BY CAMI KOONS
Not even a pandemic can stop the annual spring sugar rush to Thin Mints, peanut butter patties and Caramel deLites.
Local Girl Scouts will trade in old selling habits of standing outside grocery stores and instead push their famous cookies through drive-thru sales events and online purchases this year to adapt their annual fundraiser to fit COVID-19 safety guidelines.
Girl Scouts Troop 7693 Leader Aubrey Bretthauer said her eighth graders will host a drive-thru cookie booth from noon to 4 p.m. Feb. 27 at the northwest corner of Gene’s Heartland Foods parking lot. Individuals can pick up cookies without having to leave their vehicles.
“We’re trying to protect the girls and the customers who are wanting cookies,” Bretthauer said.
In addition to drive-thru booths, Girl Scout troops across Eudora have found innovative ways to sell cookies. Daisy Scout Troop 2951 Leader Laura Lewis said her girls are using the online selling program offered by the Girl Scouts. Customers can buy through Scouts’ personalized links and choose to have cookies shipped or delivered, contactless, by their Scout.
Lewis said the brand new troop of kindergarteners and first graders has sold more than 800 boxes since selling started in mid-December. Lewis said her daughter and Scout, Hadley, was excited to be able to sell cookies to her grandmother in Cleveland, along with other long-distance relatives.
Scouts also have turned to their parents’ Facebook accounts for promotion. Lewis said Hadley and some of the other girls made posts and videos to sell their cookies. She said Hadley recruited her brother and filmed a “Girl Scout cookie taste-test video,” reminding everyone who saw it of the familiar cookie flavors.
“It’s a great way for the girls to learn social media and its positives,” Lewis said. “And also new ways to promote the cookies.”
Even with the changes caused by the pandemic, cookie selling continues to be an educational activity for Girl Scouts. Bretthauer asked her Scouts to think of all the potential problems at their drive-thru event and to come up with solutions for each.
Mask refusal, the possibility of customers getting out of their cars and backed-up lines were just a few of the issues the Girl Scouts workshopped.
“I wanted them to try and get involved in the planning as much as possible,” Bretthauer said.
Bretthauer said the booth will function like “an automatic car wash.” When a car pulls up, the girls will take their order and hand over the cookies. Should their line get more than three cars deep, Bretthauer said the plan is to ask customers to park and wait for a Scout to take their orders.
Bretthauer’s daughters, Ryan, in the eighth grade troop and Avery, in the fourth grade troop, said in past years they have mostly done door-to-door sales and this year’s plan is quite different.
The girls hope to sell their almost 300 boxes of Girl Scout cookies before the selling deadline of March 7.
Lessons learned from the Feb. 27 cookie booth will be passed on to fourth grade Troop 4246 to help improve their drive-thru event from noon to 4 p.m. March 6 in the Gene’s parking lot.
“We’d love for the Eudora people to come out and support their local Girl Scouts,” Bretthauer said.
For every $5 box of cookies, $1 goes back to the troops to help fund troop activities throughout the year. Lewis said she’s been amazed at the generosity of customers this year as they buy cookies.
“I don’t know if it’s a comfort food or something that brings normalcy during this time, but we’ve been very pleased with the generosity of people who have been buying,” Lewis said.
Reach reporter Cami Koons at eudoratimes@gmail.com.
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