This Gen Xer charges $38 an hour to wait in line—including for the Diddy trial and sample sales. Now he’s made a business empire out of standing around all day
Robert Samuel has built a line-sitting empire. His team queues up for hours for criminal trials, sneaker launches, Broadway tickets, sample sales, and restaurants. ·Fortune·KENA BETANCUR / Getty Images
Emma Burleigh
5 min read
People are being paid as much as $40 an hour to wait in line for others—and Robert Samuel, owner of Same Ole Line Dudes in NYC, has a staff of 45 taking on the gigs. Waiting in line for anything from the Sean “Diddy” Combs case to high-fashion sample sales, Samuel typically rakes in between $25 and $37.50 hourly, and people are eager to join his operation.
There are a lot of unconventional ways to turn a dime into a dollar—and one entrepreneur struck gold by taking on the everyday annoyance of others.
Robert Samuel runs a line-sitting business in New York City called Same Ole Line Dudes; customers call and ask for someone to hold a spot for them in line, with hourly rates typically ranging from $25 to $37.50, depending on the request. The 49-year-old’s business started with the “cronut” frenzy in 2013, and now Samuel and his 45 employees queue up for hours for criminal trials, sneaker launches, Broadway tickets, sample sales, and restaurants.
In the city—where there’s a new passing craze every week—that means steady business rolling in all year. Right now he says requests are surging for the Sean “Diddy” Combs trial from media outlets like the New York Times, Washington Post, and news bloggers. Samuel’s hourly rates for that trial are $32 an hour.
Line-sitting may be an occupation that few people know exist, but Samuel took a bright idea and turned it into a successful company and 13-year-long career. With business booming, people have the chance to reel in $40 an hour waiting in line for others.
“Always be observant around everything around you. When people complain, just put your thinking cap on and see if you have a solution to what they're complaining about,” Samuel tells Fortune. “You would probably shock yourself and be on the verge of the next steps.”
You can make upwards of $40 per hour on the job
Samuel says that he always has a steady stream of interested applicants. And how big his employee base is depends on the happenings in New York. But even when the “Diddy” trial wraps, he said there will be something around the corner, like the wildly popular summer event Shakespeare in the Park.
Same Ole Line Dudes charges a two-hour minimum of $50, with an extra $25 per hour onwards. The business also has an inclement weather fee of $3 per hour in case of rain, snow, or intense temperatures. There’s an additional $15 charge for any line request going from midnight to 7 a.m., and a $20 rush fee for same-day inquiries. Hourly rates are 1.5 times higher during the holiday season, and for “hypebeast” sneaker drops, like Supreme. At $37.50 an hour, those shoe events can get rowdy, and are extremely unpredictable with supply.
In setting his own prices and ruling NYC’s line-sitting scene, Samuel says he makes far more than he did at AT&T. Plus, he gets to be his own boss. But in case you can’t snag a job working with the Same Ole Line Dudes, there’s also the chance to become a line-sitter on your own terms.
Line-sitters on popular employment website Taskrabbit charge anywhere from $20 to over $40 per hour for their services. Some of them have taken on dozens upon dozens of these waits, showing a steady stream of desire for the service. Upcharging extra dollars for things like weather, these taskers advertise standing in line for as long as 24 hours to fulfill a client request. At their independently-set rates, those lengthy jobs can mean a nearly $1,000 paycheck in just one sitting.
From AT&T salesman to launching a line-sitting business
Samuel’s business journey all started in the middle of his last 9-to-5 gig as a sales representative for AT&T.
It was 2012, and he was bummed he was going to miss his commission check due to the timing of the new iPhone 5 release. To make himself feel better, he posted an ad on Craigslist offering to wait in line to snag the highly sought-after phone. Somebody hired him for three hours, and once Samuel was at the front of the line gearing up to pay, his client informed him that he had placed an online order instead.
Unsure of what to do next, he turned around and sold his spot in line for $100. Samuel instantly recognized the exchange as a money-maker, and returned to the queue to sell another spot for the same price. Alongside the money from the Craigslist ad, he walked away with $300 that day.
“I said, ‘Well, what can I do? Wait a minute. I made hundreds just sitting on the sidewalk,’” Samuel says. “So I made social media accounts, and gradually it took off from there.”
For the first nine months, Samuel was running his business solo. He took on every line-sitting gig that came his way, and finally came into the funds to hire workers when the media covered his story in 2013. It was in the thick of the croissant-donut “cronut” craze, when everyone was fiending for the intensely popular bakery item. It always sold out in the blink of an eye, so Samuel would wait in line for many hours, pick up the pastries, and deliver them to customers. Same Ole Line Dudes can still be hired to pick up the sweets today—at $65 for two cronuts.
Now, Samuel and his employees take on a whole host of jobs. They’ve covered Sam Bankman-Fried’s trial, Ghislaine Maxwell’s case, as well as Donald Trump’s arraignment in New York City. Drawing in clients from all around the world, most of his business revolves around holding a spot in line for popular sample sales. He was even flown out to do Warren Buffett’s most recent Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting in Omaha, Nebraska, earlier this month.
Samuel’s inquiries can range from strictly business to a life-long wish to see a Broadway show—and he loves his job, because he gets to make people’s dreams a reality.
“It's the beauty of bringing joy to people just by doing something as simple as waiting in line,” Samuel says.
