Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
Evening Standard
Evening Standard
Business
City Spy

The drinking starts early at Axa

You know the old saying, it’s five o’clock somewhere. Well nowhere has this expression been interpreted more liberally than at Axa, which last week put in a licensing application to the City of London Corporation to serve alcohol from as early as 7:30am at its offices on Gracechurch Street, five days a week.

Booze is the lifeblood of the insurance market, of course, but even for Spy, 7:30am is a little too soon in the day. Not at Axa though, which doesn’t just want to offer drinks to guests in the entrance lobby but has also asked to serve alcohol on the second floor, the seventh floor, the eighth floor, the twelfth floor and the sixteenth floor, no less. Indeed, Spy wonders whether it will soon be possible to find anyone, anywhere in the building who isn’t on the sauce.

Mind you, sounds like a fun place to work. Almost as fun as working at JPMorgan, which appears to be planning something similar.

Sign up to the weekly City Spy newsletter for your unmissable round-up of gossip, analysis and untold stories inside the Square Mile:  standard.co.uk/newsletters

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.