Do Citigroup Employees Get Free Lunch at Cafe Metro?
According to this article, Citigroup employees just have to say the word “Citigroup” to the cashier and their lunch is covered at the Cafe Metro on Lexington and 46th. The author questions whether or not a company that is being bailed out by the Government should be buying lunches for its employees. I’m more interested to know if we could get free lunch by pretending we work for Citigroup.
Posted: 9:00 am, January 14th, 2009 under Cafe Metro, Free Stuff.
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25 Comments
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What’s to stop the hundreds of thousands ” :-)” of people that read this blog from mentioning citigroup at checkout?
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Well, somebody’s just going to have to try it out and report back!
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As a 485 Lex employee, all I have to say is: Balderdash!
Today I’m eating at Pinnacle deli for $10.
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That’s still overpriced for Cafe Metro.
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this makes me disgusted on so many levels. Citigroup is completely going belly up.
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If you think Citi buying a few $10 lunches is the most egregious thing that big financial companies have done with your tax money you are either 1)naïve 2)delusional 3)don’t read much d)all of the above.
Citi has paid Bob Rubin almost 90 million for bad/wrong advice! I want that job!
The list goes on, car services for exec’s that live 6 blocks away! And while you got me started…
How about $150 billion spent in Iraq reconstruction half of which is unaccounted for?
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/opinion/11rich.html -
Please tell me this is not true….had I seen that, I would have punched that suit in the back of the neck….without hesitation. F’ing criminals! all of them!!!!
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Btw, Level #1 is “Ew, Metro?”
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I am a temp (they call it “consulting”) at Citi, I work across the street from this place and recently got a pay cut. Someone get back about whether or not this really works, it might make up for the paycut, if just a bit.
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Why would they arrange free lunches at Lex and 46th, when there’s a closer Cafe Metro at Lex and 51st? Not to mention the Cafe Europa that’s practically at their front door?
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Citi is everywhere, hence if this actually exists they probably have similar deals everywhere else
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A lot of the financial shops in manhattan have lunch programs with the local restaurants. But you can’t just walk in and say “I work for $company”.
Most lunch caterers require vouchers. The facilities groups distribute lunch vouchers which are often stripped-down versions of the menu, where the lunch choices amount to no more than $10 (and I’m sure the caterers are careful to make sure you get less than $10 worth for your lunch).
I work for a bank at 9W57th and we have two lunch options: Mangia and Cucina. Cucina is by far the better value (quantity/selection) wise. I could probably eat 2 mangia lunches and feel “satisfied” (though their burgers are decent, but they don’t come with fries, and whoever heard of a burger with fries).
Oh, well back to the whole “free lunch thing”:
- The “free lunch” is just a benefit, a part of compensation, no different than transitcheck, having an expense account, or even a comprehensive health plan that includes life insurance or an eyeglass plan.
- The “free lunch” amounts to $10 worth of food (but what you get for $10 would probably annoy Zach).
- In order to make use of the program, you need a physical voucher. It’s not like a code-word you use to get into some speakeasy dining establishment. You have to put all your information on the voucher (name, floor, phone extension, etc).
- Typically you can only use the voucher by filling it out and leaving it in the kitchen, where facilities collects them and delivers them to the caterers so that they can deliver your lunch.
- Lunch is usually delivered in batches. You don’t know if your lunch will be there by 11:30 or 1pm. Thus you’ll really only get “hot soup” during the summer (it’s 19 degrees out today. I’d be shocked if your soup got to you anything above room temperature).
- Lastly, in this economy, the “free lunch” thing is usually the first expense to cut.I don’t know citi’s program, but this is how it works for most shops that don’t have an in-house cafeteria like the larger shops (MS, Lehman, etc).
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I really hope this is true! Even if they need some verification, I left the sinking ship for greener pastures a few months ago but I still have my old ID…
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Having worked at Citi’s offices in the 485 Lex building for 2 years ( which is right across the street from Cafe Metro) .. . I can safely say that this is complete bullsh*t.
cafe metro sux anyways. hit up pampano or pinnacle … even blarney stone has better food
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There’s probably no free lunches but if you say “I’m with Merrill Lynch” at the Cafe Europa on 5th Ave. btwn 51st & 52nd you will get a discount. Not sure how much. No ID required. Just saw it happen this morning.
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Sorry. I meant the Europa on 5th btwn 43rd + 44th.
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Oh yeah people! There’s DEFINITELY a secret password that gets you free lunch (using taxpayer’s hard-earned dollars of course) at every deli in midtown. I’m willing to share it with you, for $5 each. Just think of the bounty that you’ll score with the secret-magic-rich-people-only password, when all it costs you is $5! I’ll even throw in some shares of the Brooklyn bridge! They come with special lunch rights to the super-secret Brooklyn bridge dining room (you didn’t know there was one right?) where you can eat your free Cafe Metro lunch while bemoaning how the rich financial industry executives are ruining NY and America. FIVE BUCKS people – leave a message here if you’re interested and I’ll send you paypal instructions.
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There used to be the not so super secret subsidized cafeteria in the basement of the Citigroup building. It was run by Aramark and anyone could go down there. I think it closed in 2002 or 2003.
FWIW: A couple of months back, I was in Cafe Europe at breakfast time and the person in front of me said “Sloan Kettering” and got a discount on their food. It might have been because they were a regular, but they didn’t have to show ID or hand in a voucher.
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In my last post, I meant Cafe Europa, not Europe.
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No, I don’t believe it. I am a former citi employee. Probably the guy had called ahead and was just picking up his order. I have gotten corporate or university discounts at certain places such as Zeytuna. Sometimes they make me show ID, sometimes now.
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The discount thing works at my in-building generic deli – you just have to say ‘it’s for upstairs’ and they take off 10% or some such. (Must be 10% b/c my $1.40 bagel becomes $1.26.) I’m sure that’s true in a lot of them but the arrangements and viable code words differ. In any case it’s not really enough of an incentive to try to finagle a discount where you don’t legitimately get one, but it’s worth asking around to find out if it’s a thing in your building – I didn’t learn about until I was in line with a co-worker who knew.
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This is BS. Call-in orders, vouchers, the mighty Seamless Web (lawyers get $25 now for lunch, not $10, sheesh, but only on weekends/holiday)…but not random free offerings.
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We do not have any financial affiliation with Citi Group, We do offer certain customers a discount due to the high employee patronage. There is no free lunch for Citi Group Employees.
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Let’s start with discounts. Most big companies get them. If you don’t…either you are oblivious to your company’s benefits (as 85% of the people I have worked with are), or you just work for too small a damn company and you get nothing. Every single company I have ever worked for has gotten discounts or freebies somewhere (free museum admission with your id badge, discounts to broadway plays, magazine discounts, apple store discounts, the list goes on and on and on). And I have worked for dozens of companies. But then, I always make it my business to find out what I have coming to me. And then use it. Did you know if you worked in the Rockefeller area, there is Rockefeller card you can get from your HR that gives you a nice discount on MOST restaurants and stores in the area? Duh, go to your HR and ask for it. If they don’t have it, ask them to ask for it. It is part of retention of good talent. But then, you aren’t very talented if you didn’t know that your ID badge or the Rock card got you a discount at that place you eat every Monday for the past 10 years.
Without knowing for sure, I am pretty sure Citigroup is not handing out free lunches to everyone in that nearby office at Cafe Metro. I am sure this “journalist” observations and researching abilities may be missing something. If some dude said Citigroup in front of me on line…anyone who knows me knows I would have no qualms with going to the cashier and asking what that was all about, being curious and all.
Now on to free lunches. My boss buys my department lunch when we kick ass or go through hell and back. We would go to the company commissary and give the super secret password and bingo! Free lunch. This code was determined beforehand with the manager and staff of the commissary. And the manager paid for the lunches out of the departmental budget. Obviously our manager is little better at budgeting than the dude in the suit’s manager’s manager, though…because you don’t see my manager asking for millions in bailout money from taxpayers. LOL.
Free lunch is good for morale. My theory in business has always been “a well fed crew is a productive crew”.
So what this astute person writing the article missed was vital facts. Did the suit’s manager just call down and tell them he would pay for whatever the suit ordered? Did the suit pay on his credit card already and just needed to specify the order he already made on the phone? When I get lunch, I almost always call ahead and pay and then just pick it up, stating my name or my company. DUH. Saves time.
Does this extend to vendors to Citigroup?