8 Companies with Weird Perks

You might think you’re at the top of the pack when it comes to employee incentives, but free meals and gas cards are just the beginning. These companies spend big bucks on all sorts of weird perks, from Botox to tanning to Dance Dance Revolution. Sure, they’re nice, but do they actually help your human resources department retain the best and brightest staff? I’ll let you decide.

You’ve probably heard about Facebook’s free perks: high-end meals, unlimited snacks, public transit passes, gym memberships and ping pong. But did you know that if you’re a parent-to-be, you get four months paid parental leave, reimbursement for daycare and adoption fees and $4,000 “baby cash” for your new arrival? It’s tough to land a job with the social media giant—Facebook’s HR department receives 25,000 applications each year—but it’s totally worth a shot.

Dropbox describes itself as “a pretty sweet place to work.” Want to know why? Whisky Fridays. Employes also get free breakfast, lunch and dinner daily and have access to a fully-equipped music studio and a game room with DDR, ping pong, and more. Oh, and you can set our own Dropbox quota.

Clif Bar, the energy bar company that stuffs a world of nutritional goodness into each tiny bar, also stuffs a lot into their workplace. Employees have free access to a 40-foot bouldering wall and a fitness centre with a yoga room, a dance studio, two massage rooms and 5 certified trainers and nutritionists. The gym offers 33 different fitness classes and every employee gets 2.5 hours of paid gym time each week. That's all fine and dandy, but what is Clif’s recruiting department looking for in an employee? According to their website, potential employees must “like tasty food, nice people and lots of interesting challenges.” Sounds doable.

Pesky household chores getting in the way of your work? At SC Johnson, employees have access to a full concierge service, which takes care of just about any chore, from dropping off packages at the post office to returning overdue library books to picking up your dry cleaning.

In addition to the expected free movies, Netflix offers employees $10,000 in health benefits each year (whatever they don’t use they get to keep) as well as unlimited vacation days.

Not surprisingly, Burton, the snowboard giant, is a fun place to work. Every day is bring-your-dog-to-work day, there’s a skate park behind the office, there’s a demo closet full of the latest gear, and every employee gets a free season pass for the slopes. And if it snows 2 feet or more, the office is closed for employees to go snowboarding

Possibly the best perk ever: 100% tuition reimbursement for undergraduate and graduate degrees. With no limit.

Not only do employees of the natural gas producer have access to a 72,000 square-foot fitness centre, but also to on-site Botox injections and tanning beds. Other perks? Parent/child yoga classes, lesion removal, cancer screenings and complimentary scuba diving certification.