(page 7 of 10)

Best Place to Get Stuffed
Build-A-Bear Workshop
By Matthew Halverson
Photograph by Frank Di Piazza

Here’s the thing about trying to explain the environment at the corporate offices of Build-A-Bear Workshop: It takes some kind of superhuman willpower to resist the temptation to throw around really bad puns. This is, after all, a place where trainers are called “professors of teddyology” and the main conference room is named Bearemy’s Board Room.

It’s also damn near impossible to avoid using words such as “cute” and “nice”—in the most saccharine of senses. “Cute” because if you’re still frowning after you get past the front desk, the décor in the rest of the office will slap your sour puss back to Pouty Town. (Example: The clock in the lobby features words such as “love,” “friends” and “hugs” instead of numbers.) “Nice” because those cute decorating touches—in another example, the walls are adorned with “Bearisms” such as “Take time to paws for thought”—seem to have succeeded in infecting everyone with an “all smiles, all the time” attitude.

“When you start working here, you expect to hear a rimshot after every bear reference, but then after you’re here for a while it’s, like, normal,” says Sherri Karandziff, manager of visual presentation and concept development. “Just today I heard someone say, ‘All of the monkeys are missing.’”

As community-relations bear Matt Pohl explains his daily routine for responding to the hundreds of charities that request free bears, a woman flits by his desk and drops off a plastic-wrapped lapel pin: They’re celebrating their 10th anniversary this year at Build-A-Bear, and, in recognition of the milestone, they’ve dubbed 2007 the Year of Friendship—because apparently the previous nine years were built on fiery animosity. Kathy Duck (a woman whose name is so woefully out of step with the corporate culture that you have to wonder whether she had to lie about it on her application) is excited about her “annibearsary” gift. She’s been there since the beginning, so she’s sure it’s going to be something “pretty special.”

A level-headed outsider can draw one of a couple conclusions here: Either these people drank the Kool-Aid or they’re all just inherently—uncommonly—pleasant, and the latter would represent an inhuman feat of recruitment kismet capable of sending your average human-resources manager into a fit of apoplectic convulsions. (Alternate explanation: Those with even a hint of cynicism quickly find themselves overwhelmed by the niceness and bolt for the door, leaving only the shiny happy people.) The solitary frown on display in the yellow, red and blue “bearquarters” on a sunny January day came after word spread on the help desk that several stores were having trouble with their stuffing machines—but you have to admit that, as technical glitches go, that’s a cute one.

It’s hard to begrudge these people their happiness. They can wear what they want, their desks are literally piled with teddy bears and they can bring their dogs to work. Heck, even the receptionist—check that; “first-impressions bear”—has the über-stressful task of dressing the dolls that sit on her desk. For someone of a less jovial nature, though, it can be a little difficult to … bear. (Dammit! So close.)