”
Martinez initially planned to open another caf̩ at the Palisades CenterӪs food court, but did not want to go into direct competition with long-established eateries. Instead, a new pursuit arose when he least expected it.
“Someone came to me with the idea of putting their product in the front of our office,” he continued. “That happened to be a person with a disability who designed a shirt and a hat. And I said, ”˜I don”™t know if we could do that right now. But let me give it some thought.”™”
After conferring with the Bridges team, Martinez realized a new business opportunity could be pursued.
“We came up with the idea to open up this unique boutique that we would call the Independence Café, which would showcase and sell products designed by people with disabilities for people with disabilities.”
Independence Café was initially conceived with products from six vendors, but word of the project quickly spread and it is now offering items from 20 vendors. Among the items for sale are soy wax candles from Beaver Creek Candle Co, which are prepared and shipped by people with developmental disabilities; jewelry designed and produced by Aspire Accessories, a program of the Houston nonprofit Social Motion Inc. that employs individuals with autism and other disabilities; and artisan jams from Sweet Heat Jam Co., a culinary arts program offering a three-month internship program for young adults with disabilities to learn culinary and social skills.
Martinez said that he is constantly on the lookout for new vendors.
“Just yesterday, I was looking at the Westchester County Business Journal and I saw an article about a gentleman with a disability who is selling a product,” he said, referring to Newburgh-based Derrek Cooke, owner of the startup DerreksBags. “We connected with him ”” he”™s another person that we”™re in dialogue now to put in our retail space.
“We look for opportunities to highlight people with disabilities who are inventing and creating. We have everything from books to artwork, to clothing, to jewelry, candles and soaps and food items like jelly and granola bars, and we”™re getting chocolates, and all in line with the same mission. They”™re designed by people with disabilities created by people with disabilities.”
Martinez noted that the new store also carries products from able-bodied entrepreneurs designed to support people with disabilities. These items went through a testing phase to ensure people will be able to use the products to their fullest.
In addition to the store, Bridges is looking to open additional grab-and-go cafés in Rockland, with the possibility of including several of the Unique Boutique items for sale in these new outlets, depending on the size and location.