Students, scouts, sprinters and rowers are among the many taking to the streets this month, delivering old-fashioned phonebooks.

Many of the books may even be delivered by New Zealand's fastest man.

Several local groups are taking charge of delivering to the region, with the deliveries making up an essential part of their yearly fundraising efforts.

Tauranga Athletics Club, home of self-proclaimed fastest man in the land Joseph Millar, has been delivering Yellow Local books for almost 50 years.

Joseph, who has raced against Usain Bolt and holds three national records (and counting), is one of around 60 club members who takes part in making sure the books end up on their rightful doorsteps.

Club life member Malcolm Taylor says families and kids get on board, as well as life members who have long stopped running, but still lend a hand.

'Last year, we delivered around 16,100 books, and we're only expecting this number to grow as Tauranga keeps on expanding.

'Bagging the books for delivery actually takes the most time. We have our sprinters do it because the deliveries take place around the same time as Nationals, and we need to save their energy,” he laughs.

Recently, 14 club members attended the New Zealand Championships, and 10 came home with medals. With so many rising stars, it's not surprising the majority of funds raised by the club's participation in the book deliveries goes towards helping to send members to compete overseas.

Another group benefitting from delivering Yellow Local books is Omokoroa Point School, who have been involved for two decades and take charge of delivering around 2500 books to rural areas.

Omokoroa Point School principal Vicki Knell says they spread the load over 33 families of our Year 7 and 8 students.

'They deliver to country roads and up the back of hills. The families are delegated their streets and off they go.

'All the funds raised by the Yellow Local book deliveries go towards a trip to Northland. It is a six-day camp in Kerikeri, where the students stay in a marae and learn about the history of New Zealand and Bay of Islands.”

Mt Maunganui College, Tauranga Girls College Rowing Club, Bellevue Athletics Club and Te Puna Scouts are also delivering to Tauranga.

Yellow CEO Michael Boersen says the goal is to help connect people with their communities.

'And what better way than to have locals delivering the books themselves, with their efforts directly benefitting their organisations?”

Combined, the Yellow print and digital directories receive 450,605 lookups in Tauranga each month. 84 per cent of lookups in the Tauranga Local book result in a phone call to a local business.

Those wishing to opt out of receiving next year's phone book and join the 658,000 kiwis using Yellow digital products each month, can do so by visiting www.ypgbooks.co.nz or calling 0800 803 803.

Students helping out with packing.