Business Photo Slideshows

The Most Outrageous C.E.O. Perks Jun 20 2007

$1 Million Vacation Home

Photo by AP Photo/Mike Wintroath

Don Tyson. Tyson Foods, former C.E.O.
In 2002, Tyson and the company paid the S.E.C. $2.2 million in 2005 to settle charges that the firm failed to disclose more than $1 million in perks, including a vacation home in the English countryside; a home and yacht in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico; housekeeping services totaling $203,000; and $84,000 in landscaping.

$80,000 a Month Pied-a-Terre

Photo by Nancy Kaszerman/Zuma Press/Newscom

Jack Welch. General Electric, former C.E.O.
The former chief’s much publicized divorce in 2002 prompted the disclosure of details of the perks he took home. Among them: a Manhattan pied-à-terre that cost the company $80,000 a month.

$2 Million Birthday Bash

Photo by AP Photo/HO/New York district attorney

Dennis Kozlowski. Tyco, former C.E.O.
As chief, Kozlowski had access to a $30 million company-owned apartment on Park Avenue. But it was the furnishings there—a $12,000 umbrella stand and a $6,000 shower curtain—that grabbed headlines. Tyco also indulged Kozlowski’s inclination to party hard, and expensively, which included paying for half of a $2 million birthday bash he threw for his wife in Sardinia in 2001.

Business Trip to Bora Bora

Photo by Marcos Townsend/AFP/Getty Images

Conrad Black. Hollinger International, former chief and chairman
Under the Canadian newspaper baron, Hollinger paid $60,000 for a surprise 60th birthday party for Black’s wife at the tony Manhattan restaurant Le Grenouille, in 2000. The company also spent $532,000 for a “business trip” on a Gulfstream IV to the remote South Pacific island of Bora Bora in 2000.

$1 Million Driving Lessons

Photo by Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images for Nascar

Bill Butler. Aaron Rents, president
Rent-to-own company Aaron Rents spent nearly $1 million in 2006 to sponsor Nascar racer Michael Waltrip’s (left) “driver development program”—a program whose two key participants happen to be two sons of Bill Butler, the president of Aaron’s sales and lease ownership division.

Private Fleet of Jets

Photo by Bernard Troncale /The Birmingham News/Polaris

Richard Scrushy. HealthSouth, former chairman and C.E.O.
Scrushy, a former respiratory therapist who founded Birmingham, Alabama-based HealthSouth in 1984, had 12 corporate jets and a helicopter called Bonus One which he used to fly to his home in Lake Martin, Alabama. He was fired in 2003 following charges by the S.E.C. that he overstated the company's earnings by $1.4 billion.

Free Beer for Life

Photo by AP Photo/Rene Macura, HO

August Busch III. Anheuser-Busch, former chairman
Busch may have retired at the end of 2006, but that doesn’t mean he’s giving up one of the perks that comes with running the world’s largest brewery: free beer. According to an agreement that he signed on November 22, 2006, the company will provide “draught beer services and packaged products to [his] residence” on request, for life.

Wine Allowance

Photo by Courtesy of Ste. Michelle Wine Estates

Vincent Gierer. UST, former chairman and C.E.O.
While at UST, the holding company for U.S. Smokeless Tobacco, Gierer doesn’t get a discount on the conglomerate’s chewing tobacco products. But he does get an annual $5,000 “wine allowance,” which UST says it provides to executives to encourage them to purchase the company’s Columbia Crest and Ste. Michelle wines.

Out of This World Statuary

Photo by AP Photo/Paul Sakuma

Richard Thalheimer. Sharper Image, founder and former C.E.O.
When Richard Thalheimer left the company at the end of 2006, he asked for two life-size statues that used to be in his office: a seven-foot tall Superman statue that retails at Sharper Image for $5,000 and a $15,000 statue of C-3PO, the robot from the Star Wars movies. Thalheimer agreed to pay half price for both statues as well as the cost of shipping them.

Courtside Seats

Micky Arison. Carnival Cruise Lines, chairman and C.E.O.
Arison got Carnival to spend $180,000 a year for five years to cover the cost of six courtside lounge seats at the American Airlines Arena where the NBA’s Miami Heat play. Arison isn’t just a casual sports fan: Separate companies that he controls own the Heat and the arena where they play.