Goldman Sachs' fruit and veg stall coincided with the disappearance of free bananas
The availability, or not, of free fruit, has long been the sort of thing to evoke excitement among people working in investment banks. It's not so much the potential to eat unlimited bananas without paying as the principle behind that potential: your employer values you and your health so much that it will fund your consumption of healthy snacks.
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The disappearance of free fruit from Goldman Sachs' London office has therefore raised eyebrows.
Sources say that until this Monday, Goldman people were among those benefiting from the banana principle. Apples were growing from Goldman's metaphorical tree too.
Not anymore.
«We could help ourselves to the free apples and bananas in the canteen,» says one Goldman Sachs vice president in London. «Now we have to buy them for 50p.»
The free fruit has been displaced by the fruit and veg stall whose arrival we reported on Monday. Based in Goldman's London canteen, it's selling seasonal fruit and surplus vegetables and donating the funds it raises to a charity for tackling food poverty in King's Cross.
The new message is therefore that Goldman cares about employee health, but that it also cares about food waste and food poverty and is trying to combine the two. The take-home vegetable option is new. Some employees just want the free bananas back, though.
Matthew Newton, head of communications for Goldman Sachs in EMEA suggests this is churlish. “This initiative will support some excellent local social enterprises and will be convenient for our staff. To complain is just sour grapes.”
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