Girl Scouts Celebrate A Century Of Cookie Sales With New Flavor
ALAMEDA (KPIX 5) -- The Girl Scouts of America marked their 100th year for cookie sales this week with a new flavor being made available in the Bay Area.
Each year Americans withstand a marketing blitz like no other.
"Yes! It's cookie time! Girl Scouts in Northern California are selling cookies this year from February 1st through March 5th," said Girl Scouts spokesperson Heather Burlew-Hayden.
Sales support activities for local troops, but back in 1917 there weren't a lot of options for a woman to earn money.
"So in order to get the cash resources, they had to figure out a valuable thing to sell that people would want to buy," said Burlew-Hayden.
Down through the years, sales techniques got sharper. Today, YouTube is full of videos offering advice for setting up the perfect cookie booth. One helpful video shows examples of what not to do and actually warns against being kidnapped!
But despite that dubious help, this pop-up industry has blossomed nicely into the 21st century with mobile apps that locate nearby sales locations and ways to order online from anywhere in the country.
And the results are staggering. Last year, in only one month's time, more than four million boxes were sold in Northern California alone. That's more than $20 million worth of cookies.
"These girls are working towards their goals, so why not support them?" said Maria Gonzalez, an East Bay and Solano area product sales manager. "It's like a win-win! You're supporting and you get delicious cookies."
And with the dawn of a new century of cookie sales comes a new cookie flavor. This year, Girl Scouts will be selling s'mores cookies for the first time. It's one more guilty pleasure that you can actually feel pretty good about.
