I drove for Domino’s when that policy was still in place. Here’s why that policy was such a problem.
As a pizza driver, you were supposed to come in, look at the runs that were ready to go, and take the oldest one (maybe two, very occasionally three). The drivers decided which runs to take. So if you saw a run that you knew was going to be late, you just didn’t take it, and left it for the next schmuck.
But why would you do that? What did it matter to the driver whether the corporate policy was “30 minutes or it’s free”? Because if it was late, the driver had to pay for it. (And of course, no tip.)
I never had a late run, but I drove very dangerously sometimes to ensure that never happened.
I never had a late run, but I drove very dangerously sometimes to ensure that never happened.
Snowcrash intensifies
The driver had to pay for it
Is that even legal? Not that it matters since nobody enforces laws against corporations or politicians…
Probably not legal, but who was going to fight it? The teenage pizza drivers?
They’re all franchises, could have just been my shitty owner, but somehow I doubt it was just the one bad apple.
Only after the pizza joints all dropped “30 minutes or less” did the large pizza companies add those advertising signs to their delivery driver’s cars. This to me is a tacit acknowledgement by the pizza companies that they knew their drivers were driving dangerously before they dropped that policy.
Snowcrash
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snow_Crash
The Deliverator belongs to an elite order, a hallowed subcategory. He’s got esprit up to here. Right now, he is preparing to carry out his third mission of the night. His uniform is black as activated charcoal, filtering the very light out of the air. A bullet will bounce off its arachnofiber weave like a wren hitting a patio door, but excess perspiration wafts through it like a breeze through a freshly napalmed forest, Where his body has bony extremities, the suit has sintered armorgel: feels like gritty jello, protects like a stack of telephone books.
When they gave him the job, they gave him a gun. The Deliverator never deals in cash, but someone might come after him anyway – might want his car, or his cargo. The gun is tiny, acm-styled, lightweight, the kind of gun a fashion designer would carry; it fires teensy darts that fly at five times the velocity of an SR-71 spy plane, and when you get done using it, you have to plug it into the cigarette lighter, because it runs on electricity.
The Deliverator never pulled that gun in anger, or in fear. He pulled it once in Gila Highlands. Some punks in Gila Highlands, a fancy Burbclave, wanted themselves a delivery, and they didn’t want to pay for it. Thought they would impress the Deliverator with a baseball bat. The Deliverator took out his gun, centered its laser doohickey on that poised Louisville Slugger, fired it. The recoil was immense, as though the weapon had blown up in his hand. The middle third of the baseball bat turned into a column of burning sawdust accelerating in all directions like a bursting star. Punk ended up holding this bat handle with milky smoke pouring out the end. Stupid look on his face. Didn’t get nothing but trouble from the Deliverator.
Since then the Deliverator has kept the gun in the glove compartment and relied, instead, on a matched set of samurai swords, which have always been his weapon of choice anyhow. The punks in Gila Highlands weren’t afraid of the gun, so the Deliverator was forced to use it. But swords need no demonstrations.
The Deliverator’s car has enough potential energy packed into its batteries to fire a pound of bacon into the Asteroid Belt. Unlike a bimbo box or a Burb beater, the Deliverator’s car unloads that power through gaping, gleaming, polished sphincters. When the Deliverator puts the hammer down, shit happens. You want to talk contact patches? Your car’s tires have tiny contact patches, talk to the asphalt in four places the size of your tongue. The Deliverator’s car has big sticky tires with contact patches the size of a fat lady’s thighs. The Deliverator is in touch with the road, starts like a bad day, stops on a peseta.
Why is the Deliverator so equipped? Because people rely on him. He is a role model. This is America. People do whatever the fuck they feel like doing, you got a problem with that? Because they have a right to. And because they have guns and no one can fucking stop them. As a result, this country has one of the worst economies in the world. When it gets down to it – talking trade balances here – once we’ve brain-drained all our technology into other countries, once things have evened out, they’re making cars in Bolivia and microwave ovens in Tadzhikistan and selling them here – once our edge in natural resources has been made irrelevant by giant Hong Kong ships and dirigibles that can ship North Dakota all the way to New Zealand for a nickel – once the Invisible Hand has taken all those historical inequities and smeared them out into a broad global layer of what a Pakistani brickmaker would consider to be prosperity – y’know what? There’s only four things we do better than anyone else
- music
- movies
- microcode (software)
- high-speed pizza delivery
The Deliverator used to make software. Still does, sometimes. But if life were a mellow elementary school run by well-meaning education Ph.D.s, the Deliverator’s report card would say: “Hiro is so bright and creative but needs to work harder on his cooperation skills.”
So now he has this other job. No brightness or creativity involved – but no cooperation either. Just a single principle: The Deliverator stands tall, your pie in thirty minutes or you can have it free, shoot the driver, take his car, file a class-action suit. The Deliverator has been working this job for six months, a rich and lengthy tenure by his standards, and has never delivered a pizza in more than twenty-one minutes.
It’s a novel that was a major contributor to cyberpunk culture. It could probably be viewed as a predecessor for movies like Ready Player One. The cyberworld in Snowcrash is what the Metaverse was trying to duplicate. I envy you getting to experience it for the first time.
The Deliverator’s car has enough potential energy packed into its batteries to fire a pound of bacon into the Asteroid Belt. Unlike a bimbo box or a Burb beater, the Deliverator’s car unloads that power through gaping, gleaming, polished sphincters. When the Deliverator puts the hammer down, shit happens. You want to talk contact patches? Your car’s tires have tiny contact patches, talk to the asphalt in four places the size of your tongue. The Deliverator’s car has big sticky tires with contact patches the size of a fat lady’s thighs. The Deliverator is in touch with the road, starts like a bad day, stops on a peseta.
Honestly there should be a whole book based on that one chapter, that was such a cool concept
It’s fertile ground, that’s for sure. But Stephenson does this. He concocts these little vignettes to build the world up, and then ends it, always leaving you wanting more.
It’s been ages since we had a proper Crazy Taxi style-game. I want a Deliverator game, but I’d settle for a Cyberpunk:2077 mod.
I did have some used 245/60s on stock steelies in the back of my 70 Oldsmobile at that time.
Pretty sure the driver paying for it is illegal too.
I remember there was also a landmark court case where the companies, especially domino’s, had to pay for drivers getting into accidents, and class them as employees instead of contractors.
Pizza places did a lot of shady shit back in the day.
by using a paper map like some sort of mystical land pirate
Oof, I remember going to people’s homes to install phone and Internet links using paper maps because we didn’t have maps on our phones back then and the GPS were mostly shit and out of date.
Some of the smaller villages were barely there on the regional maps, aside from maybe a dot near a main road with none of their actual streets.
For these, we’d call or stop by city hall, sometimes they’d have a shitty map or just directions.
I’m getting old…
That brings back some (mostly annoying) memories!
I recall wanting (and maybe using?) an option on MapQuest on dialup to choose how many of the turn-by-turn targeted maps to download, to save time and ink.
And I recall having to factor in dial-up map image download times and printer print-out times, into my total travel-time calculations.
Yes, I should have downloaded and printed the maps the night before, but my mother had a phone call with her mother.
I did this as well. When it was new, it was freaking revolutionary.
Barely a decade prior to that, you’d have to call AAA, give them your itinerary, and they’d mail you a custom triptik for your journey. And it would cost. You can still get these, but why?
Good backup in case your phone shits the bed or you end up somewhere with no data
Wow, actually wondering about your age and the country. Pretty interesting and I am not even that young.
Not OP. Decent smartphones have been around for less than two decades. I used to have a Windows Mobile PDA with GPS and navigation software (I had one called Navigon), those sucked at the time, lots of outdated maps and terrible navigation… “It’ll get you there, but don’t expect to take the best route!”.
Of course it was all offline navigation, 'cause back then we paid internet by the minute!
It wasn’t even that long ago, I delivered for Papa John’s in the late 00s. Some of the guys had tomtoms, but they were always out of date, and would lead you astray more often than not.
We mostly just used a giant laminated map of our delivery area that was attached to the heat shield of the pizza oven. You’d be surprised how quickly you can memorize the layout of a small city when your pay is dependent on it.
I haven’t been back to that town since college like 20 years ago, but if you gave me an address there, I could still prob pin point it on a blank map.
Yup, I delivered pizza for the Hut around the same time. Big ol’ map of the area divided into sectors, each order listed which sector the address was in. I’d write directions on the back of the order slip, and go off into the night with nothing but a flashlight. First day I got a lecture by the manager on how to navigate by address and tell which side of the street a house was on, I learned more about navigating that day than in the entire rest of my life.
Sometimes I miss those days and wish I could be 19 and driving my tiny Honda Civic through the highlands again, listening to video game songs downloaded from OCRemix on my little MP3 player plugged into the car audio with a tape adapter.
Lol, I too delivered in a Honda Civic. I feel like there were like 4 vehicles back then with decent mpg.
Though my tape deck was broken, so I had to use one of those things you plugged into the cig lighter and tuned to an unused radio frequency. Oddly good times, when I think back to it.
how to navigate by address and tell which side of the street a house was on, I learne
Whether the number is odd or even, right?
And often ran red lights, had very small delivery areas, and people literally died for their pizza.
30 minutes or it’s free was short lived.
My weed dealer in the 90s was our local pizza delivery guy. Brilliant business model.
It’s actually kinda funny. His name was Neil, and his best friend/partner in crime was Bob.
Everybody loved Neil and Bob.
Buddy of mine went on a dominoes kick a while back. They have an automated system that lets you get 60pts if the delivery was slow. He would spend 20 for bread bites and put no tip and “contactless-knock loudly” in the instructions(if they were on time and knocked, he would give them the 20 he kept next to the door…ONE driver earned the 20…that was it). They took forever and he didn’t care, then he would collect his 60pts. He had 600+pts banked at one point because he couldn’t spend them fast enough. Every Saturday we all got together to catch up and hang and he would have pizzas delivered for free, well the $3 delivery fee. LOL
Those morons never figured it out. He still does it sometimes, but not as religiously.
Edit: plenty of confusion in comments.
-Dominoes gives you 10pts per order. You can spend 20, 40, or 60 on ‘free stuff’. 20 is little stuff like bread bites and 60 is pizza. -If the delivery is slow, you get an automated email letting you get 60pts right away. -He did not “pre-tip” on paying for the order (which I agree with…tips are extra for good service and they haven’t provided a service yet). He did leave a note to knock. -The drivers saw no pre-tip and as revenge they delivered slow and refused to knock. (Behavior that shouldn’t be rewarded with tips) If they did still deliver on time AND follow instructions (ie. the bare fucking minimum) they would get a very high% tip.
As I understand it, he got a normal order twice to get 20pts. Used that on the bread bites for free during the week when he wanted a snack. When the drivers slowed his order because they didn’t get pre-tipped he got 60pts from the automated system. Three more days that week he would get bread bites (he works from home) and each one would be slow and get him 60pts each from the automated system. So, for the cost of 2 normal orders and delivery fee of 4 bread bites he would have 180pts at the end of the week. 60 is a free pizza or larger item.
The drivers that didn’t get tipped did it to themselves (be on time and knock get over-tipped) and they also cost the restaurant money (dominoes stupid system also be at fault there too).
Hope that cleared it up. (This is second hand, so I think I have the order of events right)
Your buddy is an asshole and back when I did pizza delivery he’d absolutely be at the bottom of any delivery list.
I’ve never understood this mentality. I just took orders and delivered them. All of my drivers would lose their shit about which orders were tipping what, so I’d just grab the contentious ones and get them done. I can’t tell you how many of those turned into some of my best customers and also some of my wildest experiences. Also, a few people that were expecting to be treated like shit for not pre-tipping would then call in to thank my manager for my service and attitude despite it, I remember one was a single mother who looked, traumatized, when she opened the door. We were allowed to comp a certain number of orders a night so I did that for her and she just started crying. I never forget that one. So not worrying about it literally paid for itself with several raises and a promotion. Sure, there were dickbags who would stiff you but it all came out in the end. So, my advice is to just do your job and it will work out. If people see that they can rely on you to get it done right every time then they are far more likely to tip better on the next one, so just treat every delivery as one you’ll be tipped for later. If you’re not getting paid, then get a different job. ,
I did get a few unconventional tips too. One guy would just give me a beer and then the option to drink it real quick with him (stupid, I know, but I don’t drink anymore and luckily I never killed anyone). There was a group of Canadian travelers that would give me an entire case when they came through. And also an entire bag packed tight with very potent weed, in exchange for my delivery bag. I have no idea why they wanted it so bad, but while considering it they gave me a shot of something and then they flashed me. I wasn’t actually considering what to do. I was already really stoned at the time and was struggling to get the words out that I would accept. But the unexpected tits sobered me up instantly and I handed the bag over. My buddy realized that I was trashed when I got in that night so he put me on dishes for cover. When it was discovered, I blamed the missing bag on a dickweed that had recently been fired and they asked no more questions. An older guy gave me a pirate Lego set, it was a little island with a palm tree and a treasure chest. And a delivery that was technically outside our area but missed by the computer turned out to be a ring holding and famously nicknamed NFL player. His driveway was a very long previously unmaintained road that had once intersected a road in our service area. But that was blocked off and access was from the other side of an enormous housing development of mansions. Never knew that was a thing. There were a lot of pools. And lights. That’s all I remember though.
Because people just want consistency. If you get 15 percent all night it’s better mentally and financially then betting on the guy that plays games with your income. That money is rent, groceries, keeping the car going, and maybe some beer. You make me wonder if I’m going to make rent just because you think you’ve got some inside line on motivation and I’m going to deliver cold pizza anytime there’s another order at the same time.
That’s hilarious.
Because nowadays the amount of times deliveries are screwed up, I tip afterwards. I put a small tip on the order.
When someone gets it right, I’m way too happy and I might toss them 20cad.
Just for not fucking up.
(I’d always tip 5-10 on a pizza from a pizza place if I ordered directly from a pizza place and the pizza place had their own pizza place delivery drivers. Pizza place)
He paid for 10 orders and wouldn’t tip unless they came on time . Only one person got tipped $20 by not being late. His secret was since he didn’t tip in app people were less motivated then probably he became a shitblist house making his service worse. After 10 orders he got a pizza party free with points.
But he still had to buy the bread bites, which you have to account for the price of in the price of the “free” pizza party. Bread items are also among the most overpriced things on the menu, so from Dominos’ perspective they might not have been losing any money at all to the guy who thought he had figured out how to scam them. wait nvm
