THE QUEENS
Bayside granola company helps
people with autism succeed
BY JENNA BAGCAL
jbagcal@qns.com
@jenna_bagcal
A Bayside woman is helping individuals
with autism join the workforce in a delicious
and healthy way.
In 2015, Dr. Lisa Liberatore founded
the Luv Michael Granola company, a
Long Island City-based nonprofi t which
aims to “train, educate and employ people
with autism and special needs.” She was
inspired aft er she noticed that there was
not enough being done to help people
with autism, including her son, fi gure out
the skills they could use in the workforce.
“Th ey were graduating and sort of fi guring
out what their life was gonna look
like aft erward,” said Liberatore. “Th at
concerned me and my husband and
we started to look at what are Michael’s
interests and what are his abilities and
how could that be translated into a
meaningful life for him.”
She also shared that Michael had
always had a love of food but found it
hard to break into the culinary industry
without a high school diploma. So
in partnership with her husband Dr.
Dimitri Kessaris, Libertore started Luv
Michael which utilizes a “culinary entrepreneurial
model” to manufacture and
sell granola.
Liberatore chose granola as a way to
reinforce the company’s mission of people
with autism following a healthy lifestyle.
She said that those with the condition
are oft en obese due to the use of
food as reinforcement and also a lack of
exercise.
A typical day for the 12 Luv Michael
employees — 10 young men and two
young women — begins the night before
work. Th e employees are required to
clean and press their uniforms, pack a
lunch and go to bed early.
Employees or “granologists” are split
into two groups during their 9 a.m. to
2 p.m. workday: one group starts in
the kitchen and the other group sits
through lessons in a classroom. Classes
are taught by Sarah Kull, who personalizes
the food-centric lessons for each
employee based on their abilities.
One of the main goals in the Luv
Michael classroom is to prepare individuals
to earn their food safety and
ServSafe certifi cations so that they might
move on to other ventures outside of the
company. Liberatore said that some of
her former employees have left to further
their education or get full-time jobs
in other kitchens.
In the kitchen, each person follows
the 12-step process to make the granola,
which starts with weighing and measuring
the ingredients and ends with packaging
the product and applying labels.
On average, Liberatore said that they
make about 500 bags of granola per day.
Th e company is currently based in LIC,
but Liberatore said they are planning to
open their own freestanding location in
Tribeca over the next few months. She
shared that the bigger space will allow the
company to hire more people for regular
day shift s, night shift s and weekends.
Luv Michael Granola is currently sold
in 60 stores across New York City and
the Hamptons.
Visit luvmichael.com to fi nd a location
near you or to inquire about a monthly
granola subscription, or to learn more
about the company’s speaking engagements
and employment opportunities.
All proceeds from sales go toward
training, educating and employing individuals
with autism.
Photo courtesy of Luv Michael
Luv Michael teaches people with autism how to make granola from start to fi nish.
MARCH 2019
link
/luvmichael.com
link
