Robert Samuel is a 46-year-old former mobile phone salesman who now gets paid to sit in line for others. If a client wants something but can’t stomach a long queue, they pay him thousands of dollars to do it for them. Samuel sits, standing, or sometimes sleeps, in lines: waiting for theater tickets, iPhone releases, limited edition hoodies, and more before either relinquishing his place to his customer or buying them tickets. This has been his work for nine years and before the pandemic, he was earning over $86,000 a year. The toughest gig was Hamilton where the inside of his tent frosted over.

He said, “You can get people to literally do everything for you. They can watch your kids, they can watch your pets. They can clean your home. They can pick you up from A to B, or bring you your food. So, this is just an extension of that. You can get people to do just about anything, within reason, as long as it’s legal and you want to pay.”