Milkman - Summary

Summary

Milk deliveries frequently occur in the morning and it is not uncommon for milkmen to deliver products other than milk such as eggs, cream, cheese, butter, yogurt or soft drinks. Originally, milk needed to be delivered to houses daily since the lack of good refrigeration meant it would quickly spoil. The near-ubiquity of refrigerators in homes in the developed world, as well as improved packaging, has decreased the need for frequent milk delivery over the past half-century and made the trade shrink in many localities sometimes to just 3 days a week and disappear totally in others. Additionally, milk delivery incurs a small cost on the price of dairy products that is increasingly difficult to justify and leaves delivered milk in a position where it is vulnerable to theft.

In the United States, houses of that era often had a "milk chute" built into an outside wall, a small cabinet with a door on the outside for the milkman to place the milk bottles, and a door on the inside for a resident to retrieve the bottles. Thus the milkman could deliver the milk without entering the home, and the resident could retrieve the milk without going outside.

While rare, milk delivery does still occur in the United States; in 2005, 0.4% of consumers had their milk delivered, and a handful of newer companies have sprung up to offer the service.

In recent times, British, Irish, and other European milkmen have traveled in an electric vehicle called a milk float, except on rural rounds. Earlier milkmen used horse-drawn vehicles; in Britain these were still seen in the 1950s. In Australia the delivery vehicle was usually a small gas or diesel engined truck with a covered milk-tray. In hotter areas, this tray is usually insulated.

In India milkmen usually still use milk churns that are no longer used in western countries. On the road they are put on any kind of vehicle. In big cities like Mumbai those milk churns are often transported in luggage compartments in local trains.