In what’s likely to be a first for the world-renown cultural gathering, tech darling and industry titan Firm Globe ($FIRM) will be temporarily moving its Mountain View headquarters to Black Rock City next week, running operations from “the Playa” in Northern Nevada during the week of the Burning Man Festival.
“Before the pandemic, we had problems every year with office attendance during Burning Man,” said Firm Globe CEO and Founder Barry Muhfistiner.
“Productivity plummeted, clients were upset, and frankly our bottom [line] always took a deep, deep hit.”
Muhfistiner is a staunch in-office work proponent and “BISTOM” believer (Butts In Seats Theory Of Management). Early in the pandemic he had Firm Globe classified as essential work in the State of California for their augmented reality app that removes human clothes, for Monkeypox detection. The app is scheduled for release in Q4 on Apple IOS and Android.
With this deadline looming, Muhfistiner proposed a compromise to his employees that they couldn’t refuse: from September 29 to August 2, remote work is permitted, provided of course that it be in their remote office in the desert, 15 miles northeast of Gerlach, address 3:45 & E.
This created quite the challenge for Firm Globe’s VP of Cultural Appropriation Dixon Yermouth, who is serving as Liaison between Firm Globe and the Burning Man Organization (“BMORG”) for the move. BMORG has a process for designating areas of camping for themed groups, and even sets aside discounted tickets for them, but has a strong cultural taboo against corporate branding at Burning Man.
“We had to go above and beyond on other aspects of culture at Burning Man,” said Yermouth.
“Our mantra for Burning Man that we thought of is called Radical Inclusion. Every single resident of Black Rock City is invited to fill in their W-4 and I-9, grab an oar, and climb aboard the S.S. Firm Globe as we call it.”
Yermouth also noted that Firm Globe will be gifting access to their group healthcare plan (at the 5% employee discounted rate), and that 1% of post-tax profits for that week only will go to support the ecosystem of shrimp currently living on the Playa.
Firm Globe recently raised a Series K round of financing at a $2.2 billion valuation.
“We’ve found it’s easier to raise money from investors than from customers,” said CEO Muhfistiner, “and I’m really looking forward to meeting other potential Firm Globe investors out on the Playa this year.”
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