So what are we working on these days at Groupon? Super important things – for example, check out this email I just got from our managing editor (and the guy that coined the name “Groupon”) concerning a conference room our writers are designing in our new office.
Begin forwarded message:
From: Aaron With Date: April 21, 2010 8:08:41 PM CDT To: Andrew Mason Cc: Mark Desky Subject: Fwd: ‘Weird Room’ Shopping List and Assessment
OK…here is our vision for the weird room, including the items we intend to purchase. It’s meant to be like a really strange bedroom, where every item is pretty weird, but you could concoct some strange, frightening story in your head to rationalize why it might be there. I’m pretty excited about this as a theme. There’s a lot of variety, but it’s just restrained enough to not be “random for the sake of random.”
While we didn’t go for anything crazy expensive, it is going to cost us, at least a few grand undoubtedly.
We can run up the budget, but that’s gonna take a while. I just want the go-ahead first from Andrew that you’re behind this thing & we’ll be able to pay for it.
Unfortunately, to make this happen I’d probably need to use a temp who can run around & get & assemble this kind of stuff. They’d report to me & Kibblesmith. It’s the kind of thing that’s just not gonna happen if we don’t get someone on it full time for a little while. Is there someone currently available for this kind of thing we could use? I could see this taking 30 hours, though maybe up to 70ish.
So Andrew—what do you think?
Aaron With Groupon Managing Editor www.groupon.com
e: aaron@groupon.com
Begin forwarded message:
From: Daniel Kibblesmith Date: April 21, 2010 10:05:50 AM CDT To: Aaron With Subject: ‘Weird Room’ Shopping List and Assessment Here’s our list so far, with some a few additions toward building a very vague theme:
12 BOXES – Identical Obscure Cereal (Frute Brute, Urkel’O's, etc).
1 TERRARIUM (or shoebox diarama) Open or chewed through, creature has implicitly escaped, nearby jar of spider-food?
1 TOILET (not hooked up)
SEVERAL BULK-SIZED BAGS OF INDIVIDUALLY WRAPPED COLORFUL HARD CANDY (to fill toilet)
1 AIBO
MAP OF BELGIUM OR OTHER FICTIONAL COUNTRY (with colorful pins)
1 BED (with itching powder, and fire-damaged sheets)
BIKE-POWERED RECORD PLAYER (with ‘Smooth Operator’ Single)
1 JAR OF VASELINE (gently used from someone’s home)
SOLAR SYSTEM MOBILE (some missing or replaced with alternatives)
BERT AND ERNIE DOLLS WITH HEADS REMOVED AND SWAPPED (Handcuffed together)
RUG WITH LUMP UNDER IT (lump held in place with staple gun, inaccessible)
PAIR OF BOXERS PINNED TO WALL BY CEREMONIAL DAGGER
ANNE GEDDES CALENDAR (Andrew Mason’s face taped over babies in advance, cryptic messages maintained on calendar)
BIKE HELMET (with severe visible damage)
ASSORTED WALL CLINGS AND STICKERS (many scratched off hastily)
3 – 12 DIGITAL PICTURE FRAMES (Rotating pictures of Andrew, Andrew holding up messages, and voyeuristic shots of staff working)
MUSEUM OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY-STYLE STATIC ELECTRICITY BALL
ANIMAL POSTERS WITH EYES BURNT OUT BY CIGARETTES
DOOR HAS HOLE PUNCHED IN IT ::or:: AXE STUCK IN IT
6 CLOCKS LABELED AS DIFFERENT CITIES (all operating on CST)
TABLE TOP MODEL OF CITY OF CHICAGO BENEATH A SHEET (doesn’t have to be nice, or to scale, SHOULD look like someone’s plan)
1 GUITAR BROKEN IN ANGER
THIS POSTER ON CEILING (or TBD equivalent)
SOUND SYSTEM: There are a couple ways to go with this, that I’d like your opinion on (we can also mix and match): Big-Brother-style computerized text-to-speech translator reciting Groupon Says columns, or entire works from Google Books Giant reel-to-reel tape recorder for aesthetic purposes 1980s-style answering machine with cryptic messages from Andrew and others, addressing an individual by name. I think it’d be really funny to have messages directly from Andrew, addressing the owner of the room as “a disappointing boy.”
THE NAME:
I’ve been calling it ‘Michael’s Room,’ which I liked because it was really creepily generic, and conveyed some kind of monstrous manchild, but we can go with any name or designation (variant on the “Weird room,” etc.) At my house, the spare room is called ‘The Ghost Room,’ because presumably that’s who lives there.
If we go with ‘Michael’s Room’ or similar I was thinking we could get some childlike askew adhesive letters to spell out ‘MICHAEL’S ROOM’ and then scratch a few of them off, maybe even with tools and a little fake blood so it looks like it was done desperately by hand.
BUDGET:
The more I got into this, the more it became clear I had no idea. Almost everything home-furnishings related could be gotten off Craigslist or from IKEA, but would require additional time commitment and transport. Something like the clocks, the cereal or the candy could all be gotten from Costco or ordered from office or restaurant suppliers, and things like the guitar and the vaseline, someone in our circle definitely owns already. I wanted to run this list by you and see whether we should add or cut anything, before getting into the budgeting, because finding this stuff is going to be a pretty intensive separate job.
SMOOTH OPERATOR:
Cullen had a really inspired idea on the record-bike (and the room in general), which is going to the Steppenwolf props department, or other theater departments, who might have experience putting together live practicals with mechanical components. I imagine we can get the record off eBay or from a local store.
So that’s all the notes consolidated plus more, the next step would be hunting these things down, and figuring out a way to transport and pay for them. Working remotely on write-ups, but let me know if you want me to start sending out e-mails and pricing all of the above.
- Daniel
Congratulations, you made it to the end – now apply for a job!
Kristi
onApril 21, 2010 7:19 pm
I have Vasaline at my desk you guys can have. I bought it for Lina for her birthday from the 1st floor sundries shop, got it upstairs and found it was lightly used.
Jonah Grant
onApril 21, 2010 7:21 pm
I think I need to work at Groupon. NEED. This is beyond hilarious.
Daniel Kibblesmith, Groupon Writer
onApril 21, 2010 8:37 pm
Any potential temps interested in helping us track down the above items, please contact kibblesmith@groupon.com
Must provide own ceremonial dagger.
Steven W
onApril 22, 2010 7:57 am
The baby changing table didn’t make it in?
Lucian S.
onApril 22, 2010 8:06 am
How about something that would make weird/creepy noises at long, random intervals? Things like whispers in a strange language, floors creaking, or knocks on the door.
Brandon N.
onApril 22, 2010 10:37 am
Hey Andrew, dig the blog and the company.
Speaking of applying for jobs, I’ve thrown in two applications — humor writer & fact checker, but I don’t know exactly how the statuses over at jobvite.com work. Both still have the status of “new,” I have no idea if that means they haven’t been reviewed yet or how that works.
Anyway, I’m sure you guys have tons to sort through, I was just curious as to how I’ll know when my apps make it to the top of the pile. Or when they’ve been rejected.
;( — I think the winking frowny face is a really strange emoticon. What’s he thinking behind that semi colon? Something sinister, no doubt.
Linds @ MOV
onApril 22, 2010 8:33 pm
Would a ceremonial ninja star work? If so, consider it donated.
Randy
onMay 12, 2010 11:55 am
Sounds cool now Groupon make http://www.randbreloaded.com famous
Dennis
onMay 14, 2010 4:01 am
Need a job in Virginia Beach – this is a great company.
Jen in Tenn
onJune 28, 2010 5:13 pm
ok, I have some “Monkey Butt Powder” if you need it…
Joao Fernandes
onJuly 7, 2010 3:35 pm
Hello Good Afternoon, My name is John Fernandes and worked until yesterday Groupon in Portugal, I have 41 years and has worked as a director or manager in companies with Kraft Foods, Colgate, Danone, etc.. I accepted this challenge of starting the company’s activity in Portugal believe that the net still has a lot to improve especially in a country like Portugal. We started working on the very day they were interviewed, had a brief training on the company and Enviro-in to the street. Deal or Groupon City was not known in Portugal, appeared on the clients without any type of document and not with the minimum of information about the company or about working, the person who should be head of sales for the past five days Portugal elected a seller as co-ordinator, as he confesses to not be able to work and support the group, this promotion has been poorly accepted by most of the team in Lisbon. But as we believed in the project and because the history of the company is a success story in motivavamo us to each other and would always appear a deal or other, we worked with our media, computers, telephones, net, car, everything was ours, had a team of two Germans and were marked at one time 2 / 3 meetings per day in cafes or on the street, without a minimum of conditions, I as the oldest team tried to help those who were more, us in Portugal we have a saying “no eggs do not make omelettes.” than advised two weeks ago we had to start using a tool for all the work that was the Sales Force, had a Conferen call of 10 minutes of training to learn to work with the tool, but combined with Spain so that we would work when we had tools to do so, why the team had no computer or as was my case the computer had problems, however, Boris told me have to use the tool, okay, during the weekend trying to learn to work with the tool, asked for help some doubts Spain (Miss Martha) who sends me an email for me to read the manual, and I responded and apologized for being to work on Sunday but had no manual, if she could then send me the 3rd following Monday I receive an email with lies, false information from a Sr º Ricardo to fire me, I’m not agree with this decision, I do not know officially who Mr º Ricardo to send me an email with lies and dismiss me from the company, Veza many tried to talk by email, phone, sms Boris never answered me, send me an email yesterday that would call me but did not! What is going on in Portugal is an absolute disgrace, am not entirely agree with this decision. What is going on in Portugal is a real shame for Groupon which will be criticized, I will proceed with a complaint in court against the conduct of Groupon, I am outraged and seriously consider seeking investors and create my own site but better than the Groupon! And I will publicize this very situation through all the knowledge I have in the media is a disgrace and I want people to know all the sadism and the form of HR work in Portugal. Mr. Ricardo is a disgrace to the company’s representative in Portugal, or is Boris? In court know. So I write to you to know the truth of what is going on in your company, do not want anything more than respect for the work that was developed and the conditions they were held to the end of a month, we receive an email from a who do not officially know who is sending them away from the company to which we devote our time and our money, because Groupon not yet paid the costs we had to work for your company! Best regards
João Fernandes +351 918 23 22 71