The questions usually start in the fall: When will the Girl Scout Cookies arrive?
This year was no different, with some Upper Valley Scouts finding an increased demand for the beloved Thin Mints, Tagalongs and other flavors when cookie season kicked off earlier this month.
“I completely demolished my record. My goal was 85 boxes but I ended up selling 140-something,” said junior Girl Scout Stella Swan, 10. It’s the most she’s ever sold.
Before cookie season started, Stella’s parents had told their daughter to anticipate selling fewer cookies than in past years because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In past years, Stella would sell cookies door-to-door in her Lebanon neighborhood and join other members of Troop 10659 outside area businesses to catch customers.
This year, Stella and other Scouts throughout the region have largely pivoted to online sales. The girls have set up websites through Girl Scouts of America and have been reaching out to people electronically instead of face-to-face. Though sales goals in some cases have been reduced, cookie sales remain brisk, thanks in part to a more proactive customer base.
“I have found more people than ever reaching out to me to see if Stella is selling cookies before we started spreading the word,” said Stella’s mother, Kristin Swan.
For Kylie Tilton, a 13-year-old Cadette in Unity, the majority of her Claremont-area troop’s sales have come from booths set up outside the city’s Walmart. But when the pandemic came to the Upper Valley last March, area Girl Scouts were nearing the end of cookie season, and booth sales were canceled.
This year the troop, run by Kylie’s mother, Tara Tilton, is adjusting to the new cookie-buying reality.
“It’s been good,” Kylie said. “We’ve been texting some of our friends. We’ve been leaving the door hangers on people’s doors.”
They’re in the process of organizing contact-free drive-thru booths, where people who didn’t preorder cookies can still purchase them. While online sales have been commonplace for a few years, they’ve made up a fraction of the hundreds of boxes the Scouts have sold, according to Tara Tilton.
“I think that all of our girls would much rather see everyone in person than Zoom, but we adapt,” Tilton said. “That’s what we teach the girls: to adapt.”
Scouts have also learned new ways to communicate with prospective customers.
“I’m doing a lot online,” said Valentina Machado, 5, a Daisy in Troop 10659. “I ask my family to help me.”
Parents have helped their Scouts film promotional videos, compose emails to prospective cookie buyers and create flyers to put in neighbors’ mailboxes.
“It’s a positive that all of our girls are being tasked with how to network a platform like Digital Cookie,” said Troop 10659 leader Erin Buck. “Having those expectations and those skills is also something they need to become young adults and be successful.”
In addition to raising money for Girl Scouts and their troops, cookie sales provide financial breaks to Scouts going to camp or other programs. Buck’s 10-year-old daughter Acadia plans to use the funds to go to camp, where one of her favorite activities is glow-in-the-dark archery.
The Lebanon’s troop’s sales were lower than anticipated last year with the onset of the pandemic,
Last year, Acadia’s goal was to sell 5,000 boxes of cookies and due to the cancellation of booth sales in March and April, sold 1,890. Troop sales were similarly affected and as a result, they halved their box goal from 10,000 to 5,000, Buck said.
“Cookie sales are going well,” Acadia said. “This year my goal is to tell 400 boxes.”
They’re also planning a digital campaign to encourage community members to purchase cookies to donate to essential workers. All delivery will be contactless: People can either pay to have their cookies shipped to them, or area Scouts can deliver orders to customers’ homes. Those who usually buy their cookies from Scouts outside stores can go online to connect with a Scout in their area.
“My favorite part is taking the money and giving the cookie boxes and also just kind of doing it with friends,” Acadia said.
That in-person experience is something that Kylie and other scouts will miss as well.
When booth sales were suspended last year, some troops were left with a surplus of cookies, said Susan Henderson, who leads a Daisy troop in Lebanon. Parents took on a grassroots effort to sell the remaining boxes. Some stores have said Scouts cannot set up booths this year, but have offered to hang up flyers instead.
“It’s really the beginning stages of learning how to run a business,” Henderson said. “I have to say that despite the pandemic, all my girls are really excited about selling cookies this year.”
That’s the case for 6-year-old Daisy Scout Khloe Sarantopoulos and her mother, Kassandra, who leads their Daisy troop in Plainfield.
“I learned about talking to people and counting,” Khloe said. “Selling cookies is one of my favorite things with my mom.”
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