I went to high school in Phoenix, Arizona, 1961-1965. During that entire time I was a newspaper carrier for The Phoenix Gazette, an afternoon paper owned by Eugene Pulliam, who also owned The Arizona Republic, Phoenix's morning newspaper, and two newspapers in Indianapolis, Nowadays he is probably best known for being Vice President Dan Quail's grandfather. As you might gather from that fact he was politically conservative, and his newspapers reflected his lean to the right. But we paperboys--and at that time there were no girls among us--didn't care about that. What we cared about was delivering our papers, rain or shine, and collecting from our customers for this service.
We were not employees of the newspaper; we were, although children, legally independent contractors. The newspaper company sold us the newspapers, for which we paid them once a week, and we re-sold them to our customers, for a profit. Each paper cost us 4.17 cents, or 25 cents for six days a week, and we re-sold them for 5.83 cents per paper, or 35 cents a week. Theoretically, then, we would make a profit of 10 cents a week per customer. If you had 100 customers (most had far fewer) you would make $10.00 per week. There were no raises, no sick days, no vacation days, no holidays, no workers' compensation, no health insurance, no nothing. But we were kids, and that stuff didn't matter to us.
What did matter to us was the money. But in order to make that 10 cents per week per customer, we had to collect it from them, week in, week out. Sometimes they weren't home when we came to collect. Sometimes they couldn't afford to pay us. Sometimes they had moved away. Sometimes they refused to pay us, perhaps because a newspaper left on the porch got wet before they got home from work. The reason we didn't get paid didn't matter; if we didn't collect from each customer every week, we wouldn't make that magic $10. The newspaper company ran no such risk of nonpayment; we had to pay them their 25 cents per customer per week, whether we got paid or not. And if we didn't, we were abruptly terminated and the small cash bond we (or more likely our parents) had to post when we began carrying our routes was invaded and applied.
Phoenix was a relatively small city then, perhaps 250,000 people, and it was divided up by the newspaper company into four districts. Each district was subdivided into about 15 areas, and each area would contain about 15 routes. On the average, then, each newspaper route would have about 250 people living in it. Of course there were far fewer actual residences than that, because most people lived in family groupings from 2 to 5. So the average newspaper route would contain perhaps 100 potential customers. Each area would have one or two big routes, with that magic 100 customers, and a lot more small routes of 30-40 customers. The average route was 50-60. Boys could move up to a larger route when one became available. But they could also increase the size of their own route by selling subscriptions to the newspaper.
The newspaper company actively supported the selling of subscriptions by holding contests for the paperboys. Each new subscription earned a certain number of points, and prizes (including cash) were available for different numbers. For example, during my paperboy years I won a new bicycle, a trip to Disneyland, a trip to Seattle for the World's Fair, a week at a Dude Ranch for kids in Colorado, and several other trips, smaller prizes, and cash. Many of these subscriptions increased the size of my own route, but I branched out and sold subscriptions all over the area and even into other areas. Not that many other paperboys were as motivated as I was; in my family there was no allowance and little money even for clothes, so whatever I wanted I needed to earn.
During most of my high school years my route was downtown Phoenix, with many of my customers being banks, other businesses, and various municipal, state, and federal offices. This route had both positive and negative aspects. On the positive side, most customers paid in advance by the year or at least by the month so I didn't have to bother with collecting from them. Many tipped well, routinely adding an extra nickel or dime a week. This doesn't sound like much but when your profit from a single customer is only a dime a week it adds up. One of them (John Rhodes) offered me an appointment to West Point (he later became the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives), which I turned down. On the negative side, going in and out of office buildings and up and down in elevators doubled the time it took to deliver my papers. In a normal residential route a paperboy could throw 100 papers (we rode bikes, loading up with papers at a station somewhere inside the area and riding to our routes, then throwing the papers onto the porches or wherever the customer wanted us to) in about an hour, obviously less time for fewer papers. That would be about six hours a week, plus an additional two hours to collect. So a paperboy would make $10 for eight hours, $1.25 per hour or equal to exactly the minimum wage at the time. But if I had to spend two hours a day for the same pay, it would be $10 for fourteen hours, or only about $.70 per hour. That would not have been a very good deal for me. So before I agreed to take the route (yes, they came to me) I asked for an additional "bonus" of $10 per week, to be taken out of what I owed them for the newspapers every week. They were a little surprised by this request, from a fourteen-year-old independent contractor, but after a little negotiation we settled on $40 per month. This raised my profit back up to close to the minimum wage, and I was satisfied.
There were other ways I could supplement my income in the newspaper business. As mentioned above, some of my customers would tip, and on average I brought in an additional $4 per week in this way. Christmas tips added an additional $150-$200 per year, plus pounds and pounds of boxed chocolate. I could cash in points earned in the various subscription-selling contests. But the main supplement was the delivery of the Sunday Republic.
While the Gazette was a six-day-a-week newspaper, the Republic was delivered seven days a week. The Sunday paper was a lot bigger, and it was sold at a premium. Instead of 35 cents a week, a Republic subscription cost 60 cents. Of that additional 25 cents, 6 cents were profit for the paperboy, since the newspaper company only charged him 19 cents for it. So a 100 paper route on the Republic would theoretically pay up to $16 a week rather than $10 a week for the Gazette. The difference was that the Republic was delivered in the morning before 6:00 a.m. So for an extra hour's work a Republic carrier could bring home an extra $6; not a bad deal.
But Gazette carriers could get in on the action as well. Gazette customers had the option to subscribe to the Sunday Republic for that same 25 cents. Many, but not all, did. On average, about 60% of a Gazette carrier's customers would take the Sunday Republic. That would amount to a potential additional $3.60 per week in profit. For my downtown route, though, the number was significantly lower: only about 20% of my customers subscribed. This extra $1.20 a week was hardly worth getting out of bed for on a Sunday morning, but I soldiered through. I had a reputation as the top carrier in the state, and I wanted to maintain that.
And maintain it I did. I continued to win sales contest after sales contest, and won Carrier of Month, Station Leader of the Month, and was first runner up in Carrier of the Year. It all paid off in the Spring of 1965 when I was selected the very first winner of a Phoenix Gazette College Scholarship, $500 a year for four years, on top of any other scholarships I may have won. It was this award that put me over the top and enabled me to waste everybody's time, including my own, while I played around in the theatre for four years in college.
On the whole my experience as a paperboy was positive. It kept me out of most after-school activities in high school, but not the ones that counted most. It gave me the money that I needed to pay my own way. It taught me how to deal with difficult personalities. It boosted my confidence. Much as it pains me to say it, I owe a lot to Dan Quail's grandfather.
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