Question for Girl Scout parents
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Anonymous
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As Girl Scout cookie season approaches, I’m curious… what do your kids’ troops do with the cookie proceeds?
My elementary age daughter is in her 3rd year of scouts, and other than minor outlays for snacks at meetings, I’m failing to see where the funds go. Our troop is participating in a winter outing (a painting event at a studio) and the cost per girl (to be paid by parents) is $50. Not that I can’t afford it, but I’m wondering… if the cookie $ doesn’t go toward something like this, then what does it go toward? I’m thing of non/confrontationally approaching the leader to ask but wanted to anonymously crowd-source first—in case Im missing something. Thoughts? |
Anonymous
| Ours usually goes to trips like that but there's it also costs a fair amount to run normal meetings. |
Anonymous
| We spent almost $400 on a "glamping" local camping trip with our third grade troop |
Anonymous
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The troop leader and money manager should give an annual report on the finances. I think you could nicely ask for that. The girls should also get an annual report on what they made in cookie sales and make a joint decision on how to use it. For instance, one year my Brownies decided to use a portion to buy food to make sandwiches for the homeless and the rest of an ice skating lesson. I think the next year they used some to buy supplies for the animal shelter and put the rest towards a pool party (pool admission fees plus pizza and cake). Another year my cadettes used their money for a dave and busters party, and another year the used it to pay for admission tickets for Hershey park (parents paid for hotel room).
There were a couple years in the pandemic we used it just to pay tegistration fees and waive dues for the troop since I felt bad about asking families to pay when we weren’t sure what we would be able to do. We’ve also used it to cover some smaller expenses for smaller things like archery badge program, etc. If your troop doesn’t have dues, it may be covering something like a room rental for your meeting and the costs of badges. Did you ask your daughter if they talked about what there were going to do with cookie money? I would start there. She must be at least a second grader, and they should be discussing this at meetings. |
Anonymous
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Our troop funds would pay for an outing like you describe, OP.
Also for annual registration fees, uniforms, badges, art materials for projects, camping sites and food, event fees, etc. Girls only pay for events if rhey are individual activities or if there isn't enough in the account to cover it. |
Anonymous
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We use ours to pay for:
--refreshments/supplies at meetings --outings that have a fee (we sometimes ask parents to split the cost because we were having problems with people saying they were attending and then not showing up) --badges --end of year celebration |
Anonymous
Oh--we also cover the renewal membership fees for the scouts and the adult leaders. |
Anonymous
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GS leader here. You (/the girls) should be voting at the beginning of the year on what they want to do and determining a budget from there. For our troop, very few participate in cookie sales but everyone pays dues. The money goes to 1) uniforms, 2) insignia, 3) badges, 4) food for meetings, and if we make anything useful from cookie sales we'll plan an outing (probably to the zoo or something equally accessible, and the money will just pay for snacks).
As the girls get older I hope that more will sell cookies so we can fund camping trips. |
Anonymous
| This is information that should be easily available to parents. You should just ask the leader and say that your child doesn’t know and you want to explain it to her. Some kids sell cookies to earn cookie credits to pay for camp. Just ask. It’s a legitimate question. |
Anonymous
| I am curious if the fund should be ALL used by the end of school year ( like before the last meeting in mid June)? I predict not every girl scouts will re-enroll next school year for whatever reasons in the same troop. |
Anonymous
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OP here - thank you for all the replies! Very helpful. I had no idea other troops were so transparent with their financial info. I don’t believe we have a treasurer, just a leader who does it all. No info provided about cookie profits but I do know we had several girls who sold 200+ boxes and we did several booths, so like I said, I’m curious where the $ goes if we’re covering activity costs individually. I’d be more than happy to give up cookie sales, lol.
I will report back after discussing with the troop leader! |
Anonymous
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OP again, to add in reply to the GS leader who replied above:
Our girls pay for their own uniforms and annual membership fees. Is “insignia” membership fees? Troop pats for badges and meeting snacks. We did have a campout last year which was covered by the troop. I helped out with cookie sales last year and so I know everyone in the trip sold cookies and it seemed like we did really well. But I have no idea how much in profit we actually made. |
Anonymous
| Our girls saved the money for 3 years so we could go on a 10 trip to Europe. We visited 2 of the WAGGGS (Switzerland and England). It was an awesome experience for our young ladies (they were cadets). |
Anonymous
They were supposed to be yes! |
Anonymous
Badges, patches, and other insignia can easily run $30 a girl, plus probably $300+ for a camping trip depending on the size of your troop. At most the troop gets $1/box, usually less, so you can see how those funds go quickly. Did everyone in the troop get the axolotl tshirt last year? That was for troops that averaged 200 boxes per selling girl (so max $20/girl). Cookies help, but unless every girl sells aggressively, they can’t fund the entire budget for an active troop. |