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A protest stunt by VPN.com outside of Facebook's Menlo Park, California campus.
- Facebook has an army of valets who park the cars of employees and guests at its California HQ.
- They're witness to a variety of incidents on campus, from employee panic attacks to political protests and disgruntled users.
- Business Insider spoke to some, to hear what it's like working on the front lines at one of the world's biggest companies.
SAN FRANCISCO - At Facebook's sunny headquarters in Menlo Park, California, hidden among the office blocks, shrubbery, and rows of shining vehicles, there exists an army of hundreds of valets hired to park its employees' cars for them.
It's a little-noticed job that offers valets a front-row view of life at the world's largest social networking company - from mundane day-to-day work to political protests and occasional emergencies like employees of the fast-paced company suffering panic attacks.
Business Insider spoke to a couple of Facebook valets, to hear about what it's like getting paid to park cars for techies at one of the hottest companies in Silicon Valley.
I expected nicer cars
The job comes with nice perks, like free food from Facebook's various on-site restaurants, occasional sightings of tech industry celebrities, and relatively good pay. But anyone who imagines they'll be screeching around the company campus in a rotating collection of Lamborghinis and Bugattis will be disappointed.
"They were a lot less nice than I expected them to be," one of the valets said of the cars. "I honestly expected there to be more really, really nice cars." (Apple's campus, by contrast, apparently has nicer cars.) When Business Insider visited the campus recently, the cars were nice but not ostentatious, including a number of BMWs and a predictably high volume of Teslas.
Standout vehicles from Facebook's campus include a new Audi R8 V10 and a Maserati GranTurismo, they said. 'VIP's' vehicles are kept "up close" and taken particularly well care of.
The valet parking service is offered for free to Facebook employees and guests.
Of the 14,000-odd Menlo Park Facebook employees, around 50% use alternative modes of transport - shuttle buses, bikes, car pools, and so on. And many of those who do drive opt to park their vehicles themselves.
Still, with so many employees, often in a hurry, and with open parking spots difficult to find, the valets stay busy. There's a morning rush between around 8:30 a.m. and 10 a.m., and a corresponding evening rush at around 5 p.m. There have been a few occassions where due to insufficient valets working they've found themselves "straight sprinting the entire day," one of the valets said, but "it's for the most part a great experience overall for everyone."
The valets are not technically Facebook employees, they're provided by a third-party firm. California's minimum wage is $11, and valets make significantly more, around $16 or so. But they earn far, far less than what most full-time Facebook employees make: The median salary at the company is more than $240,000 a year.
Whether Facebook employees are good tippers is a mystery. There's no tips - the valets aren't allowed to accept them.
Angry users, curious tourists, pesky reporters
Because it's Facebook, the company's headquarters attracts a variety of guests, some of whom have been invited, others not. Whether it involves protestors, tourists, aggrieved users or opportunists, the valets are often the first point of contact between Facebook and the outside world, making them unofficial customer service reps for the 2-billion member social network.
And with large parts of the sprawling office campus open to the public, it's easy for anyone to wander in.
On one occasion, a valet recounted, a man came to complain because he believed Facebook had an employee who was stalking him and deleting the posts he made, a valet said. (In reality, they apparently violated the company's community standards.)
Job-hunters will turn up without invitations, and ask valets if they work for Facebook and what it's like. Other times, people come to complain about the site itself, or to ask to talk to someone about privacy issues. On one occasion, someone turned up to complain that they didn't like their daughter using Facebook.
Merlyn Deng/Facebook
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, pictured inside Facebook's offices.
The vast parking lots surrounding the Facebook buildings can also attract problems: As Business Insider previously reported, there were eight 911 calls for suspicious people or vehicles from Facebook campus over the last year, and in one incident, a security guard was maced.
In recent weeks, a bright red truck driving around the premises with the hashtag #DeleteFacebook emblazoned on the side has been prowling the premises. The vehicle has been spotted on at least four occasions, a valet said, starting around the time CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified to Congress over the Cambridge Analytica scandal. The rolling protest turned out to be a a publicity stunt by privacy-focused internet firm.
I don't want to jeopardize my job. I just say 'hello, goodbye' that's it.
The valets can also be witness to incidents involving Facebook employees - including panic attacks and nervous breakdowns. On these occassions, valets are told to keep the area outside the relevant entrance clear, so first responders can arrive and tend to the employee. (In one incident a valet saw, paramedics carried the employee out, "kind of like a normal rescue, basically."
One of the valets said these employee breakdowns were a regular occurrence, happening more than once a month (though the other valet said they only witnessed one such event).
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Protesters with the group 'Raging Grannies' hold signs during a demonstration outside of Facebook headquarters on April 5, 2018 in Menlo Park, California.
There weren't major complaints about the Facebook employees themselves, though some are approachable or more talkative than others. "Some people are just very much trying to get to work, but I would say for the most part no-one's unfriendly," one of the valets said. "You just know who's gonna wanna talk and who's not going to want to talk."
The other valet added: "There's definitely a line drawn between, 'you are here to do this and I am here to do this and you need to do this so I can do this.'"
Senior staff are seen around campus "on a daily basis," they said, though interactions with them are minimal. "That's purposefully ... I don't want to jeopardize my job, I just say 'hello, goodbye,' that's it."
And when there the Facebook employees have complaints about the valets, they will generally go the valets' managers, or grouse on Facebook's internal message boards, rather than confront the valets directly.
And compared to parking cars at a restaurant or a hotel, there's something exciting about being a part of the world's largest social network - even if only in a limited way.
"It's very easy to forget that you're contributing to something so ginormous because everyone here is kinda like so used to it," one valet said.
"It's easy to forget you're dealing with the lives of billions of people ... it's like when you know what you're doing, but you're only working such a small piece of it that you don't think of the other pieces that are fitting the puzzle."
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