At the age of 24, Carleton student Yuliya Riabko finally got her own bedroom at her parents’ home.
Her family’s business, a Ukrainian food shop in Ottawa called Perogies, was successful enough that her parents bought their first house in 2010, one with a bedroom for each of the Riabkos’ five daughters.
Along with helping her parents run Perogies, which opened on Baxter Road in November 2007, Riabko is in her fourth year as a full-time business student at Carleton, majoring in commerce. She expects to graduate next year.
She’s also been recognized for her work with the store in a local business competition.
In February, Riabko won the 2012 National Capital Leadership Challenge, a business competition that rewards the most promising future leaders among Ottawa post-secondary students. She won $5,000 and a summer internship with CAE Professional Services, a company that builds airplane and helicopter simulators and provides aviation training.
Life in Canada is different for Riabko and her family compared to their situation in Ukraine, where Riabko grew up sharing a two-bedroom apartment with her whole family. They moved to the capital eight years ago, but before coming to Ottawa, they lived in Israel.
The family, including Riabko, her parents, her four sisters and her older brother, were struggling for financial survival in Ukraine, Riabko says.
Her parents couldn’t go to university. Her mother was Jewish, making her ineligible to attend university in the country, Riabko says. Her father chose to take care of his ailing mother rather than continue his education after high school.
“It was difficult for us because it’s not very common in Ukraine for a family to have six kids,” Riabko says. “My parents realized if we wanted to stay in Ukraine, they [would] not be able to feed us or give us education, and that’s when we decided to move to Israel.”
Riabko was 12 years old when her family moved to Israel in 1998. At first, the family’s situation was looking more optimistic, she says, but the situation in her new country quickly became dangerous.
Following Sept. 11, 2001, things became much less peaceful, Riabko says. While going to school in Jerusalem, she was almost killed more than once, she says.
So in September 2003, Riabko’s parents decided to pack up and move the family to Canada. Her brother stayed behind, eventually moving back to Ukraine.
The family became very involved with a Ukrainian Orthodox church when they first moved to Ottawa, Riabko says. They began making perogies, using a secret family recipe, and their food quickly became popular at church events.
“The proceeds, some of it [went] to us but the majority [went] to the church, just like a charity,” she says, “But then, people were asking us to do more orders. And then my parents decided to quit their jobs and open the store.”
Along with her parents, Riabko also had to quit her two part-time jobs to help her family build the business.
Riabko says the family was afraid they would go bankrupt after seeing many businesses close as a result of the 2008 recession, but at the end of the year, they realized they had made a profit.
“It was not a million dollars. It was something for us just to survive and fulfill the basic needs for the family,” Riabko says.
But if the perogy business doesn’t work out, she has a back-up plan.
“I took a cake decorating course,” she says. “In the near future, I’m thinking I might add a dessert part to our store. I’m also a cake decorator, so that’s something.”
