Business Notes SERVICES

After two decades in the shade of the local 7-Eleven, lo and behold, milkmen are making their rounds again. Customers ranging from affluent suburbanites to working mothers are paying up to $1.99 per half-gallon for milk delivered to their doorsteps. Since the Palm Beach Milk Co. opened in May with 200 customers, it has added 800 people to its routes, and it expects to tack on | 500 more this fall. Welsh Farms in Long Valley, N.J., estimates that about 25% of its business now comes from home delivery.

The main reason for the modest upsurge in men in white is the pressure on two-income families with little time for shopping. The traditional reusable glass milk bottles delivered to the doorstep also please environmentally conscious customers. The new breed of milkmen have a lot of doorsteps left to visit: despite their return, says the United Dairy Industry Association, less than 1% of all milk sold in the U.S. is currently home-delivered.