A few weeks back, our office had a breakfast meeting whereburritos, fruit and yogurt were offered.

The meeting was very popular, (and I'm pretty sure it wasbecause of the food; not because the CEO was present), but evenmore popular were the leftovers that provided snacks for the next24 hours.

“Did you get an apple? There's still some in the kitchen!” acoworker excitedly said to me later in the day.

“Free fruit!” one email screamed.

It was an appreciated change of pace in our office kitchen,which usually offers up a smorgasbord of Keurig cups, plasticutensils and a few pounds of sugar packets.

Suffice to say, it was a big day at the office.

In an age where salaries only jump when you change jobs, andbonuses seem like an old myth, seemingly small workplace perks offer a bigpayout for employee satisfaction and engagement.

It's no secret. Studies (and, of course, anecdotal evidence)back it up.

One such study of 1,000 office employees by Peapod, a grocerydelivery company, suggests offering employees free food is an easyway to keep them happy and productive. Those who were offeredsnacks on the job reported significantly higher levels of jobsatisfaction than those who weren't.

The free-food perk also keeps workers more productive. A 2011study from Staples found that half of all workers left the officeto get snacks at least once a day, with some people making as manyas five trips to get their sugar fix, so offering food is a sureway to keep your employees at their desks.

There's also the wellness part of the equation: Companies caneasily help mold healthy behavior by offering healthy food in theoffice. The question is: Do you want your employees to hit thevending machine for a Snickers and a bag of Cheetos, or would yourather they snack on some fruit and a granola bar?

More proof that employees love their free snacks? When some ofthe companies who did offer the perk decided to do away withit—Sprint recently said it would end the era of free office snacksto boost its bottom line, and Kraft even yanked its own Kraft-madesnacks (save the cheese sticks!) from office fridges earlier thissummer—they received a lot of negative attention. (People are verypassionate about food, as you can imagine.)

Turns out, the meager savings that come from killing the freefood, or not offering the perk altogether (just 16 percent ofworkers reported having access to free food at work, Peapod says),aren't worth it.

While it seems that food really is the way to many employees'hearts (personal admission: food and snacks are basically myfavorite thing ever), it represents so much more in aworkplace.

Worksite cafes and cabinets and refrigerators stocked with foodjoin other workplace perks like flexible schedules, wellnessprograms and unlimited vacation time that are growing in importanceto employees. These are cheap (or free!) perks that show employeesthey are valued and appreciated. And it's time to truly embracethem.

Personally, I'd love to see some snacks in the kitchen. As itturns out, the sugar packets are not that healthy—or filling.