A New Orleans UPS driver makes Instagram stars of the dogs on his route!
Jason Hardesty is a young, very cute, New Orleans UPS driver who – despite the fact that he doesn’t have a dog of his own – clearly LOVES dogs!
He’s been working for UPS for seven years, and, for the past couple of years, he’s been loving on the dogs on his route and taking selfies with them that he posts on his Instagram account (@jhardesty), along with personal pictures and pictures of locations around New Orleans.
Jason has over 62,000 followers of his adorable collection.
Jami Attenberg
Jami Attenberg, author of the New York Times bestsellerThe Middlesteins,national bestseller All Grown Upand four other novels (JamiAttenberg.com), lives on Jason’s route. In March, Attenberg tweeted “I have extremely important news and it is this: my sweet UPS guy has a hashtag of all the dogs in the neighborhood.” And she linked it to #pupsofjay.
Hardesty said, “I think I gained like 10,000 followers in 48 hours.”
Dogs Love Jay!
Just to give you some idea of Jay’s mojo: In 2016, 6,755 postal employees were attacked by dogs nationwide. That is 200 more than in 2015 (about.usps.com).
Linda DeCarlo (U.S. Postal Service Safety Director) says “Even good dogs have bad days.”
Jay must really have some great vibes, because we all know that dogs and delivery people DO NOT get along. Yet, his story goes against all we’ve heard of and known of for years.
It’s kind of stunning that Jay has received the loving responses that he has from the dogs on his route.
Two years ago, Jay was given a new route. He said the dogs on his old route were family dogs; they were protective of “their” kids and not very friendly. “The dogs did not like you,” Jay said. Now that he’s on the new route, the people are younger and the dogs are friendlier.
He said there are around 30 to 50 dogs on his route, but he doesn’t get to play with all of them (“I’d get in trouble.”)
Pooch Portrait Days
Fridays are Pooch Portrait days. These are the days when Jason snaps selfies of himself and the furry friends he’s making while delivering packages. Jay told Linda Poon at CityLab.com, “I don’t want my Instagram page to be known as the dog page. So I tried to do it only on Fridays, and I pick the cutest dog of the week. Well now there’s a waiting list of seven dogs that I have to post, but every Friday around 4, 5, or 6 [o’clock] I’ll post one.” These are the days when our NOLA UPS driver makes stars.
There is a waiting list of dogs to appear on Jay’s IG account!
Don’t forget to follow #jhardesty on Instagram!
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Resources:
#jhardesty on Instagram
citylab.com