Individuals at Yankton's Ability Building Services haven't had much time to chat recently.

They've been too busy assembling the “Chat Pack: Fun Questions to Spark Conversation" for Questmarc Publishing of Yankton.

Since Ability Building Services (ABS) contracted with Questmarc to do the project in the spring of 2007, assembling the ‘Chat Pack’ has become one of its biggest endeavors.

ABS is a not-for-profit community agency that provides a variety of services to people with developmental disabilities. As part of its services, it provides paid job-training opportunities.

At times, clients put together as many as 2,000 ‘Chat Packs’ a week, according to Rich Wright, a training area supervisor at ABS. The product, which comes in a plastic container with 156 cards featuring questions meant to spark conversation, is then shipped to Barnes and Nobles, as well as retailers in Yankton and other places across the country.

To celebrate the successful partnership. Questmarc had a small Christmas party for ABS clients last week. Taking a break from assembling the ‘Chat Pack,’ they enjoyed some ice cream bars.

The publishing company had contracted with ABS in the past for smaller undertakings, such as stuffing envelopes. But the insistence of ABS staff that their clients were capable of taking on more got Questmarc owner Paul Lowrie thinking about what else he could have them do.

“We created the ‘Chat Pack’ in such away that it could be assembled in the ABS setting,” he said. “When I first came to Rich with the idea, I had no idea how many we'd need."

The original goal was to produce 30,000 a year, according to Lowrie. Because of the demand for the product, ABS clients have produced much more than that.

“This fits in perfectly with what we do," Wright said. “We can have a large number of people working on it. There are a number of steps that some people can do and some can't. lt's been a great partnership.”

On some days, 80 people are working on the ‘Chat Pack’ in the ABS training area, Wright said.

Among the assembly steps are placing a cardboard brace in the plastic shell, as well as inserting the cards themselves. Two stickers must also be applied to each container in order to seal the contents.

The toughest part of the process is "making sure there are stickers on the sides of the ‘Chat Pack,’'’ said Jerry Quick last week as he was in the midst of doing that task. Still, he said he enjoyed the work.

"Assembling the ‘Chat Pack’ is something that pretty much everybody can do," Wright said. “That’s the part of it we really like."

Lowrie said he was pleased with the results of the partnership and encouraged other businesses in the area to find ways to work with ABS.

Wright said Shur-Co and Wilson-Trailer Co., as well as Quality Park Products of Beresford, are among the area businesses that keep ABS clients busy.

“The main goal is for people to learn work skills and habits so they can work outside of our building," Wright said. "That happens with a lot of people, and it's great when that happens.”

Return to Chat Pack.