UCO Story:
Jessie: A long time ago I had a foster mom who told me I couldn’t do anything for myself.
Adam: I had a lot of companies say they couldn’t take me because I got a reading disorder too. They wouldn’t take me because of that.
Debbie: Monday through Friday, every day.
Interviewer: You want to come every day to work?
Debbie: Everyday, work at UCO feels like home.
Helen: I was just a stay home wife, my husband worked all the time. So this job came up and I enjoy getting up every day and coming to work.
Tactile Interpreter for Bryan: People say that you know working with my hands wouldn’t be a good idea but working the same kind of job every day I become more skilled with that. And that’s something that deaf/blind people definitely have to experience. UCO empowers me by helping me make a living.
Adam: On the forklift, I get stuff down from the rack and take it to the back so people can work on it. I was nervous and didn’t know what to do at first. Management showed me what to do and how to do it.
Debbie: I’ve been serving for Honda. Put packet in the bags and send them down the belt. I work here for 43 years. People in here are good people I work with. Every day I like to come here, Yep.
Jessie: It makes me feel very happy to tell people about what I do and I get to see my dad and Wayne every day. Wayne is my production trainer. He makes me laugh when I’m down and he makes he makes me smile every day. Meeting new people is one of the things in my life that I would love to do is meet more people.
Dave: UCO Industries, as a not-for-profit organization, has a mission to create paid employment opportunities in an integrated fashion for individuals with developmental disabilities. That’s our mission, that’s our whole purpose for surviving, and it’s to create an opportunity that they might not otherwise have. Limited jobs exist in the community so we’re all about creating additional opportunities, a variety of opportunities for individuals.
Helen: I’ve made a lot of friends here. I like everybody I work with. And it’s some of the handicapped people that’s here, it just amazes me what they can do. You know, the ones that only have use of one arm. Some of them can’t see or don’t hear, but yet they understand what you’re saying. They have just impressed me.
Tactile Interpreter for Bryan: UCO will give you the skills you need, people with disabilities. Some of them are learning sign language and finger spelling, you know signs like the animals and colors and numbers. I really enjoy working here for the last six years. It’s making sure I make a living and I enjoy the people that I’m with every day, and UCO is really important to me and I’m really grateful for letting people with disabilities work here at UCO.
Dave: UCO Industries is proud of our partnership with Honda of North America. We have been a tier one supplier for Honda for a number of years. They don’t take that relationship lightly and they don’t take it easy on us. We have to produce the same, high-quality product as any other supplier for Honda. Our vision at UCO Industries is to be viewed by the business community as an organization really committed to being customer focused and committed quality outcomes at a reasonable price. Because, again it comes back to we’re not in this for charity, you’re paying us for the quality product.
Jessie: Makes me feel like I just wanted to tell them, I just wanna go back and tell them what I can do now and don’t be saying that I can’t do stuff when I can.
UCO Logo and Tribute to Helen Hoffman, 1952-2018.
