Taqueria chain Tacombi is expanding its efforts to help people in the communities surrounding its 16 locations by launching a work training program. The effort, which will be run by the Tacombi Foundation, should launch this fall, says Susana Camarena, the company’s senior director of impact and culture.
“We are building a program that will allow people to get trained in the restaurant industry and back of house and front of house, and also to gain human skills that can help them to continue growing and going up within this industry,” Camarena says. “The idea is that once they go through the program, they can find jobs that are suited for their next step in their career.”
The training will occur in the taquerias themselves before the doors open at 11 a.m., and the trainers will be a mix of outside experts and Tacombi’s own staff.
Camarena explains that the program is more than just an employee-training program: “Obviously, we are going to have opportunities here at Tacombi for some of them, but we don't want to narrow down their opportunity to Tacombi. They can go wherever they want. This is not for Tacombi. This is for them.”
The new job training program is not Tacombi’s first effort to help its neighbors. An existing project of the Tacombi Foundation is the Community Kitchen, which uses Tacombi’s kitchens to prepare meals for people in need. To date that program has created over 600,000 meals.
“This [Community Kitchen] enhances the reputation of the brand because it's aligned with our core values and we feel proud about not only existing to serve our guests, but also our team members and our community,” Camarena says. “And this has provided a lot of pride and meaning to our team members because they know that they're part of something bigger.”