The hot new side hustle: standing in line
Ricardo Rey for BI
After her job contract for the City of New York ended amid the pandemic, Tanya was left scrambling. The 55-year-old was juggling roles as an adjunct media professor, community activist, and writer in New York City, but still needed some extra cash. A friend introduced her to Taskrabbit, where she spent a few years earning money by running errands, working the odd event, and pet-sitting. Then in January 2024, she came across a side hustle she'd never seen before: someone was offering their services to stand in line. It was something, she thought, she could also easily do.
In major cities, standing in line has become all the rage, a "scene" unto itself; hourslong lines are now the price of entry to secure restaurant reservations, concert tickets, brand merch, bagels, and more. Retail brands are leaning into the luxury of the real-life experience, offering more exclusive events and you-had-to-be-there sample sales that bring out hundreds of fans. When the Hailey Bieber-backed beauty brand Rhode did pop-ups in New York and London in the fall, for instance, people waited in the cold for seven hours just to snag a single tube of lip balm.
In order to beat the queues, professional line-standers have become a growing part of the gig economy. While the cash-rich, time-poor have been sending their assistants ahead to get early access for years, more people are joining them in outsourcing their time. Bookings for professional standing line services on Taskrabbit experienced an 18% increase in the US in November and December compared to the previous year, the company found, earning those willing to wait an average of $27 an hour. For people with more money than time, it's an easy way to save a few precious hours. For those who wait, it's not a bad deal.
The process to become a line sitter is simple: Tanya, who asked that we just use her first name to protect her privacy, will get a notification saying someone is interested in hiring her to stand in line. After reviewing the details and making sure it is something she can do, she will contact the client and ask for specifics.
Certain restaurants like the pizzeria Lucali in Brooklyn — which saw a 30% increase in bookings the month after Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce made an appearance — only take in-person reservations, leading to long wait times.
"You need to know how many people they have in their party and what time they would like to go," Tanya says. The first people in line for a popular spot typically show up a couple of hours before a host comes out to take reservations. When it's Tanya's turn at the front she will tell the host the client's preferred timings for later that evening. "I also always ask for alternative times because you never know where you're going to get until you're up there," she adds. The client then comes back at the reserved time to claim their table.
If clients don't want to fork out for the extra hours to guarantee a front-of-line spot, Tanya can't make any promises.
Tanya quickly learned that different lines have different protocols. Waiting for Broadway tickets or an art gallery is not the same as waiting in line at a popular restaurant. For "the really sought-after places like Lucali and Don Angie" she says, she's started charging a two-hour minimum for clients to have a shot at a reservation. If clients don't want to fork out for the extra hours to guarantee a front-of-line spot, Tanya can't make any promises.
One time a client insisted that Tanya start waiting for a reservation at Lucali at 3 p.m., an hour before reservations are taken. She didn't end up getting the reservation. "They were disappointed," Tanya said, adding that they "hesitated to pay." But she has never been stiffed for failing to get a spot.
"Some places the process is very predictable," she tells me. "In other places, you have no idea whether you're going to get a spot or not."
Tanya charges $20 an hour. Clients will generally book a day or two in advance, but sometimes she will activate same-day tasks and take on last-minute requests. She normally makes herself available on Friday nights and weekends, averaging about three-line-standing bookings a week and earning between $60 and $200. "It's definitely one of my most consistent task categories," Tanya says. "It's relatively easy, but then it's not. You do have to have patience and you do have to come prepared."
Her longest line to date was for tickets to Gutenberg! The Musical! on Broadway. "It was a limited engagement and it was closing," she tells me. "People were really going crazy trying to get these tickets." It was January 2024 and one of the coldest days of the year. The client had paid for her to stand in line from 6 a.m. until the box office opened at noon. Other people didn't start showing up until 9:30. "I was freezing, it was brutal. It tested everything I had," she says. Despite wearing two coats, two hats, a scarf, and two pairs of gloves, "I couldn't even feel my hands or my face," she says.
To make the wait slightly less gruelling Tanya brought a stool to sit on to and a hot drink to sip on. She also listened to a high-energy playlist she had compiled specifically for these types of gigs, featuring hits from The Greatest Showman, Michael Jackson, and Beyoncé. "The last thing I would listen to is something really slow that makes me sleepy," she says. The client, a local New Yorker, met her in the line shortly before noon so that they could both purchase the two-ticket-limit each. On top of $120 for standing in line, they gave Tanya a $50 tip.
Professional line-standing is not limited to New York. Jennifer Goff, 38, first tried her hand at making some money from waiting in line at a Game of Thrones pop-up bar in Washington, DC, in 2017. After three hours of trying to convince those already in the queue to hire her to stand in for them while they went for a drink or grabbed some food, someone bit. From there, standing in line snowballed into a full-time business. She launched Skip The Line, which now employs five people part-time and charges $30 to $40 an hour for their services. Goff has stood in line for concerts, book signings, new iPhones, and releases of limited-edition liquors. However, her most lucrative jobs are standing in line for Supreme Court hearings.
"They generally only allow the first 50 people in line to attend the oral arguments," she tells me. "So people do have to line up, sometimes for days." In November, she was booked to stand in line 24 hours in advance for the US v Skrmetti Supreme Court hearings, which dealt with whether minors could receive gender-affirming care. In 2023, she was booked 36 hours in advance to secure a spot at the United States v. Donald J. Trump hearings, which addressed presidential immunity. For bookings of this length, Goff's team will work in shifts that range from about four to eight hours at a time. If they need to quickly grab a snack or use the bathroom, other members of Goff's team will keep an eye on their spot. For both cases, she got her clients seats in the courtroom.
If you can find one way in this world to make your life a little easier, why wouldn't you take it?
Goff has found that others in the line are interested in hearing about her services. "It's a popular topic of conversation," she says. "When you're standing in line for a very long time, it's natural to start chatting with others around you. There will also be some folks who keep to themselves or have headphones, but for the most part, no matter the line, people like to converse with each other."
Tanya, for the most part, works alone. "I used to work as a reporter," she tells me, working 12 to 14 hours straight covering breaking crime stories. "I would go for hours and hours when I was on assignment and not even eat or go to the restroom." Standing in line, in comparison, is light work. "I can hold it," she says.
At some of the most coveted spots, Tanya will be one of many hired line standers. "They know my face, I know their face." Sometimes, it can get competitive. In the Lucali line recently, five people tried to slip in ahead of her as she approached the front, but she stood her ground. "It was cold, I'd been waiting for two hours," she recalls. "It was not gonna happen."
As lines get more time-consuming and competitive, more services have sprung up to help people save time. Startups like LineLeap allow people to pay to skip the line at bars, clubs, and concerts it has partnered with, while credit card companies like American Express have snatched up restaurant booking apps to offer their cardholders more exclusive opportunities. Online marketplace Appointment Trader lets people buy and sell reservations, and subscription-based apps like Access charge up to $300 a month to reserve tables at top restaurants.
Of course, the economics of line-skipping don't work out in favor of everyone who has to camp out in the cold — something anyone who has watched people bypass them in the fast pass lane at an amusement park can attest to. For that reason, some venues don't allow line skipping. A new law in New York is also cracking down on the restaurant reservation black market, requiring third-party reservation apps to obtain consent from restaurants before they can market and sell their reservations. Popular spots like Saturday Night Live have outright banned paying to bypass the line and many restaurants disapprove of it, so Tanya has to convince the hosts that the reservation is for her. "I've gotten smarter," she says. "I memorize the person's name and act like they're with me."
Still, some people get mad when they realize she is being paid to stand in line. "One person asked me, 'How early do you get here?'," Tanya says. She explained her process and that she had to start arriving earlier and earlier to beat out other line standers. "'That's not really fair,'" the person responded. "'If everyone in line is getting paid to do this, it leaves the rest of us with less chance to get a reservation.'"
Tanya and Goff were quick to defend line skippers. Goff's clients range from attorneys and activist groups to journalists without press passes and individuals physically unable to endure long waits. It's not just for the wealthy; the services allow people to choose what they value more — time or money. "Life is busy. You don't owe an explanation," Tanya says. "If you can find one way in this world to make your life a little easier, why wouldn't you take it?"
Although Tanya waited in line at Lucali over 20 times last year, she's never waited for herself. Her personal line standing mainly involves getting tickets to Broadway shows. "I wouldn't say never," she says about waiting for Lucali, "but I think I'd do it on a nice day."
Eve Upton-Clark is a features writer covering culture and society.
