MossRoad
Super Moderator
- Joined
- Aug 31, 2001
- Messages
- 58,353
- Location
- South Bend, Indiana (near)
- Tractor
- Power Trac PT425 2001 Model Year
Up here, our motor route papers are delivered to a box on your mailbox post due to the weather. Many years ago I was visiting relatives in Cincinnati and their paper is just put in an orange plastic bag and tossed into their driveway. I asked how they find it when it snows? They laughed at me.... it only snows a few times per year. But still, you have to play hunt for the paper when it does.
When we bought our first house back in 1985 it was in the city, with foot routes, and we were still an evening paper weekdays, morning paper Sat and Sun. Kids still had paper routes that they could do after school. They had to collect money back then. So many people refused to pay, and a lot of kids didn't like carrying money because they'd get robbed on collection day, that it was almost dangerous for the carriers to collect. I always told my wife if we had one person that stayed on the route for 1 year, I'd give them a large tip at Christmas. I stopped counting somewhere over 20 carriers after 5 years.
The paper switched to all pay-by-mail, so that made it easier for the carriers, as they didn't have to collect.
Then, the paper switched to all morning paper 7 days per week. The town went into an uproar! All those kids will lose their paper routes because they can't get up that early on school days........... turned out only a small percentage of the carriers had been with the company more than 1 year, and of those that had been there over a year, only a handful weren't adults. There just weren't any more long-term non-adult carriers, despite what people thought. They all recalled how kids got paper routes and kept them for years, passing them down to siblings, or another neighborhood family when they left for college. It just wasn't the case since the early 80's. With very few exceptions, it's been well over 30 years, pushing 40 years since kids had paper routes.
When we bought our first house back in 1985 it was in the city, with foot routes, and we were still an evening paper weekdays, morning paper Sat and Sun. Kids still had paper routes that they could do after school. They had to collect money back then. So many people refused to pay, and a lot of kids didn't like carrying money because they'd get robbed on collection day, that it was almost dangerous for the carriers to collect. I always told my wife if we had one person that stayed on the route for 1 year, I'd give them a large tip at Christmas. I stopped counting somewhere over 20 carriers after 5 years.
The paper switched to all pay-by-mail, so that made it easier for the carriers, as they didn't have to collect.
Then, the paper switched to all morning paper 7 days per week. The town went into an uproar! All those kids will lose their paper routes because they can't get up that early on school days........... turned out only a small percentage of the carriers had been with the company more than 1 year, and of those that had been there over a year, only a handful weren't adults. There just weren't any more long-term non-adult carriers, despite what people thought. They all recalled how kids got paper routes and kept them for years, passing them down to siblings, or another neighborhood family when they left for college. It just wasn't the case since the early 80's. With very few exceptions, it's been well over 30 years, pushing 40 years since kids had paper routes.
