BURST
He is known as The Legend. Like every superhero, Vancouver pizza-delivery guy Charlie Cowley has a vehicle with superpowers: A two-door, 1982 Chevy Chevette.
It doesn’t have performance, advanced technology or bat wings, but it does have durability, character and a certain no-frills cachet.
Cowley, 69, has been delivering pizza, steaks and souvlaki dinners for Minerva’s Restaurant in Kerrisdale for 37 years.
The car’s odometer only has five digits, but Cowley estimates he has clocked over 500,000 kilometres in the Chevette.
“Maybe nobody thought it would last this long,” he said.
He had it painted GM factory orange after the original silver paint wore off. His friend, Art, helps him find the increasingly rare parts that keep it on the road. “He’s the unsung hero in all this,” said Cowley.
The car is so eye-catching, Minerva’s customer Brent Butt, of Corner Gas fame, once came running out of his house in excitement when Cowley pulled up with a delivery.
“He’d been looking all over for one for a film,” said Cowley. “But it was too late.”
Cowley’s trusty ’82 Chevette doesn’t burn rubber or pull any fancy maneuvers on the road, but it gets the deliveries to the doors — and that’s where the magic happens.
Dennis O’Reilly, a retiree, and his wife in Dunbar are regulars. They have been ordering from Minerva’s and taking deliveries from Cowley since he started there in 1988. Their usual is a large pizza — half Minerva’s Special, half pepperoni, mushrooms and peppers.
That Cowley arrives with clockwork reliability — car shining, smile beaming, bag of good food in hand year after year, whatever the weather, political or social climes — means something to O’Reilly. It’s something about community, says O’Reilly.
He shows up, no matter what, in good humour.
“It’s remarkable,” said O’Reilly. “After so many years, we look forward to him coming every week.”
Cowley feels the same way about his regulars. “The best part about the job is when I walk up the driveway and see their eyes light up,” said Cowley, who is part of a team of four delivering for Minerva’s.
“We get paid by the hour, and tips are a bonus,” said Cowley. He covers his own gas — premium, because the Chevette’s engine suffers from run-on when he uses the cheap stuff.
Now that the credit card machines have pre-programmed tips of 18, 20 and 22 per cent, he occasionally has to gently let a client know that when they manually plug in the number 15, it sometimes rings up as 15 cents, not 15 per cent.
One customer who ordered every day, would tip 1 cent one day, 2 cents the next. Cowley doesn’t hold a grudge. “Now there is a delivery charge, so maybe he thought that was a tip,” said Cowley.
Occasionally, he gets a big spender. A $100 tip on a Super Bowl order, or $20 on a $10 order.
Like any celebrity, he gets recognized from time to time. A stranger in a supermarket once yelled out, “Hey, I know you,” and announced to everyone within earshot, “This guy’s a legend!”
For years, Cowley had a uniform, as recognizable as any superhero garb: Duck-themed T-shirts. “ What the Duck?” “Duck off.” “No Ducking Way.”
But it got to him. “When they start calling you Ducky, it’s time for something else.”
Now he scours Value Village for T-shirts with images of cars.
The delivery business is challenging these days, what with SkipTheDishes, DoorDash and Uber Eats all competing for a slice of the pie. But Cowley wouldn’t dream of leaving Minerva’s for a crack at the gig economy.
“Nope,” he said. “It’s about the people you work with.” And besides, he doesn’t have a smartphone. He would have to learn to use an app.
He’s got his route, and his regulars — the ones whose eyes light up when they see him — and it feels good. “I delivered to them, and then I delivered to their kids. They are my friends.”
When he’s not delivering Greek and Italian dishes for Minerva’s, Cowley builds 1:8 model cars and trucks. He has had to move recently, and rentals are more expensive, so he’s in a Burnaby studio, where he can’t really spread out.
“I usually work on a model for a couple of hours before work, and then until 2 a.m. or 3 a.m. when I get home, but I don’t have enough room for that now,” said Cowley.
He was hoping to retire, but since the downturn in the economy, that is out of the picture.
“I was hoping to slow down a little bit, but with the economy it’s tougher these days,” said Cowley. “The car is feeling its pains now too.”
But Cowley has learned a thing or two over the years about keeping the faith, words only a legend can deliver to the rest of us about life: “Just be a good person, and things will work out.”