The Disappearing Google Perks

In early 2022, I officially started working in Mountain View. I found a cheap moving company and hired two Chinese workers. After we loaded all the stuff, my car followed the moving truck all the way from Folsom to a small room in a friend’s house in Fremont. The move only took one morning. I was very satisfied with the efficiency and gave more than $100 cash in tips. Then as I watched they left, I realized the tip could have been reimbursed by Google if I had tipped them using the credit card. Very sad. Another sad thing is that I left all my furniture to my tenant in Folsom. He was very satisfied with my decision and had a big smile on his face when I left.

After starting work, my first impressions of Google were:

1. Many Buildings, Vast Land

In Folsom, Intel had six buildings, and I thought it was a big company. Google’s Mountain View campus is 10 times bigger. Its campus stretches across several highway exits. There are about 40 to 60 office buildings and over 30 cafeteria. A ten-minute drive takes you to the Sunnyvale campus, which has another 30 to 40 buildings. There are probably more janitors and cafeteria workers than Intel’s employees in Folsom. There are also campuses in San Francisco, San Jose, and San Bruno. Is it bad to wish Google has even more campuses so that I can always find an office and grab a drink wherever I travel in the US?

Google Sunnyvale campus

2. Convenient Transportation

Google has shuttle routes throughout the Bay Area, making it convenient for employees to commute to and from work. The buses are equipped with Wi-Fi, so you will never be late to work even if there’s traffic. There are hundreds of Google bus stops with dozens of routes scattered across the greater Bay Area. However, these Google bus routes are not public information. It is not only to protect employee safety but also, as said by some people, to prevent jealousy. If this information were public, it wouldn’t be hard for people to realize that there are two worlds within the same city: the electric buses exclusive for high-paying Silicon Valley employees and the old city buses. With that mental image, it makes paying state taxes even harder.

Google also has shuttle buses that connect the various Google campuses. If you don’t want to wait for the shuttle, you can use Google’s taxi app, which is on-demand and completely free. However, it can only take you to the office for work.

A moment when a Google bus had a breakdown

3. Very Few People

The pandemic had just ended when I started working at YouTube; there were very few people around. For a while, I thought there were only four people in my team, until at the first group meeting I found out there were actually ten of us. A year later, like most tech companies, the company required us to be in the office at least three days a week.

Google cafeteria during the pandemic, with very few people present.

4. Plenty of Perks (That Later Disappeared)

On my first day at work, I rummaged through all the fridges, drawers, and snacks in the break room. Typically, each floor of the office has a break room stocked with juices, coffee, sodas, and energy drinks that you can grab at will. There are also small bites like boiled eggs, fruits, and about a dozen types of snacks. Intel also have break rooms, but I couldn’t remember what they were for. Besides snacks, Google also provided free breakfast, lunch, and dinner, as well as coffee shops and juice bars serving freshly made coffee and juice. The extent of Google’s perks was evident during company meetings; I remember someone asking if bidets could be installed because the toilet seats were cold in winter, and it was unfair since some offices had them.

YouTube afternoon tea YouTube afternoon tea

Besides food and drinks, there were also many activities. In 2022, Google held two employee concerts featuring Lizzo. There are also small pop-up events where you could eat, drink, take photos, and play games. These events aimed to attract people back to the office, but with very limited success. In the end, the company had to mandate a return to the office in 2023.

Sometimes there will be a food truck where employees could grab some free snacks

Some of these perks started to vanish in 2023. In January 2023, Google laid off 6% of its workforce, about 12,000 people. The number of break rooms began to shrink, and some employee restaurants reduced their hours. The juice bars are nowhere to be found. What about the bidets? Well, the bidets were never installed, and it was never brought it up again.