Fresno Area Community Enterprises (FACE) was started in 2012 as a way to better address the needs of under-resourced families living in the Robinson-Hoover neighborhood of Fresno.

We're located near Bullard and Fresno Streets right down the street from Hoover High School.

Our motto "Restoring hope, renewing neighborhoods" inspires us to empower every person and family we meet so they can thrive.

We accomplish this by accomplishing our three core values: care, resource and develop.

Over 20 years ago, our supporting church adopted Whispering Woods - a high crime, low income, highly dense apartment complex down the street in our neighborhood. It's what police called a "red zone" because of the high number of 911 calls they received from residents.

We started an after-school reading program and sports club there to provide healthy activities for kids and students. Through these two youth clubs, we began to encounter several families struggling to make ends meet. Most parents and caretakers were underemployed or unemployed. We discovered this was primarily due to barriers to employment such as being formerly incarcerated, not having their GED, or simply not having a good enough resume to even get noticed.

The solution became evident: start our own social enterprise businesses. Then we could hire these men and women who were desperate to work, but feeling stuck and hopeless ourselves. We could give them a real second chance at a career and a livable income.

In the past 10 years, FACE has started three social enterprises that provide job training and job placement to residents of Robinson-Hoover neighborhood.

Rock Pile Landscaping
Provides exceptional yard care services such as pruning, mowing, edging, weeding, cleanup projects, and water-wise landscaping. We're also engaging in fuel reduction projects for homeowners vulnerable to or impacted by wildfires. These projects help create a defense that will prevent fires from consuming homes located in fire hazard areas.

Moving On Up
Our second social enterprise combines two of our ministry services. First, our furniture distribution, where we receive gently used furnishings that are placed into homes of families in need, or brought to our store: Thrift On Blackstone, to be sold at affordable prices. The other, is a traditional moving service which allows us to generate revenue and provide part-time employment. We own a truck and a small trailer, and will rent whatever is required for larger jobs. Most of our clients are local, but we've helped a few families move to other parts of California.

Thrift On Blackstone
Is our third business we started about 7 years ago in collaboration with West Coast Mennonite Central Committee. WCMCC is an agency that works with refugees and poverty around the world. It is a storefront retail thrift store located on Herndon and Blackstone. We employ 4 women from our neighborhood, each of whom had big barriers to employment. Our motto is: "Redeem goods, lives, and neighborhoods".

All three ventures employ 10 men and women.

FACE has helped over 35 individuals get hired and move on to bigger and better jobs and careers since 2015.

Justin
Used to be homeless and lacked his high school GED. He recently stopped by to show us his new big rig. Eight months ago we sent him to trucking school and now he's a truck driver with his own truck and earning a great income.

April & Kathy
Two single moms who manage Thrift On Blackstone, were both formerly homeless. Kathy hadn’t worked in over 20 years because she was busy raising several grandkids of her own very large family.

Xavier
One of our boys who grew up going to Learning Quest Tutoring Club received his first job from us, and is now a college graduate of Pacific University in Oregon.

See Javier's Journey

During the Covid shutdowns, FACE gave two young college students their first-ever paying jobs.

FACE has also come alongside to help two individuals who had always dreamt of starting their own business get up and running: a basketball business and a landscaping business.

We are overjoyed to see people move people from instability to stability, from living paycheck-to-paycheck to financial freedom in both their work life and family life. When leaders of the household, men or women, become productive and stable - it has a ripple effect on everyone living in that house, especially children.

In order for under-resourced families to find gainful employment, we believe it's critical to provide support in other areas of their lives as well. Emotional, social, and spiritual support in addition to resourcing housing, transportation and financial literacy skills are vital. We tap our extensive network and generous resources to provide people with the support they need to advance in life.