You are now in the main content area

Do Good Donuts

Do Good Donuts Logo

Founder: Melanie Cote

Website: www.dogooddonuts.ca (external link) 

Do Good Donuts is the café that bakes futures.

Do Good Donuts and Café is a non-profit social enterprise that aims to change how people thinks about employing young adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities. This group faces an 85% unemployment rate vs. just 15% of their peers.

Meanwhile, the hospitality and food service industry has the second highest labour market demand in Canada – they have more jobs than they can fill. Not only that, but most of the large quick-serve food companies have programs in place to on-board marginalized youth, including those from this population. But most of the potential candidates aren’t prepared to enter the workforce.

Without jobs, these young people are left without a sense of independence and without a feeling that they belong. A job gives a person a meaningful role in society.

When we learned my daughter has a rare syndrome, the outlook they painted for her future was grim. They told us she would never be able to work. She was 5 months old. With Do Good Donuts, I hope we can change that, not just for her but for all the young people like her, who need a bridge from the end of school to a great start at work.

Do Good Donuts will hire young adults with Intellectual and Developmental disabilities for on-the-job training in a working food business (the job-before-the-job) then link them to jobs in the community through employer partnerships.

In summer 2021, we are launching our pilot and we aim to have our first trainees joining our virtual (for now) training program.