A Domino’s delivery driver was robbed twice. It was originally reported that the driver had to pay back the money that was stolen from him, but that turned out to be incorrect.
It is true that Domino’s has a policy that drivers carry less than $20 on them. They even put it on their advertisements. Domino’s figures that people out there won’t bother to rob driver for only $20.
I don’t think Domino’s really thought that one through. A quick search for “pizza delivery robbery” shows that this is not an uncommon occurrence. Robbers seem to usually take the pizza, because “when you’re hungry, you’re hungry.” If the robbers manage to get a couple of bucks and a cell phone in addition, it’s what they were after. Ambushing and robbing a pizza guy is not exactly an Ocean’s Eleven type caper.
Given the number of pizza delivery drivers that have been shot, the argument could be made that being a pizza delivery driver is one of the most dangerous jobs in America.
It’s a good thing then that Domino’s has a strict no guns by drivers policy because “if an altercation [were to] occur, it would put the company in a position of looking poor.”
That’s what will make Domino’s look bad, a driver defending himself from an ambush. The driver having his brains splattered all over the place, well… that’s just the cost of doing business.
I have never delivered pizzas. Hopefully, I’ll never have to. But whenever I go somewhere new in the dark, I’m packing. It’s not the $20 in my wallet I’m protecting, or even my old Samsung. I’m armed because I don’t want to die or spend the rest of my life being fed through a tube because of some punk.
Maybe if a few drivers did deliver some hot lead instead of a hot pepperoni, they won’t seem like such easy marks and will stop getting robbed.
It can be a regular customer, but the thugs catch you on the street or in the parking lot on the way to deliver. Those damned light up roof signs even identify you at a distance.
I was a manager of a (poorly run by a shitty franchisee) Domino’s Pizza just on the “not Detroit” side of the Detroit/Suburban border for a good long while.
Three of my five drivers carried. They knew I knew. I knew that they knew I knew. None of us ever said a word about it.
I worked for Pizza Hut for 2 years. Same stupid “no guns” policy. I carried. At least 3 other drivers I knew carried. I suspected 3 others carried as well. That was out of a pool of 8 drivers.
I delivered pizza for a few years, and was fortunate enough to do so in the safer portions of the city, and this was before I owned guns of my own, but I did still exercise caution once or twice.
I deliver pizza for a smaller company. 4 or 5 years ago, a Pizza Hut driver was robbed at gunpoint in our area. He managed to defend himself and put 3 rounds in the assholes guts. Pizza hut fired him because a dead driver is cheaper than a dead criminal. Besides, the criminal could be a future customer or employee. Right after it happened, I asked my boss if I would be fired for defending myself. I got told that as long as I have a permit and am other wise legal, I was good to go.
The owner of the company carries and so does one of his managers. The owner of the store where I work doesn’t carry, but he does like it when I’m there at night.
We did have a driver robbed about a year ago. They took his car keys, his wallet, the pizza and the money. He immediately had his family leave the house and went home and changed his locks. With his ID and keys, they knew where he lived for a future robbery.
You forget that delivery drivers also by definition have a CAR, which no matter what kind of rattle-trap it is, is worth a LOT more than $20
Richard Davis, the founder of Second Chance, the first Kevlar body armor company, was a pizza delivery guy in Detroit. He got the idea for using Kevlar, which was developed for use in tires, as body armor when he was robbed at gunpoint by two misunderstood youths who called in a fake order. He shot and killed both of them.
If I were a pizza delivery driver, I’d carry, company policy be damned. Not to discredit the job, these are people working their tales off for a living, but if some corporate drone finds out and fires you, there are a ton of Mom & Pop pizza places (around here, at least) that will hire you. It would be better to be looking for a new job than be slaughtered by some thug.