It's been established by this point that Groupon's quirky attitude reaches far and wide. That blase Chicago behavior has served the company well in the US.
But what we've gotten a less clearer grasp on is the picture on the ground at Castle Groupon's faraway outposts.
In a profile posted on Saturday, techcocktail.com gives a good idea of what it's like at Groupon Malaysia, formerly known as GroupsMore.
It's actually, in a way, a microcosm for Groupon's arc on the whole. It's an office that exploded extremely rapidly and staffed largely by twentysomethings. To wit: Groupon Malaysia launched as GroupsMore in September 2010, and by January 2011 was acquired by Groupon and its staff ballooned from 8 employees to 120. And today, the average age of a Groupon Malaysia employee is 24. (According to the Sun-Times, as of 2011, the average Groupon Chicago employee is 25.)
Even though a company run by so many youngsters might be cause for hairy eyebrows to arch skyward, it sounds like they've all got a pretty great working attitude. CEO Joel Neoh marvels at this in the techcocktail.com piece:
"You have 18-year-olds running around the office not too sure what they’re doing, but they seem to be really energetic and really passionate whenever they’re given a task. Young people don’t come with preconceptions or baggage – the ‘why not?’ culture here is very strong."
You can read more about the culture here.
Stateside, Groupon's stock is at $24.43 -- which is a large jump from where it's been lately.
David Wolinsky is a freelance writer and a lifelong Chicagoan. In addition to currently serving as an interviewer-writer for Adult Swim, he's also a columnist for EGM. He was the Chicago city editor for The Onion A.V. Club where he provided in-depth daily coverage of this city's bustling arts/entertainment scene for half a decade. When not playing video games for work he's thinking of dashing out to Chicago Diner, Pizano's, or Yummy Yummy. His first career aspirations were to be a game-show host.
