Okay, don't laugh. It's a job and it can be a darn good paying one if you have a good route. Being a newspaper delivery boy isn't what it used to be many years ago. Today, newspapers are much more efficiently run and the delivery services themselves have been upgraded drastically. Today's paper boy doesn't work anywhere near as hard as the paper boy of the 1970s. So if you're thinking this is something that you don't want to do, you might think differently after reading this review of exactly what a paperboy does and gets paid. Paper boys of the 21st century have it made. Of course this isn't a job that a 10 year old is going to be able to do anymore, at least not if he wants to make the big bucks. Today's paper routes are much larger than they were years ago. So in order to work today's routes you're going to need a car, preferably one with a lot of trunk space. An SUV, van or truck may even help. Years ago, a route was maybe 100 papers. Today, a route can be up to 1000 papers if you get a really good route. The first thing you need to do is contact the local newspaper in your area and tell them you want to route. They'll ask you where you live and try to assign you one that is close by. They will ask you if you have a vehicle. When you get hired, they will give you a destination to go to in order to pick up your papers. Yes, you do have to pick them up yourself. They don't deliver them to your door. On normal days there won't be anything more to do than to pick up the papers and throw them in your car. But on Sundays things are a little different. The Sunday paper comes in sections and before you can deliver each paper you have to put the sections together. This can be very time consuming, so on Sunday you better be prepared to get up a little earlier and work a little longer. But it's worth it because the Sunday papers are very expensive today and the commissions you get on them are very nice. After the papers are put together you will have a route sheet to look at. This will have the addresses of every subscriber. You better either know the area well or have a map with you or you're going to get very lost and your job is going to take you all day to complete. This is not good when you have people who are expecting their paper by 7 AM. After you have delivered all your papers, you return home and report in to the main office that the route for that day has been completed. They'll ask you the time of completion and how long it took you. If they see you're taking longer than expected you may not keep your job long as this will lead to unhappy customers. Years ago, when papers were 10 cents, you got paid 2 cents on every paper, or 20 percent. Today, the percentages are closer to 30 percent and with papers going for 50 cents a pop during the week and $1.00 on Sunday, you can make a nice part time income for an hour of work a day. Being a paper boy isn't what it used to be. |
