Archive for February, 2014

One of the drivers destroyed his wheel in a head-on accident with another bike today. I knew there had been an accident as soon as I saw the bike outside the store. The rim was beyond warped, bent over like a Pringle.

“I like your front wheel modification,” I said to Aaron, the bike’s owner. The only other time I’d seen a wheel like that is when I got pushed over by a car leaving a garage. “When that happened to me the guy gave me 200 bucks!”

“Yeah, I got hit by a homeless guy,” Aaron explained. He was threading an alley into the Epicenter, rounded a corner and came crashing into the other bicycle. Or, more likely, the other bike crashed into his. “Did his bike get messed up?” I asked. “Nah, I’d kinda feel bad if it did, but his bike was totally fine. His wheel must’ve just rolled over mine.” It’s just another day at the shop.

Valentine’s night was predictably slow. I worked just 3 hours because business was dead. One of my coworkers was in an unbelievably good mood, she said, because she had broken up with her boyfriend and wasn’t taken anymore.

I had caught a ride to town in my roommate’s Subaru today. My car wouldn’t have made it through the slush. Not having the car meant taking the bus home tonight.

After work I waited 20 minutes in the Uptown transit station. The first bus didn’t show. I was staring at my phone when I heard a dad shout to his little girl. “I’m gonna leave you here! I’m not even jokin’,” he said laughing. He stopped, walked slowly away, and glanced back playfully. The girl smiled, ran and caught up with him and hugged his leg. I made eye contact and laughed with the father before they played a game of chase and disappeared. I saw another man holding hands with a woman, a little bit of some pink and cellophane gift poking out of his jacket.

The marquis counted down, 3 minutes, 1 minute, and then rolled over to 10 minutes again. The 9 bus finally pulled up to its spot as a crowd of passengers coalesced into a huddle by the door. Once onboard I moved to the back, sat down and glanced around. One couple sat on the back bench, the man’s knees almost touching mine. “How’s y’all’s Valentine’s going?” I asked. “Aaagh, could be better,” he said in a loud, enthusiastic growl. “We been gettin’ run around all night, trying to find a hotel room. We just gave up. We’re just gonna wait and have our Valentine’s on Sunday.”

“That’s the way to do it…,” I offered, trying to cut the tension of the negative response, “…when no one else is out.” “Yeah, that’s true,” he said. He asked me about my drawing, and I showed him my sketchbook. We rode in silence until he got off at his stop, leaving his girlfriend aboard. I wished him luck with the next date. “Yeah, thanks man,” he smiled and waved.

My mind wandered. I noted the young man who took the place of my interlocutor. He chose one of the two available seats, but then slid onto the hump spanning them to avoid being too close to either neighbor. Another couple disembarked, and the young man sprang up and over to the far end of the bench. My stop came. I mounted my bike and cruised home.

This isn’t the first time I’ve ridden the bus. I had commuted by bus for most of last fall, winter and spring, before I bought my current car. I didn’t always enjoy the constraints of transit. But I’ve come to realize how unique a place the bus can be, a classroom to learn about other people and cultures and human behavior. Anyone who never has should commute by bus at least one week. It’s a guaranteed way to learn something new about yourself and others.

Our company redid its online order system before I left 4 months ago. Drivers were mostly unhappy with the new system, although I realized we were all getting bigger tips. The site allows users to pre-select a tip amount, usually $2 (the standard tip), $4 or 10 percent of the total. While the system should be good news in that it promotes good tips, it’s a bad idea for a couple reasons.

The first problem is incentive. Suppose you order a sandwich at noon and add a pre-tip. If a security guard calls in a cash order at 12:05 and the same driver takes both for delivery, chances are your stomach will be growling while the guard is chowing down.

The driver’s reward from you is fixed, regardless of the time and energy he expends reaching you. But that same driver can wow the security guard by pedaling straight to her and earn himself an above-average tip. Only then will he leisurely cruise your direction.

The second problem with pre-tipping is that drivers won’t see increased reward for increased effort. This is one of three characteristics that make for meaningful work, as described in Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers. (The other two are autonomy and sophistication of tasks, in case you were wondering, although this article makes a good case for the overarching importance of significantly affecting others’ lives. But I digress.) So not only is your driver going to take his time getting to you, but he’s also going to like his job less overall.

But it’s not all bad news. There is one way this system differs from, say, the downfall of communism. If a driver–I can only speak for myself–if I get sent with just your order and a healthy pre-tip, I am more likely to get there quickly out of appreciation for the tip. Good tippers just get it. I like customers like you. And it’s more than sentiment; I want to reenforce your tipping behavior, and I’ll bend over backwards to please you.

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As an aside to my readers, I’ve been keeping track of how my delivery customers pay, what they tip and a few other notes. I’m doing a quantitative study to test my hunch on mood and tipping, and I also want to look for tip correlations with gender and race as well as weather. Do people give sympathy tips when drivers getting snowed on (as is forecast this week)? Do they tip because it’s sunny and they feel chipper? Will they stiff when it’s cold and cloudy? I’ll be doing this kind of project, and I’ll produce stories on Charlotte news from street level. Expect 2 to 3 posts a week, and stay tuned!

It’s hard not to notice the diverse temperaments of the people I deliver to. Some seem downright displeased even when they get everything they order right on time. Others are cheerful even when their food is late, or when they had to wait for their forgotten tea to be run back. It’s encouraging that some people can have such a positive attitude in the face of inconvenience. But I cringe to imagine the kind of life negative people live through, frustrated and angry with every small road bump.

One interesting thing about negative and positive customers is their their attitude and tip amounts don’t seem to correlate. It seems, more often than not, a person has decided what they’ll tip before they order.

“You know what I’d like to see? I’d like to see you sweep this floor.” That’s Vicky. “You know what? I’d like to see me sweep this floor too.” We banter non-stop in the store. “I need to you dust around all the vents. You just extend this thing like this, and then when just when you think it can’t get any bigger…” I give Vicky a smart-alecky smirk while she’s talking. “You know what I mean!” she laughs.

During the lunch rush, drivers carry on with innuendo and defiant shouting non-stop. It’s normal to hear, “Welcome to Jimmy’s,” and “Hell no! You get them damn chips down yourself!” in the same breath. Conversation can be colorful enough to make a sailor blush, but usually it’s a hairbreadth shy of offensive. Some customers walk in, pick up on the conversation and give a cautious grin. Most appreciate the irreverence, opening up and joining right in. Only a few clam up, stand quietly and wait for it to end.

The perfunctory fake niceness found in most retail environments is nowhere to be found at our store. Today, Jacob greeted a nice looking lady with, “Hey, welcome to Jason’s Deli!” (Not our store.) She failed to contain a grin. While she was still paying he called to the next guest, “Hey, welcome to Jarell Cooper’s!” (A famously lazy delivery driver at the store.) The man looked confused, then grinned.

On Saturday a customer asked for the Italian Nightclub, no pickles. He just laughed when Vicky called out, “Number 9, extra pickles,” in a perfect, bored deadpan. And that’s rare. It is a rare workplace where the fun is so infectious.