Thrills by the slice
by Paul Kita
Staff Writer
paul.kita@ohiou.edu
Dodging and weaving through the inebriated masses of Oaktoberfest, Domino's Pizza delivery man Graham Tucker searched for whoever ordered the two cheese pizzas he balances over his shoulder.
"Hey, yeah! Pizza man! Woo, Domino's!" shouted a guy wearing a polo shirt, helping a friend do a keg stand. "You are awesome!"
"This is crazy," Tucker said before stopping at another house to ask, "Hey, did you order Domino's?"
Finally a woman in a tank top approached Tucker, handed him money and took her pizzas with an ear-to-ear smile. "Thank you," she said followed by a flirtatious, "You should come inside for a while."
Tucker politely declined. He had many more deliveries to make, many more mouths to feed.
Off and on for the last two and a half years, Tucker has been delivering Domino's pizzas to a six-mile area that covers Athens and The Plains. He is a graduate student at Ohio University, working on his master's degree in history and also teaching History 348 as a teaching assistant.
Delivering pizzas part time, he averages about $50 to $100 in tips a night plus $5.15 minimum wage. Domino's covers his gas for 70 cents, flat rate, on each delivery. Other, added "benefits" -like the woman on Oak Street or invitations to do a beer-bong -come every once in a while. Even though he always has to say no to these invites, Tucker still loves his occupation.
Part of the reason, he said, is that people are generally very cordial.
"The Domino's Pizza delivery guy, to me, is sort of like Santa Claus," said freshman education major Lauren Sagar.
Accepting his pizza, senior video production major Mark Klosterman said Tucker "means a whole hell of a lot to me. He is dinner for me, my roommate and possibly even my dog."
As he drove back to Domino's Pizza, 12 Mill St., in his 1997 Buick Regal, Tucker was relaxed, at ease.
"I couldn't imagine a better college job," he said.
Tucker has previously worked at an OU dining hall, in a hardware store and as a clerk in a video store. He said he likes delivering pizzas the best.
Back at headquarters, Tucker waited for more deliveries to come in while folding boxes, snatching up pizzas that churn out of the 500-degree oven, taking calls, manning the drive-through customers and occasionally redirecting vagrant and confused drunks to the front entrance of the building.
"For this job, you have to like people," Tucker said. "Everyone is pretty nice. I'd probably pull my hair out if they weren't."
He has worked the day-shift for Halloween for the past two years, having to navigate his car through streets of people and flying beer bottles but picked up $130 in tips last year -the most he has ever made in one night.
The largest order ever to have been placed in Tucker's time at Domino's was 136 pizzas to a visiting football team party. Tucker's personal best was 60, which he had to remove the back seat of his old van to deliver. Most deliveries are only one or two -traditional pepperoni being the favorite.
One might wonder how he keeps his appetite under control being surrounded by fresh-baked pies, but Tucker said the job has spoiled him from fast-food pizza.
"I am inundated in pizza," he said, laughing. "It actually sometimes gets to be nauseating."
Most of the orders Tucker receives are from the dorms -East and South greens especially, he said.
Tucker also has observed that students tend to tip more than Athens residents, women seem to tip more than men and drunk people tip the most of all.
Tucker said two dollars is a good tip -one good enough that it might even bring him to your door faster the next time.
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