It’s Girl Scout Cookie season, and just like nearly every other annual tradition or celebration, it looks a bit different in the time of COVID. But that doesn’t mean people can’t get their beloved Thin Mints or Samoas — they just might be doing so in different ways this year.
Technology is key to 2021 cookie sales, with Girl Scouts creating websites using the Digital Cookie platform to take online orders, according to AnneMarie Harper, public relations director for Girl Scouts of Colorado. Girl Scouts have been busy sharing those links with family, friends and neighbors, but people not lucky enough to have a Girl Scout connection can visit www.girlscoutsofcolorado.org/cookies to purchase cookies from a local troop and have them shipped directly to their homes.
A search using the 80501 ZIP code returned more than 75 Longmont booth locations for today through March 7.
And websites are just the start for Scouts.
Diya Mehta, a sixth grader at Flagstaff Academy and a member of Longmont-based Troop 77029, created door hangers complete with a link to her cookie-selling site and a QR code that can be scanned to place an order.
Eleven-year-old Diya, a Girl Scout since second grade, is in her fifth year of selling cookies. Last year she said she sold “400-something” packages. This year, she started out with a modest goal of selling 100. But on Monday, one day after sales officially got underway, she had already upped that goal to 150 based on response not only on her site, but also to an order booth she set up in front of her house. She had sold 122 boxes as of Monday.
Diya said her fellow troop members also are seeing similar early sales success.
The money raised from cookie sales supports projects of local troops’ choosing, Harper said. Troops can use the proceeds to pay for travel, service projects, supplies for activities — “anything they want to do together, they can use cookie money for that,” she said
But the value of selling cookies goes beyond the money raised. It also helps girls as young as kindergarten build people skills through selling, learn budgeting and marketing, and set goals, Harper said.
“The cookie program is vitally important for so many reasons,” she said. “... They learn how to talk to people, learn how to work together as a team, to set a goal that is reasonable and work together to meet that goal.”
Count Diya among the girls who have learned such lessons. Among the things she said she’s learned from selling cookies are marketing, business skills and money management. Add some math in there, too, since she and fellow troop members, when they were younger, would race to come up with totals tied to sales.
“The main thing is it's really fun and teaches me a lot of life skills that are good to know later in life,” Diya said.
In addition to setting up cookie-selling sites, some troops across the state also are holding virtual booths, and some are even employing a drive-up model for sales, Harper said. And some will be allowed to set up booths outside retail locations, including Walmart stores, she said.
Another Longmont Troop has teamed with Community Cinemas, or CommCi, to provide carside delivery at the drive-in movie events this month.
In addition to the fare provided by local restaurants and popcorn and chips, attendees of the Friday night drive-in events also can order Girl Scout cookies from the food menu and members of Troop 3031 will deliver them to attendees’ vehicles, according to the release. The movie lineup for February, which is Black History Month, is “Blazing Saddles” on Friday, “The Princess and the Frog” and “Hidden Figures” on Feb. 12, “Moana” on Feb. 19 and “Black Panther” on Feb. 26. Admission is $31 per car and proceeds benefit County Collective, El Comite, the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition and other local nonprofits. Learn more here.
For people that haven’t found a website, event or booth at which to get their cookie fix, a free Cookie Finder app is available on iOS or Android, and a text to 59618 also will direct people to virtual or drive-thru cookie booths, according to Harper.
The Girl Scouts also have a new collaboration with Grubhub, which will allow girls in select Colorado locations to take contact-free pickup and delivery orders. Girl Scouts will track and fulfill orders placed at www.grubhub.com/food/girl_scouts, manage inventory and more, all using Grubhub’s back-end technology, according to Harper. Those deliveries are only available within a 20-mile radius of regional offices; the closest regional offices to Longmont are in Loveland and Denver.
Grubhub waived all fees to make the delivery option feasible for sales without reducing proceeds, according to Harper.
This year’s cookie choices include Thin Mints, Samoas, Tagalongs, Trefoils, Dos-si-Dos, and Lemon-Ups for $4 a package, and S’mores and gluten-free Toffee-tastic for $5. Sales end on March 7.
People who might have to pass on cookies of their own or who end up purchasing more boxes than they need — Harper admits she can’t say no and often finds herself in that latter category — can also buy a box or two for local nonprofits or first responders through the Girl Scouts’ Hometown Heroes program. Those donated boxes are delivered at the end of the cookie program, and Harper said it is always inspiring to see girls recognize members of their community with some sweet treats.
Also inspiring is the way both Scouts and cookie buyers have embraced the new approach to sales this year, she said.
“There’s lots of excitement at the beginning of our cookie program,” Harper said. “The girls are pumped, the customers are pumped. People know that Girl Scouts need support now more than ever. And what can be better right now than a box of normal, a box of Girl Scout cookies.”
