Question:
Well due too my dispatcher of over a 1.5 years deciding she had ennough with the trucking business and quiting. I am having a difficult time with the new one, have decided perhaps its about time to try another aspect of trucking. I have chosen food service as one day I hope to open a resturant and it will perhaps give me some interesting exp. with diffirent resturants. I am aware of the difficulties related in the unloading of these items at 8-12 stops aday. I have not looked into the pay rates but home everynight with the 1 year old will be valuable too me also. Ok look forward to hearing from others on this sector of the industry, nothing is final for me am still weighting my options.

Answer:
Most of the major food service companies pay pretty good. Good benefits for your family and it will keep you in good physical shape.
There are back door receiving time schedules you may have to juggle.
Some food service companies run as many as 30 + stops a day. These I would stay away from. Not because of the physical work, they tend to experience more customer relations problems with the food service company, which may affect you directly.
20 to 25 stops a day should be about the max, this way, you can offer better customer care. I would think being in MN. the number of stops would be limited, especially in the winter months with those Alberta Clippers and snow storms. Just like the Mailman, no matter what the weather, the food must be delivered.
I don't know what kind of physical shape your currently in. It takes about two weeks to work out the physical kinks. In a month you'll be ok.
I use to do multi stop years ago in Fl. I only had to deal with sun and rain. I cannot imagine working in that type of trucking environment when it's 50 degrees below zero.
A number of years ago the record temp. fell to 60 below in International Falls MN. I missed that by one week. The week eariler I was headed to Lethbridge Alberta from NJ. From Wi. all the across, it was 20 to 30 below, buuuuuur!!!

Answer:
get a combination hand truck/snow blower and chain it up
When Crete built the new building in Lincoln,they made a spot for delivery drivers to back up to the side door and right inside was the elevator,it was a low loading dock for,sysco,ups,fedex ect.
It was also the smoking area and one day I asked the sysco driver if his other stops where set up like this for deliveries,you want to hear a driver go on a rant,ask questions like that
get the point,almost nobody designs places for the delivery drivers.
The last year or so with Crete I was loading them plastic food containers(clamshells) and delivering to mostly food distributers and their drivers seemed to be pretty laid back.
If your polite and pleasant,give it a try,most people are decent to deliver to and most places won't be a nightmare for parking.

Answer:
Some time ago I worked for a major pizza franchise corporation, we delivered everything they needed to run their stores. Before the truck left the dock you had to inventory everything that was on the trailer and make sure you had everything( it was all going to one store or another, nothing extra)
If you run solo, you pretty much ran 15 hours,if you were team,the run could be 24 to 30 hours plus(and even though you were sleeper berth, you still got out and helped unload at each stop to keep the pace going, being that you were paid by:
total weight of truck, mileage, downtime hourly.)"how long do ya want to be out here"
You can make good money, but in some cases your going to work real hard for it.
Alot of the stores could only be serviced at night when business was a little slower or when the stores are closed ( had keys and alarm codes)
because some were hard to get into, being in strip malls (tricky backins,blind spot backins,or needed to have an empty parking lot to maneuver around in.)
You would work, part of the daytime, and then rush hour to rush hour, all night (best time to run) can be hard on the body clock.
Most customers are relatively easy to get along with (just find out what they reasonably expect when you deliver, and do it) then theres those that can really be a pain because they've been given a little bit of control
and then they acked like the antichrist or something. Just do your best, but don't lose any sleep over them.
You being in MN don't forget your snow shovel in the winter and maybe some ice melt. People in the stores don't really go out of their way to make your job easier, much less move cars out of the way before you arrive when you are on a solid schedule and they know your coming.
You want to be very alert!, all of the time!, Its not hard to get injured at all. (slippery floors,coolers, ice, ramps, to heavy of a two wheeler load, steps,Questionable characters,(lock your truck always) low clearences (the truck and your head) ETC.
Sorry to get long winded, but theres alot to be aware of, and know, and learn. Its not bad work,but it can be real challanging at times,and a little reputitious. No 2 days are the same

Answer:
NO matter what the weather, your going to be in it,pack a bag of extra stuff to include socks and work boots (moving around as much as you do the feet get hot and sweaty,if your out long hours its best if you can change your foot wear part way through the run) Suggestions: zip up stealtoe fulls, lowquarter rubber overshoes.Even if you don't use your extra weather gear its there if you need it, and there will be times when "glad I brought this along" instead of "I wish I brought this along"
Always make everything(work) you do count (efficentcy) you can always see someone doing something that makes more sense than what your doing or doing a certain part of the job easier than what you may be doing. (even guys younger or with less experience may just by nature do something that is more time effective or easier)
Don't be to proud not to adapt it,if it makes more sense. Time is always a facter, Its always better to be ahead of the game in the beginning of the run,or else your trying to play catch up throughout the run, which is no fun as you get near the end and your naturally starting to slow down a bit because your starting to get tired.
Sometimes that can't be helped because of the unexpected, but avoid it, if its unnessary , get on a roll early and keep the momentum going.
OK,OK, I'm done babbling for now, but think about It!

Answer:
I had a intown route delivering food.
Was good money. Truck load and routing not driver friendy. Everything delivered on a 2 wheeler.
Any where between 12 to 20+ stops. Some places will not let you deliver during lunch time. You have to wait or try to work around it.
About 50% driving 50% lumping. Hard work you have to move fast and not screw around or you will never get done.
When I first started you never got the same route.
Half the battle is finding where the places are and were you have to go and deliver it.

Answer:
Did you guys have to pull a 53 ft trailer around? Because I usually see the food service guys with smaller trailers which is a plus.

Answer:
Thank you all for your input. I have decided too put it on the backburner for awhile. The company I was considering was Reinhart Food service. They indicate 15-25 stops a day pay based on how much product, stops, mileage. I have become abit leary though as they are always looking for driver's and I was not able to get information on there pay package very easily. My calls too my terminal manager regarding my new dispatcher helped greatly and he is ran me right this week, although I did end up going too Dallas Tx abit out of my regional range, however it proved to be a good adventure.

Answer:
Foodservice? I did it for a while. Pays ok. You will probably get paid by the piece, the mile, and the stop. The trailers are from 48's to small pups. Dont be fooled by the small pup trailers. They can hold alot, espically when you have to unload ever piece on a hand cart, wheel it in, go up a few flights, or down a few flights of stairs. You have to dig for the pieces on the pallets because the warehouse people load it screwed up, everytime, everday, always. You will be driving in places that were never made for trucks. Docks? not to many of them in restuarants. Customers can be jerks. As far as being home everynight, depending on the run you will be. But, it wont be for long. I never had a day less than 14 hours long. And thats not including drive time to get to work. Also, ever wonder how you get to all those stops? Well i will tell you, you follow directions from a computer. They are rarely correct, and if you do try and follow them its a pain in the *** driving with a handfull of directions in one hand, and the steering wheel in the other. Is it worth it? in my opinion, NO. The staying in shape thing, think of this, you just drove 5 hours to get to your first stop, for the next 5 hours you will be busting your butt to get all your stops done and the truck unloaded, just so you have the drive time to get home. Run into trouble from a jerk customer, or from traffic, or weather, and your stuck. Your run for the next day will get cancelled, and you will have to expain to your boss why you didnt get back in time. If your lucky you might get a helper, but unless that helper is good, your screwed. Like every other trucking job, add up all the hours, and you would get paid better workin at walmart as a people greeter. Myself, im going back otr, when i get off my butt and get motivated

Answer:
I was pulling anywhere from a 28' to 34'/36'trailer. Working 4-10's 12 to 14 hours was not uncommon sometimes more when I first started. O/T after 10 each day. Also had a Bonus program worked on how many pieces you got delivered in an hour. A pup holds a lot of cube when it is packed to the back and you have to deliver it by hand on a had cart.

Answer:
SOUND LIKE YOU WORKED WHERE I DID DID YOU DELIER CHICKEN ,PASTA, SEAFOOD? SUPERVISOR RICKY.?
lets roll

Answer:
The company I worked for delivered all types of food products. I wont tell the name of the company I worked for just because there are some pretty nice people that work there and Im not into bashing companies just because I didnt like the job. I remember one day I was trying to find a stop with those directions they gave me, I couldnt find the stop so I called them and asked for help. Well they didnt have any clue on where the stop was, and the customer was closed, no contact numbers to call, no nothing. Since I had to deliver over 200 pieces to this place I gave it one more shot. Needless to say, I never found the place, I got so pissed I slammed the brakes on and the pallets in the trailer all slid forward, blocking the side doors to the cooler and freezer. LOL, talk about frustration. I drove the truck back to the company and told them I was leaving. I only did it for a year or so, I guess hand unloading 20-40 thousand lbs of crap every day, 4 days a week takes a toll on the mind. If I was to ever go back into foodservice, it would be with a union company. At least some of them pay you for going up and down steps.

Answer:
Food service/distribution was the second highest paying gig i've had. We rarely got backhauls so as soon as you got empty you dheaded home empty and empty miles paid exactly the same as loaded except you could get back faster because you were lighter.
I don't think this is something you could/should do long-term; It is for if you need fast cash now sort of thing. I know a few cats who have and are doing it long-term but they might not be considered too bright?
If you don't like unloading, then this is probably not the gig for u.
If i can dig up my old checks, i will post them.