Is it okay to complain about your Girl Scout cookies?
Someone said to me the other day, “Boy they are sure skimping on the Girl Scout Cookies. I’ve had three or four already that only had a little bit of icing inside.”
Seriously????
I’ve heard other complaints before, as well, about Girl Scout Cookies and Cub Scout Popcorn and odds and ends of other fund-raiser products we have sold over the years. They were stale… they didn’t taste as good as last year… there’s so few in the box… they’re too expensive… blah, blah, blah.
So, your Girl Scout Cookies were covered in ants? Why is that my problem. You know as well as I do that ants happen to really enjoy Girl Scout Cookies. Just brush them off. Oh my, your Chocolate Covered Popcorn was all melted together and you had to use a hammer and chisel to free it from the canister? Good thing you’re handy and have those kinds of tools around. What, the scent from that candle we sold you made your eyes burn so badly you had to go to the emergency room? Toughen up you sissy, that’s what you get for burning nancy-boy candles in your house anyway. Your Almond Candy Bars had a few maggots in them? Well excuse me, but I didn’t put them there. Seriously, if you can pick the nasty mushrooms off a pizza, surely you can pick a few maggots out of a candy bar… sheesh!
Let me tell you something about products that kids sell. Be it Scouts or Little League or 4-H or whatever… be it cookies or popcorn or candy bars. Often these items must travel a long, hard road to get from the vendor to the home of the hapless, unlucky parent who has volunteered to coordinate the sale, then to the individual kids, this child-laboresque sales-team, who are forced to go out into the streets and knock on your doors at all hours of the day and night, and finally to you… the end-user, the consumer. People’s garages and barns and damp, soggy, musty basements, act as giant logistically-challenged warehouses waiting to process the days orders. Products are then moved by automobiles and trucks and trailers to street corners where grubby little boys and girls who haven’t washed their hands in three or four days try to sell them to innocent passers-by. Sometimes these products get rained on, sometimes they get dirty, sometimes they get dropped into mud-puddles. Sometimes smelly, homeless looking people come by and handle the products and then say they don’t have any money. It’s the commerce of children’s fund-raiser products… a dirty, ugly, cut-throat business.
Let me just make a suggestion here… take it or leave it… whatever. You are buying the Girl Scout cookies because you are interested in making a donation to the Girl Scouts organization, not so you can sit in front of your television set and watch soap operas and indulge in a massive orgy of caloric intake. If that is what you are after, there are plenty of excellent, orgasmically good choices at the grocery store for much less money and in much higher cookies per square inch packaging. The Keebler Elves make some excellent cookies! Oreo’s dipped in milk… there’s not much that rivals that experience. Chips-Ahoy’s…. ummm…hmmm! If you get a batch that is stale or tastes like crap… hey you can bring ’em back to the store and complain until the cows come home.
But please don’t complain about the Girl Scout Cookies…
I’m not saying Girl Scout cookies shouldn’t be astonishingly good… they most definitely are! In fact, in my own orgy of caloric intake, the other night I consumed a whole tube of Thin Mints in roughly five quick minutes. It was a tremendously satisfying experience other than I felt like I was going to puke afterwards. But you know what? Had my Thin Mints been stale or had a few critters crawling around on them, I would have politely disposed of them in the trash rather than filing an official complaint… because frankly, I don’t think my wife and daughter would have cared to listen!
The Brown Road Chronicles 
the only complaint I have is that my husband isn’t “smart” about the purchasing of them. We know we will be buying some boxes every year. It’s a given.
However, he’ll let the cutie pies outside of the grocery store entice him into buying some. Cuz they are just so darn cute, and the coconut cookies are so yummy… And you can never buy just 1 box. So, he ends up bringing (3) home when he’s picking up some milk. I look at him and say
“Did you forget we know 5 other people selling Girls Scouts cookies? At our son’s baseball game today, one of the little sisters is bringing some…our neice, our other neice, someone on your softball team…”
Last year, I opened my cabinet to discover 15 boxes of cookies! Not exaggerating! And yes, with inflation, prices have gone up…but that’s not the issue…I always seem to be dieting around that time…darn those evil cookies!
I feel badly, but I told my hubby while our friends/family are IN girlscouts, no purchasing from strangers! (unless we win the lotto…then buy away) When we have no other obligations, then we’ll buy from those outside Ralphs…and he has to hide the cookies at his work. I’ll eat an entire box.
Sandi
http://www.ahhsome.wordpress.com
Lake Forest, California USA
Yes, cute little kids in uniforms is an excellent sales tool! But you do have to limit who you purchase from. This year was my daughters last, guess I’ll have to find a new source.
I see your point, but I am disappointed that they don’t carry Choc. Chip
Interestingly enough, I’ve never really considered that they don’t have the crowd favorite chocolate chip cookies. It’s a travesty!!
I am addicted to Thin Mints…here in Canada they sell for $4 a box (and it’s a small box). I have never had an issue with quality…
The sandwich cookies (chocolate and vanilla) are another story…the Girl Guides recently changed cookie-makers…not a good switch. The cookies are just not very good!
I’m with you…it’s for charity…throw them away if you don’t like them (or just give the kid the money and tell them to keep the cookies – that will screw up the bookkeeping!).
Funny post, Steve!
Wendy
Yes Thin Mints are are my fav too!! They are $3.50 a box here.
Just don’t buy the smelly ones. http://writerdood.wordpress.com/2010/02/26/smelly-scout-cookies/
Personally, I must avoid them, I’m sick of selling them, I’m sick of thinking about them, I’m sick of pushing them, and I despise them for being irresistible. Those damn cookies probably kill dozens of people every year.
LOVED the link! Yes, I’m getting weary of it too, we’ve been selling cookies for years and I’ve run the popcorn sale for two years. I never really liked selling at work, but then there are this group of people that are always asking for Girl Scout Cookies. Oh well…they are irresistible though!! Except those smelly ones.
Dont really have girl scout’s here. Besides, I dont think anyone does door to door selling here either. Dogs and walls, and the fact is that so many people dont have bells- never mind answer them.
Quite sad… think i wodl have liked Girl Scouts. Excet for having to sell teh cookies.
xx
It’s too bad, both Boy and Girl Scouts are excellent programs and there are versions of it all around the world. I’m sure you’ll find other fun things for your daughter to do.
I bought a box of the Savannah Smiles (lemon). I bit one cookie and looked inside. I saw a clump of brown stuff that I assumed was a nut. I didnt see nuts in the contents of the cookie so i pulled the brown stuff out and found that it was a a piece of what looked to be cardboard or paperbag. Ruined my appetite and dont like Girl Scout Cookies anymore.
I cant lie. The cookie was delicious until I found the piece of paperbag inside of it 😦
Yes, they are delicious and I have to admit, mostly paper bag free! 🙂