Amazon Has Literally Gone Bananas The e-tailer is getting fruity with a potassium-packed publicity stunt.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Amazon is handing out bananas for free in Seattle. Yes, you read that right.
Two days ago, the e-tailer set up a banana giveaway stand manned by Amazon employees outside the company's Emerald City headquarters. Exactly why is a riddle we're still trying to unpeel, though it reeks of a pretty peculiar publicity stunt.
Bright orange jacket-wearing "banistas" seated inside Amazon's canopied "Community Banana Stand" dole out the starchy fruit -- and random banana facts -- to anyone who meanders by, even if they don't work for Amazon, according to Geekwire.
Related: Amazon Prime Day Highlighted by Disappointment
Random banana stand on the #Amazon campus today. Wishing @arnettwill were here with a Segway...and maybe a match? pic.twitter.com/CV7tREsoNf
— lindsaygrimm (@legrimm) December 2, 2015A chalkboard near the stand, open daily from 8 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. local time, reads:
A banana a day keeps the doctor away. Take one. Not just for Amazonians, but for anyone in the community. Enjoy!
Well, ok then. So what if there's no such thing as a free lunch at Amazon? At least it treats its Amazonians (and pedestrians in the immediate vicinity of its HQ) to fresh, healthy and cheap fruit on the fly.
Related: Publicity Stunt Du Jour: Spend the Night at IKEA Thanks to Airbnb
Amazon hopes the pop-up is here to stay. "Bananas are a great healthy snack with built-in compostable packaging," an Amazon spokesperson told Geekwire in a statement. "We hope the community likes it, and if they do, we'll keep doing it."
As you might recall, the company's reputation took a trouncing on the heels of a damning New York Times article earlier this year. Published on Aug. 15, the deep dive depicted Amazon as a ruthless workplace, as our own Nina Zipkin put it, "where frequent criticism, tears in cubicles and a constant refrain of "Amazon is where overachievers go to feel bad about themselves,' are part of the employee experience."
If this is just a publicity stunt to show the public Amazon isn't so hard on its workers after all, it seems a bit bananas to us.
