This past Friday I had the opportunity to visit Groupon’s headquarters in Chicago. With video crew in tow and Groupon’s own Julie Ann Mossler (Communications Director) as my very adept guide, I spent a couple of hours touring both of the company’s buildings, the main offices at 600 W. Chicago Ave and their additional space at 303 E. Wacker.
While there I met hundreds of Groupon employees, toured a number of different divisions including sales, customer service, development, editorial and even the guys behind the engaging/funny emails. I didn’t get the chance to meet Andrew Mason, who was getting married the next day, but I did leave him an “amazing” wedding present taped to his computer monitor. Congrats Andrew!
Groupon is in a Quiet Period, so interviews were off limits as Julie graciously reminded me about 100 times, but I can make some observations from walking around:
Groupon seems to be still growing and I saw room after room of empty workstations just waiting to be filled. At one point the company was hiring upwards of 150 people per week.
I love the atmosphere and energy of the Groupon work force. There were a TON of young people everywhere. The teams working on different countries have their own little groups and fly their flags proudly creating a very competitive mood. The walls in the lobby are adorned with old magazine covers of companies that have had their moment on the limelight – Myspace, Yahoo, Friendster, Napster. When I asked Julie about them she told me that they were there as a reminder to “keep us humble”.
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