What do you guys think about beverage companies?

[MikeJ]

HI guys,
Today Friday 3/14/2014 I set a personal best delivered $13,890.00 for the State Liquor Store. Now I know in Food delivery $13,890.00 is not even a whole days work, but for hard liquor that's a lot of booze. I had one stop that was 131 bottles and the total was over $3,000+.


I was really busy because of St.Patrick's day on Monday, every account that my liquor store has ordered in above average quantities! Even the smaller customers ordered heavy well they ordered heavy for them at least. I was talking to a Budweiser Distributor driver this morning at my first stop and he said that, there slammed at his Budweiser Distributor right now.

One thing that's kind of interesting is I have become familiar with some of the other guys out on the road per say, like one of the Beer distributors I am familiar with one of there drivers because him and I pretty much stop at the same places we see each other at the same places on the same mornings every week because we have the same customer. Does that ever happen to you guys? Like do you talk to and see other food service drivers because maybe your at a joint account and are delivering at the same time?

Any how I saw that Superior Beverage Group out of Solon and Youngstown, Ohio is hiring they had a help wanted sign up at my truck driving school and being that I am currently in the beverage delivery business my self working for the State of Ohio Liquor Agency I thought that maybe working for one of the beer companies would be cool, what do you guys think about beverage service vs food service?

Also when you guys are out delivering do ever have kids in school buses wave to you?
I was headed to my last stop of the day today and I pulled up next to a school bus and gosh it must have just been second or maybe third grade age children, any how I was sitting next to the school bus at a red light and these two little girls as cute as can be waved to me and I waved back and they both giggled to each other and feel back in there seats. I couldn't help it I giggled to my self when that happened, heck I'm still smiling about it right now when I think about it ha-ha it certainly put a different spin on the day and put things in a different perspective. It's funny when that happened I thought about Grocery Throwers Story with the two girls who appeared over the fence.

Any how thank you for reading and as always thank you for your input, I'm going to go fry some fish right now out in the garage and I'll talk to you all soon.

Mike in Cleveland

 

[Moneyman01]

I was a route helper for a pop/beer distributor before I started driving. I don't want to do pop or beer again. Foodservice is easier because you don't have to merchandise it. Don't have to build them Damn displays and make it all look pretty. Plus kegs can be a pain in the ass.

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[grocerythrower]

Mike, we are stealing all of Pepsi's workforce..lol, thats typical, either you stay in bev or you move on to foodservice, trust me foodservice is your best bet but coke or pepsi or beer can be a starting point if ya can get hired, you will get experience with a tractor trailer that way. I have heard if you get on with a union bev company then those guys rarely give it up to go elsewhere. My boss told me about budweiser in Boston, those guys have been there forever and deliver to the neighborhoods they grew up in, thats pretty cool.

 

[Moneyman01]

Here there are beverage companies that are union and they don't do stairs or merchandise it. Drop and run. Then it wouldn't be bad

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[MikeJ]

Here in Cleveland Coke and Pepsi have merchandisers, at the grocery stores. The big truck come's in the morning or afternoon and they back up to the loading dock and they unload the skids that they need to unload. Then the merchandiser comes in and actually builds the displays and restocks the shelves. Then the merchandiser leaves and goes to the next place. The store then will restock the shelves them selves if pop runs really low. However at the gas stations and smaller grocery stores and convenient store outlets you the driver are stuck merchandising all that stuff and making it all look pretty.

I know at my main liquor store the beer truck comes and delivers what ever cases it is told to deliver and then either the sales reps from the beer distributor show up and build the displays or the grocery store it's self puts everything up.
I know with hard liquor the sales reps from what ever company come into the liquor store and build the displays. Hard liquor though is a whole different animal then beer and pop it is heavily regulated by the state and actually in Ohio all liquor is property of the state until the end user customer buys it.
Like all the liquor I deliver is property of the state liquor warehouse and considered in the states inventory until I have a check in my hand for the bottle.

Actually driving a tractor trailer for the state liquor warehouse is an okay job, it's a mix between bumping a dock and doing like Family Dollar type work where you have to roll all the booze down the rollers into the agency store.

I did apply for a job at Superior Beverage as a route helper Superior Beverage actually had a tractor trailer driving job that didn't sound that awful, second or third shift running trailers between there three warehouses and some of the Breweries here in Cleveland. Great Lakes is the primer "Micro Brew" here in Cleveland and Superior is the distributor for Great Lakes and Coors. The job was mostly drop and hook. It wasn't the right job for me because obviously I don't have enough experience, but if I did I would have threw my name in the hat.

I will say this doing beer would defiantly be good driving experience they get those trucks into some pretty tight places. Smith Dairy is also a place I would consider and actually Smiths would be cool because a lot of there fleet are those cool "10 wheeler" straight trucks that you see from time to time nice Peterbuilt's they go to a lot of restaurants, convenience stores and grocery stores delivering Milk, Ice Cream and other dairy products. They have a pretty nice private fleet.

I figured I could wrestle with some of the kegs and other stuff for a little while, probably wouldn't be a bad first job and I get to know some of the customers and all that stuff.

 

[MikeJ]

Mike, we are stealing all of Pepsi's workforce..lol, thats typical, either you stay in bev or you move on to foodservice, trust me foodservice is your best bet but coke or pepsi or beer can be a starting point if ya can get hired, you will get experience with a tractor trailer that way. I have heard if you get on with a union bev company then those guys rarely give it up to go elsewhere. My boss told me about budweiser in Boston, those guys have been there forever and deliver to the neighborhoods they grew up in, thats pretty cool.

I have a couple accounts that I deliver to where I have to handle pop and pop is an absolute pain in the rectum. I've broken cases and broken cans and have had all kinds of stupid things happen when delivering pop. The one account we have they were having a 600 person event over one weekend and they order the most 7 Up I have ever seen in my life and I literally had a stack of 7 Up 12 packs 10 feet tall in there storage room. That was fun especially when it all feel over ha-ha. :poster_stupid: It was this big leaning tower of 7 Up the place ordered so much pop that they ran out of room to store it ha-ha.

I will say this pop is a fairly decent value you get a lot of pop for a couple hundred dollars ha-ha.

 

[Lazlo]

I was a route helper for a pop/beer distributor before I started driving. I don't want to do pop or beer again. Foodservice is easier because you don't have to merchandise it. Don't have to build them Damn displays and make it all look pretty. Plus kegs can be a pain in the ass.

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Amen to that. I worked for Coke when I started out and remember the first 3-4 months as the hardest in my life. Side load stunk. Lots of small 5-15cs stops, lots of money to collect, gas station people yelling at you to get the 75cs of 20oz bottles in their cooler while you're yelling at them that you can't because there's so much crap all over the place you couldn't even walk IN the cooler. Liquor store calling in on you after you refuse to pick up empty shells sitting by the dumpster because you witnessed a homeless guy pissing on them(true story-happened to me and I wasn't going to touch them).They run all their tractors until they absolutely don't run anymore. I started driving there in '98 and they were still running an '85 GMC topkick everyday. NOTHING in the fleet was air-conditioned, summertime was absolute hell.
Money was awesome though, I got on a 4 day bid but being in my early 20's I always worked 5. Retirement and insurance were good too.
Did it for a few years and wouldn't go back. We're right next door to the Pepsi warehouse here and they keep applying so I don't think it's any different now.

 

[Moneyman01]

I started there as a merchandiser when I was still in high school. Once I graduated I switch to route helper. The company has all new equipment now and they send the old equipment to other warehouses. I worked out of the corporate warehouse. Still sucked tho

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