[strivingtobe]

> We want to operate like the world’s largest startup

It's always amusing when a multi-decade-old, multi-hundred-billion-dollar company says stuff like this. You're not a startup. You never will be.

And if you were, you probably would actually offer perks in your offices that might actually encourage people to be there. Instead, the only perk that Amazon has is that you get one free coffee per day, and even that they have tried to remove multiple times.

I've never seen a company where it seemed more like the leadership of the company actively despises the employees that worked for them. Between stuff like this and the incessant pushing of Amazon Q against everyone's will, it's really apparent that Amazon execs think that having to employ humans as SDE is a defect they're trying to get rid of ASAP.

[belval]

I like working there, but Amazon definitely has the worst in-office accomodations. No snacks, no free coffee, for-profit (like 4-5$ for a chocolate bar) vending machines on every second floor, no cafeterias in most building and when they have one it's a hole-in-the-wall that microwaves stuff (except Seattle).

In the original RTO email they even pointed the importance of employee spending money in the surrounding restaurants to support the downtime economy as if I should feel personally invested in spending 30$/meal on an overpriced burger for lunch.

[devinplatt]

When I worked at Amazon, I also was tired of paying for expensive lunches available nearby. But I didn't always have time to make pack lunches.

So I ordered canned soup, on Amazon, to be shipped to the office mailroom. Then picked up the soups and kept them in the drawer by my desk.

[user3939382]

Super tangential please accept my apology. Do you have any insight on why one of the biggest companies in the world can’t create a dark mode on their app after 10 years?

[barbazoo]

> no free coffee

Do they have coin/card operated machines then or just no coffee at all?

[spacemadness]

It is incredibly insulting they want to use guilt of not spending like a good consumer as another tool in their sociopathic toolbox.

[tomjakubowski]

> Instead, the only perk that Amazon has is that you get one free coffee per day, and even that they have tried to remove multiple times.

This is crazy, seriously? Apparently no one has written a good enough two-pager arguing that gratis coffee pays for itself with increased productivity

[strivingtobe]

They have repeatedly tried to remove the free coffee perk (usually by claiming that it was only intended as a temporary thing and will be removed at the end of the year) and the only reason it has been retained this far is because for multiple years running now there was an internal uproar about it.

I suspect at the end of this year they will fully remove it, uproar be damned.

[alistairSH]

Holy crap, not even coffee? That's so laughable.

Not that we get great coffee here. It's one of this pod/packet machines. But, it does various teas and some cold drinks as well (fruit/herb infused stuff). So, it works for my second coffee, or a hot cocoa when it's cold outside.

We also get free lunch on T/Th, but that's a new thing since COVID (to entice people back), so I'm not counting on it being around forever. But for now, it is a nice perk and encourages some of that chit-chat the executive class tells us is so critical to making them more money.