There's Only One Free Lunch at Apple, and It's on Your First Day

Inside Apple, the upcoming book by Adam Lashinsky, a Senior Editor at Large for Fortune, reveals stunning details about the company’s culture, the immense walls of secrecy imposed by the executive team, as well as tidbits like what it’s like on your first day.

We’ve already covered the details about having to set up your own Mac on your first day at Apple, but Lashinsky has even more to share about a person’s baby steps within the company.

“The splendid central cafeteria, Caffe Macs, features separate stations for fresh sushi, salad, and desserts and teems with Apple employees,” writes Lashinsky. “They pay for their meals, by the way, unlike at Google, but the food is quite good and reasonably priced.”

He then goes to note: “The new employees learn that first day of work that they've joined a different kind of company than any they've worked at before. Outside, Apple is revered. Inside, it is cultish, and neophytes are entrusted with only so much information. All new employees attend a half-day of orientation, always on a Monday -- unless Monday is a holiday.”

“Orientation Monday brings another rare treat. ‘There's only one free lunch at Apple, and it's on your first day’, said a former employee,” Lashinsky writes.

While some may not find this tidbit particularly relevant, it may serve as testimony that Apple is all about getting stuff done.

If you’re hired there, it’s not so you can go home every day to brag that you work for the most successful technology company on the planet.

You’re hired there to make it the most successful tech company, and that means strict rules for everyone, which includes paying for your own meals. For all they know, Apple could be doing staffers a favor (wink) by not giving away food for free.