Current:Home > NewsTwitter auctioned off office supplies, including a pizza oven and neon bird sign -MarketStream
Twitter auctioned off office supplies, including a pizza oven and neon bird sign
View
Date:2025-04-13 17:52:11
Are you in need of some mid-century modern furniture, industrial kitchen equipment or audio-visual systems? Or looking to brighten up your apartment with a giant neon bird sign?
Then you're in luck. Twitter's San Francisco headquarters auctioned off "surplus corporate office assets" online for a fleeting 27 hours, giving potential lucky bidders the chance to take a piece of the struggling company home with them.
Auction house Global Heritage Partners is running the de facto fire sale, which closed at 10 a.m. PT (1 p.m. ET) on Wednesday and charged a buyer's premium of 18%.
The 631 lots include office supplies like projectors and massive white boards (in both old-school and digital form), kitchen equipment from espresso machines to refrigerators (including a kegerator beer dispenser), a wide variety of chairs and couches and miscellaneous modern-day workplace staples like assorted power adapters and KN95 masks in bulk.
There's also a bit of Twitter-specific memorabilia, including a six-foot-tall "@"-shaped planter sculpture filled with artificial flowers (with a high bid of $8,250), a blue neon sign in the shape of the app's bird logo ($22,500) and a smaller, sturdier bird statue ($20,500).
Other notable items include a pizza oven ($10,000), a conference room-sized booth ($7,250) and several individual soundproof phone booths, packs of high-end desk chairs ($4,900) and sit-stand desks ($900) and two stationary bikes that double as recharging stations ($2,400).
Overall, an eclectic assortment of goods and a jarring sight for those who once used them.
"Weird to see the Twitter office on auction," tweeted Kevin Weil, the company's former senior vice president of product. "Great memories from a different era."
Scott Budman, an NBC News tech and business reporter, pointed out some familiar items: A table where he interviewed former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey got a bid for $1,000, the espresso machine where former editorial director Karen Wickre offered him coffee is going for $1,700.
"Good luck, I guess," he wrote.
Ross Dove, chief executive of Heritage Global, the parent company of Heritage Global Partners, told the New York Times that more than 20,000 people had registered to bid online — the most of any of the firm's auctions over the last 90 years and a fact he attributes to the public's fascination with Twitter and Musk himself. He estimated that the auction would net Twitter some $1.5 million.
The auction comes at a tough time for the company, which lost many major advertisers — as well as employees, thanks to layoffs and mass resignations — after Elon Musk took over in October and has since sought to aggressively cut costs and raise revenue.
Musk — who has announced his plans to resign as CEO — said in December that the company was "not, like, in the fast lane to bankruptcy anymore."
Still, its financial outlook remains murky, with the New York Times reporting that same month that Twitter had not paid rent for its San Francisco headquarters or any global offices for weeks and was considering denying people severance payments. Employees have also discussed the possibility of selling usernames to make money, the Times reported last week.
This month, Guinness World Records confirmed that Musk had broken the record for largest amount of money lost by one individual. He lost between $180 billion and $200 billion since November 2021, largely due to the poor performance of Tesla stocks in recent years.
Musk remains the second-richest person in the world and, as of this week, is on trial for securities fraud over a series of 2018 tweets teasing a Tesla buyout that never happened.
veryGood! (28)
Related
- Senate begins final push to expand Social Security benefits for millions of people
- Biden to make his first state visit to France after attending D-Day 80th commemorations next week
- Americans are running away from church. But they don't have to run from each other.
- US Olympic pairs figure skating coach Dalilah Sappenfield banned for life for misconduct
- Romantasy reigns on spicy BookTok: Recommendations from the internet’s favorite genre
- The number of Americans applying for jobless benefits inches up, but layoffs remain low
- Clerk over Alex Murdaugh trial spent thousands on bonuses, meals and gifts, ethics complaint says
- More people make ‘no-buy year’ pledges as overspending or climate worries catch up with them
- Trump invites nearly all federal workers to quit now, get paid through September
- Nearly 200 shuttered 99 Cents Only stores to open as Dollar Tree locations from Texas to California
Ranking
- Costco membership growth 'robust,' even amid fee increase: What to know about earnings release
- Amazon Prime members will get extended Grubhub+ benefits, can order for free in Amazon app
- What’s at stake in the European Parliament election next month
- Argentina women’s soccer players understand why teammates quit amid dispute, but wish they’d stayed
- 'Vanderpump Rules' star DJ James Kennedy arrested on domestic violence charges
- Human remains found in jaws of alligator in Houston after woman reported missing
- A flurry of rockets will launch from Florida's Space Coast this year. How to watch Friday
- Former TikToker Ali Abulaban Found Guilty in 2021 Murders of His Wife and Her Friend
Recommendation
Selena Gomez's "Weird Uncles" Steve Martin and Martin Short React to Her Engagement
NTSB now leading probe into deadly Ohio building explosion
Sweden to donate $1.23 billion in military aid to Ukraine
Qatar’s offer to build 3 power plants to ease Lebanon’s electricity crisis is blocked
Residents worried after ceiling cracks appear following reroofing works at Jalan Tenaga HDB blocks
Dollar Tree acquires 170 99 Cents Only Stores, will reopen them as Dollar Tree stores
RFK Jr. files FEC complaint over June 27 presidential debate criteria
One Tech Tip: Want to turn off Meta AI? You can’t — but there are some workarounds