This being my 4th startup, I have quickly learned that company culture is one of the most important ingredients for success. I work hard on a daily basis to ensure that we adhere to our fun and energetic culture at Alice.
One example of driving this culture at the office is by assigning every employee an animal. I have this strong belief that everyone’s behavior, temperament, personality and work habits match those of some animal in this world. I feel this becomes very apparent after working with someone for about a week. Once I have had time to observe the employee in the work environment, I get together with the animal naming committee to finalize the choice and setup the unveiling ceremony. In this graphic, you can see the entire Alice team by title and animal of who we have hired so far.
A few rules, you can’t create your own animal. If we did that, I would choose a lion or some sort of majestic bald eagle but I have been given a toucan as my animal (not be be confused with the Fruit Loop cereal mascot) Toucan’s are very unique and you know when one is in the room. They have very loud vocalizations and can be heard at long distances. They are also extremely feisty, smart, friendly and playful. This describes me to a tee (not so sure about the “smart” quality)
Reading this you probably think that you wouldn’t want or care about your animal but I have had on many occasions new employees putting pressure on me after a week to reveal their animal. They didn’t feel a complete part of our Animal kingdom (I mean team) until they knew what their animal is going to be
The staff then uses these animals on name tags, door signs, Yammer icons etc….In many cases the employee will decorate their work area with pictures of their animal. We have a ton of fun with it.
I have worked with all kinds of animals over the past 3-4 years at Jellyfish and Alice. We’ve had house cats, kangaroo’s, armadillos, gorillas, beavers….. and the list goes on and on. If you have received an animal name from me in the past and are reading this post feel free to introduce yourself and your animal name in the comments 
There is a ton written on company culture including the Zappos story and a VC’s perspective. This is just one small example of how much fun we have working at Alice which sets the tone for the overall company culture. I feel that one of the CEO’s jobs is not only to take a lead in driving the vision but often over looked is to cultivate an overall culture that will ultimately lead to the company’s success.
Brian
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November 26th, 2008 at 12:28 pm
I can’t wait for the day when you’ll need a Platypus again
November 28th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
Until I saw a very promising jellyfish, I didn’t really take toucans or dolphins very seriously. If my friend’s cat and my cousin’s dog ever get together, I will be throwing money at them.
November 30th, 2008 at 12:13 pm
OK. Question answered. The animal name thing is one of the many creative and team-binding/building things you do–glad to see that you’re continuing the tradition.
Hope you guys had a great Thanksgiving.
December 1st, 2008 at 4:23 pm
Watch out for the gazelle… I’ve heard they get a little crazy!
December 2nd, 2008 at 8:45 am
All the best of luck with the new biz, and nice WI State Journal write up of the past ventures….
Dan
January 2nd, 2009 at 10:33 am
Guys:
Having been a part of two internet retailers that didn’t make it and crashed hard; can you say Webvan?, I know the thrill, excitement and the adrenilin rush of a start-up. I miss those days of everyone working in the trenches and no politics already being in place and the fun of it. I wish you the best and will being keeping a close eye on you hoping you make it
January 6th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
Could I be a Pointer Dog and help lead? I can be concise, hard-driving, alert and “ready to go.”
January 7th, 2009 at 6:52 pm
there must be a mistake,the two head honchos should have a jackass assigned to them
January 12th, 2009 at 6:42 pm
Happybutt, our animals are already assigned, but thanks for the helpful suggestion.
I’m sure you won’t be the last person to assign me or Brian another animal. You get thick skin being in a start-up. Maybe an elephant would be better?
February 3rd, 2009 at 8:40 am
Greetings from the Owl. I hope all is going well and working out as you’ve hoped!
February 4th, 2009 at 12:20 pm
I found your website while attempting to figure out why in the heck the online “household dry goods” market hadn’t been met yet. So first off, congrats, and good luck on that endeavour!
But, I’m going to use this opportunity to remind you of something that every hip and cool CEO seems to forget. Cool people don’t talk about how hip and cool they are. It takes the coolness away. I’ve been at more than my fair share of start-ups over the last 12 years. Every one of them has a “unique and exciting culture” that the CEO “cultivates”. Unique names, nerf balls, cube decorating, company provided dinner’s, go kart outings, thinkgeek items strewn about.
The truth is that those are line items in the budget that are justified as a way to help foster creativity, and to get more hours out of your employees. Theres nothing wrong with that. $100 worth of pizza brought in at 6:15, will get you at least $1000 worth of free labor! ($50/hour x 20 employees). Excellent ROI.
The problem is blowhard CEO’s who sit around and talk about how awesome the culture is that they’ve created. They pat themselves on the back, because at the board meeting they’re told how awesome the culture is. The problem is that they start to believe this line of BS, and then talk about it as a company asset. Almost like its money. Or even a released product. It’s neither. In fact, its offensive to employees that you go around talking about how easily manipulated they are. 19 of your 20 employees will participate in your awesome events. 10 of 20 will actually enjoy it. 15 of 20 will be offended every time you post a blog or brag about the awesome “company culture”…
Take a page from the coolest of the cool celebrities. Don’t talk about how cool you are… just be cool.
Good luck! I really do wish you guys a ton of success in this venture. I’ve been wondering for years why I can’t buy tin foil, toilet paper, wax paper, and plastic bags on wally worlds website like I can in their store. Give me a shopping list feature so I can add items all week, then order once a week to meet your free shipping minimum requirement! Thanks!
February 4th, 2009 at 1:16 pm
If i could pick my own animal, i’d want to be a monkey, then i could throw my own feces and not get those weird looks that people give me now…
February 4th, 2009 at 7:09 pm
Grizzled, thanks for your well wishes. I’d also love to respond to your claim that this post is a) trying to be cool; and b) insulting to employees. As a management team, we have been lucky enough to have some past success and this blog is an effort to talk about some of the things we do that appear to work, using our current work at Alice.com as an example. What we are really trying to do is be transparent, which is difficult to do sometimes. I think this post is a case in point. Is it really cool to admit that you name people after animals?
As to our employees, I strongly disagree with you that efforts to create a fun, engaging culture are simply a veiled attempt to extract more hours of work out of people. The effort means so much more. I came across this quote, that I think does a good job of summing it up: “engaged employees create engaged customers.” Enjoying your work is infectious. Start ups need engaged employees to succeed and we can’t afford employees that are simply putting in their time and feel “manipulated” that the leadership of the company spends time trying to create a fun work environment.
I hope that helps you feel better about Alice. Thanks again for your feedback and well wishes.
February 4th, 2009 at 7:11 pm
fjbros, we don’t have a monkey on staff yet. Probably a good thing
Nice to hear from a legend of Smack Shopping!
February 5th, 2009 at 1:08 am
Hello and best wishes. I’d like to know what model you use to determine which ‘animal’ each person is. Thanks.
February 8th, 2009 at 11:13 am
It’s good that you take time to get to know the inner most sanctum of the animal within. Good news is once your presented with an animal…you’re part of the team.
I would like to apply as your first Penguin. After the last two Winters in Madison I have a sense that this is an animal I can relate to… I enjoy being close to others, work to protect the little ones and hang with the brothers. The cold, wind & snow is a work in progress. I do concede, that you are the “professionals” who determine that animal within…this is just an suggestion.
You & your team are on the way to success, again. Enjoy the ride.
February 9th, 2009 at 6:21 pm
Best of luck on your new venture. I hear a bunch of animals have recently been let out of their cages… hope you can round a few of them up.
February 10th, 2009 at 12:52 am
What, no jellyfish? How about that Social Media Analyst? Sounds PERFECT.
March 2nd, 2009 at 1:19 pm
I don’t understand why there are already some people coming on here knocking you (the founders) and this site when it hasn’t even launched yet. And are they not aware of the hip, cool culture that you already created with Jellyfish? Oh well, really looking forward to the launch! Loving the Alice blog, too.
March 17th, 2009 at 2:47 am
Good Luck and God Speed!
~MustangChick72 from JF
March 19th, 2009 at 2:40 pm
[...] Why do we assign every employee an animal? [...]
March 19th, 2009 at 8:50 pm
With 5 or 6 out of 14 employees (assuming I can count correctly) being managers or executives, do you worry that you’re a bit top-heavy already?
April 1st, 2009 at 10:11 am
Good luck animals of alice
. I hope you guys are extremely successful & I can’t wait for you to launch 
…and fj you were always good for a weird laugh lol 
April 8th, 2009 at 4:29 pm
I can’t see the migratory locust in that picture…
June 23rd, 2009 at 8:27 am
It would be kind of nice if you guys used apostrophes correctly in your post. “Kangaroo’s”? The kangaroo’s what? “Toucan’s”? The toucan’s what?
July 8th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
[...] bring a blow-up mattress, and the rest plan to sleep under their desks. At Alice, each employee is assigned an animal. I am a crane, which means, in part, that I’m particular. I want my own bed, so I drive home in [...]
July 10th, 2009 at 7:12 pm
[...] bring a blow-up mattress, and the rest plan to sleep under their desks. At Alice, each employee is assigned an animal. I am a crane, which means, in part, that I’m particular. I want my own bed, so I drive home in [...]
July 16th, 2009 at 8:04 pm
[...] of the bloggers at Brazen works at Alice. Not only is the company cool (can you say nap-time and employees being assigned representative animals?) but the service looks useful. Alice allows users to buy their dry-goods online, and have them [...]
September 2nd, 2009 at 6:07 am
It is very early…the sun has not yet risen on the Serengeti Plain…but there is a Cheetah poised…ready to outrun her prey and land yet another New Account for her business…. :- ) maybe it will be Alice???
September 18th, 2009 at 8:02 pm
You know that sounds very interesting. I just had to click the link, about getting an animal name, when I popped over to review the jobs page on Alice.com. Love the site, adore the idea. Good luck and enjoy the Fruit Loops! LOL, sorry, just kidding.
BTW: Have you thought about giving your Alice.com customers animal names? It could be one of those Blogthing-inspired quiz like thingies where they answer some questions and get their animal name to feel like a real part of the team.
November 1st, 2009 at 10:44 am
Clever, very clever. As a retired manager I wish I had thought of the animal names for my team.
November 30th, 2009 at 1:32 pm
Great ideas! inspiring!
November 30th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Sorry, I mispelled my website.
December 12th, 2009 at 11:14 pm
Hey there, can your customers, like me, get animal names/icons?????? I want to be my dog!! He’s smart, handsome and really interesting. So could I be a Rhodesian Ridgeback also……..?????????
January 1st, 2010 at 3:02 pm
I have to agree with everything that grizzled dot-com’r said, especially about spending $100 on employees and getting $1000 in returned effort.
That being said, you ALL need to learn how apostrophes work. Dinner’s is NOT the plural of dinner. It shows that some quality belongs to ONE dinner. You too, Mr. cool CEO. The plural of kangaroo has no apostrophe in it. You don’t look well-educated and you appear to lack attention to detail when you make simple mistakes like this.
January 7th, 2010 at 12:56 pm
Who really cares about the punctuation? It does not mean that (someones) principles or ideas are not as good as your own,just because they cant use the english language as perfectly as you can.As a matter of fact some of the people you put down are probably alot more successful than you will ever be.And alot happier than you could ever be. Great site great idea Alice will be a great success. Thank you guys or animals for the convenient way to shop…. Jason Sturdevant
January 22nd, 2010 at 4:43 am
[...] Everything planned for the day will get eaten up by new priorities, larger plans and whether or not the toucan (our CEO) monopolizes all the time with the dolphin (our President and my direct boss). This can be [...]
January 27th, 2010 at 2:41 pm
If you ever feel the need for someone to document anything (such as policies, procedures, software, etc), feel free to let me know. Besides working for what seems to be a fun company, I’d love to see what animal I would be.
February 8th, 2010 at 10:45 pm
Hey – just killing time tonight…hoping my toilet paper arrives tomorrow! I’m serious…
Alice.com is a fun site, although I wish it were a little faster to add items to the cart. I can’t quite get the hang of it asking me every time how often I want to be reminded to order it again. I will be back when I need stuff again…just let me get it for sure into my shopping cart quickly.
Sorry…I’m getting totally off the animal topic…let’s see…I told my kids I wanted a chinchilla when I turn 40 this year…they haven’t forgotten over the years – yikes!
February 21st, 2010 at 1:09 am
Beej says – is anyone a ferret? Just curious, my littlest love is a ferret and she has so many good qualities; however, she does sleep a lot
I think that your idea for assigned animals is ingenious, and I have sent your site name on to my sister (which is a huge compliment to you, by the way). Good luck, and thank you for free shipping and great prices.
February 26th, 2010 at 11:33 am
If only corporate America would go back to start-up roots & have some fun, the economy might actually turn. Employees would be engaged, customers would be engaged, and everyone would be working to make a better product, world, etc. Having gone from DOT.COM to the corporate TechSector, I definately miss that culture. Will be watching for new animal openings
March 7th, 2010 at 4:02 pm
Au contraire, Jason Sturdevant. Punctuation and spelling are highly visible aspects of a company’s image and can be viewed as indicators of management’s interpretation of excellence. There are many people who don’t care, but most serious investors or potential business partners will care. Your organizational chart seems to be missing a Communications/Marketing person. This person’s job would be to make sure Alice’s message is clear, consistent, compelling and grammatically correct.
The totem idea is great and I think a single blog posting like this is excellent.
All that said, I thank Alice that I can finally order cat food online! My mother is in assisted living and can’t drive. The facility takes care of all of her needs, but not her cat’s needs.
I wish you well and urge you to adopt a corporate image consistent with market success (that doesn’t mean stuffy, by the way).
March 30th, 2010 at 3:53 pm
One of my hot entrepreneur friends posted this on tumblr, and now all I want to do is come work for you for a week to find out what animal I am. I wonder if the GM of our division would take the bait…
May 20th, 2010 at 7:32 am
Wow, this seems a lot lamer than I thought when I initially read about it. After reading your complete description of the animal kingdom thing, it’s clear that you are the kind of self-important boob who believes pre-fab fun is the equivalent of genuine authentic spontaneous fun. Toucan, eh? Well, the guys in my car club call me “Cruiser.”
August 16th, 2010 at 4:23 pm
Just went shopping for school supplies, wish that room (schoolroom) was listed on your website! I’ve applied for your account manager position and even though I live in Stillwater, MN (my daughter is a friend of your son), we’d happily move to Middleton, WI to be part of the Alice Team!
September 24th, 2010 at 8:22 pm
[...] of the utmost quality. Zappos became famous for its unusual business model. And at Alice.com, the founders assign each employee an animal in order to boost their company [...]
October 26th, 2010 at 9:51 am
I am amazed at some of these posts.
I am always looking for ways to make life easier. If the company that simplifies my life wants to have a culture with named animals working at their desks, so be it.
I worked for many years at one of the largest employers in the world (depending on the year, the number of employees laid off, & the mergers/acquisitions). During these years, we had no fun except at the mandatory, annual Christmas (which then became the End-of-year) party which was a potluck, which we were required to donate money for the cold cuts/plates/cups/napkins,& also bring a dessert to share), and where the VP talked about how great he was. With the constant layoffs, more and more jobs were left unfilled, but the work had to get done. As I said, I would LOVE to work in an environment where people were not only allowed, but also encouraged to have fun. Its in these types of environments that employees can be creative.
You are in luck, as I was laid off from previously mentioned company last December and am still in the market for a great job.
Feel free to contact me directly.
Carla
July 27th, 2011 at 4:26 am
“to cultivate an overall culture that will ultimately lead to the company’s success.”
I am very impressed in what you have done after these years and surely that culture and atmosphere are very important for that success.
Good Luck in Europe!
November 25th, 2011 at 10:26 am
If I could pick my animal it would be a Badger……..being from Wisconsin and a graduate of UW – Madison….Bucky Badger rules!