I just looked the locations up and of the seven offices I worked in from 1992 to 2015, zero are occupied by my ex employers or their successors. Most of my ex-coworkers are retired and many have moved to places like Arizona and Florida. So I would have no one to visit.
The drug store locations I worked in from 1988-90 are indeed still drugstores, but they are operated by the acquirer of the chain that acquired the chain I worked for (as a pharmacy tech).
The office building I worked in from 2015-20 for the employer who was acquired by my current employer has been demolished and is now a flooring “superstore”
In my mid-career IT years, ~2000-2010, we had at various times 4 different office locations as we grew, then changed to a mostly WFH configuration and greatly shrank our office footprint. Before selling the firm completely.
#1 was a suite in a much larger office building complex with 3 buildings and 10-20 tenants to a building. The facility is still there unchanged but good bet I’d recognize few if any of the tenants.
#2 was a nondescript 1970s construction 2-story office condo. Uggh. Since demolished and now a new-built 1-story dental office is on the same footprint. Somehow seeing that building gone feels good, not bad.
#3 was the largest of the bunch. And was actually built as the main office for a different small IT firm. Who eventually outgrew their building and built a larger 2-story one across their parking lot. Then we moved into their old building. They’re still there now in that newer building, albeit with a new name for what’s apparently still the same old privately held firm. Our offices now house a real estate sales outfit.
#4 was rented space in a commercial home builder who’d built a big and kinda fancy edifice rex for themselves then shrank drastically when the next housing crunch hit. We took the top floor off their hands for a year or so as we migrated to WFH and all off-prem hardware. It’s still there and they’re still in it. And probably all of it.
Regarding my last workplace (that I retired from): I couldn’t if I wanted to. Even attempting to enter the parking lot would end up facing armed guards.
On my retirement day, I spent an hour walking around my work areas - knowing I would never see them again. It was a weird feeling.
I worked for the state for 40 years and went back to the office twice, for retirement parties for old comrades. The security is tighter than it needs to be, in my opinion. Workers have ID badges to scan doors open, visitors must have a worker vouch for and escort them and also have to have security record their license numbers and check ID.
Following my state career I worked for a consultant for 7 years but I worked from home and am at my old workplace as I type, but that doesn’t count.
I have several that either no longer exist or are far away. One library where I worked isn’t too far away, so I’ve been there as a library user; there’s no one left from when I worked there, which was over 20 years ago. I’ll probably eventually visit the school where I worked for 14 years before retiring, but right now I don’t want to deal with seeing the principal.
I used to work at UW - Platteville, and I visit Platteville once a year for a gaming convention*
I have gone into the building I worked in – my friend works there**
One of the places I worked got bulldozed over so a bigger company could expand. Others are different business now. I did go into my most recent workplace***, but that was just to double check I took all of my stuff (I have occasional lunches with one my former coworkers)
Brian
* PlatteCon - Plattecon XXXIX: Year of the Endless Night
** He was a fellow student worker, is now a permanent fairly senior position
*** I got laid off from there – currently “involuntarily retired”
In between High School and the Military, I worked at a seaside amusement park, in the arcades, un-jamming quarters from machines and making change. For my 20th reunion I took my kids to that amusement park. Many of the rides were still the same.
I’m an academic who has moved several times during my career. Being invited to give a seminar at places I used to work is great fun, and not unusual. Nice to see old friends and catch up.
The workplace where I was for the longest time, in my life thus far, was my grad school. And I have visited there, to see people I knew from that time. I haven’t visited there often, but that’s mostly because I’m now over a thousand miles away. If I still lived in the area, I’d probably visit often.
I visited my old workplace a couple of weeks ago. A lot of people have retired (the college offered a buyout), but it was fun catching up with those who were still there.
Only a small handful of times. My ophthalmologist’s office is right across the hall from my previous workplace, so when I have an appointment to see him I’ll pop in to the old office to say hello. Other than that, I don’t go out of my way to visit my previous workplaces.
I never would, but it’s 110 miles away now. My wife has (same work place) but she truely has friends there. Actually, one is staying with us next weekend.
Now, I was friends with the people that I worked with, be we never did anything outside of work. Almost played cribbage with one once because her husband did not like cribbage.
I work at a University so I’ve worked in several different buildings on campus. I do visit occasionally for lunch with friends or meetings with colleagues, but very rarely for work. Within the section I work in, we may be asked to sit in a different office sometimes to prevent lone working (for safety reasons) so that’s happened a few times, but otherwise I have no desire to visit old work places.
I never have and never really wanted to. Although I would like to visit the new facility of my last employer, just out of curiosity. But it’s been 6 years and I don’t know that anyone would remember me (and vice-versa) so it’s unlikely I could get in anyway.
As an emeritus professor, I have the right to office space. For about five years after I retired I kept my office and came to it a couple times a week. Then they asked me to move in with another retired professor until he died 8 years later. I still came in regularly and kept my weekly seminar going. Another retired professor was assigned that office but decided to use space in our research library instead. I also had a regular visitor who spent 6 weeks every spring and we worked together and published a number of papers. Then the pandemic hit, the visitor cancelled, the seminar died and I stopped going in. I was assigned a third off with two other retireds, one of whom never came in and the other died. In any case I have not been there in six years and am unlikely to ever go again, although I have every right to. I am sure that third office is no longer mine. I still get invited to the dept start of term and Christmas parties, but after 26 years most of the people I knew have also retired so I stopped going to them.
Once a month, I go to a pharmacy I filled in at several times, in the early 00s. It’s the one I use now for my own prescriptions. I also shop occasionally at the grocery store that it’s in.
First employer after college graduation is still there, but I’ve never had any wish to visit. Second employer closed, so there’s no one to go back to. Third employer was acquired by another company. Anyway, they were a defense contractor, and I worked on a military base, so no chance to visit. Nor any interest.
My current employer has an active retiree association, and they visit the campus ever so often. I saw one former worker in the cafeteria during the week, and ran into another one today at the train station.