Girl Scout Cookies Selling Door to Door?

My daughter's friends, takes orders first, ahead of time, and then collects the money. Ahead of time.

I always pre-buy my cookies. A neighbor child comes by every year and we don't pre-pay, but we commit to an order. It's never enough and we buy more in front of the grocery store.

Typically girls have a cookie order form and people place an order. Once the cookies come in, girls deliver them and collect payment. After the initial order period, there are typically cookie booths where the sales are cash and carry. I do know some people who buy extra cookies during the initial period so they can sell them door to door on the spot. The downfall is if people don't buy them from you, you have to pay for them.

I've never heard of that. Our daughter wouldn't do cookie sales if that was how it worked with her troop. We had a pre-sales order form, went around the neighborhood and posted the form at work to generate orders. We didn't have to pay for anything ourselves. I'd never take on that risk.

Our troop will do booth sales soon, but the troop itself buys the cookies and the girls J. split credit for the sales.

my daughter is active in girl scouts and the month of January is presales, take orders and turn them in to our leader who uses those to order her cookies for those orders and booths. i honestly have never heard of having to prepay for cookies.
i do know that if someone does not pay for their order when the cookies arrive you are responsible for those.
i hope that helps.
good luck to you and many blessings

Maybe there is a rule in your Girl Scout Council that requires the prepayment. Or perhaps the cookie mom has been burdened by trying to collect money for cookies that have been checked out and not returned or retuned in a damaged, non salable condition. Ask for the rationale and discuss with the troop leader too. You could leave a check for the amount to cover the cost of the cookies you are selling, sell the cookies and then return with the cash and have her give you back the check.

Do you have to really "buy them upfront?" I doubt that is how they are supposed to do this. Here we(troop) orders the cookies we think we will need for booths and individual sales. The Cookie Mom does store the cookies. We are able to return full boxes or trade with other troops if need be. Then at the end we "settle up" with the council or cookie management above us. No money is put upfront for the cookies by the troop or families. Also, don't sell before you're supposed to. THAT is not follwing "Be Sister to every Girl Scout"

You will need to follow the setup your Council has established though. I'm not sure if this differs from ours though.

Our troop took orders a few weeks ago and put in an initial order. You could probably do that and go door to door to take orders. Then, once they come in, deliver them.

It depends on the council -- some councils prepurchase, and some take pre-orders. Ours takes preorders. It's not up to us. Troops have no say in the matter -- you are required to handle it the way your council determines.

ETA: I J. noticed you're in Doylestown -- my sister is in Chadds Ford and that's how they do it there -- they have to prebuy the cookies and then try to sell them. It's your council/region.

When we did cookies, the girls took orders, and we ordered extras for the booth. We didnt' prepay for cookies. We were supposed to collect the money when we delivered orders, but we encouraged the girls to collect ahead of time and we held the money for them. We turned in all money at the end of the sale.

I know that my SIL is a cookie mom and has lots of cookies at her house right now. (At least she'd better, because I'm planning to pick up our order tonight!). I don't remember if she told M. about the money part of it, but her daughter's troop did pre-order the cookies, unlike in my day when we took orders and then delivered.

I'm guess what you would really like to do is take a wagon full of cookies door to door and try to sell them, but you don't want to have to buy the cookies yourself and take on the financial burden if they don't sell?

Have you discussed this with the troop leader? I wonder if she or the cookie mom are concerned that individual girls will either not return the cookies or not turn in the money, so they want the money up front. I'm guessing this, because I'd be willing to bet settling up with the council for the cookies is up to the troops and how the troops deal with the money is up to them.

I haven't been in Girl Scouts for years, so this is J. my guess. Good luck!

I haven't seen the kids do this before. They usually go to Walmart and sit at both doors selling them. Since they're for a non-profit all they have to do is fill out the paperwork in advance then show up for that day.

We do the doors of Walmart for Race for Life with BMX. It's a lot of fun and the kids get really bold and work really hard to do their jobs.

I'm sure you could go and take orders first, but let M. tell ya...a pair of Girl Scouts, one coming to my door, and the other down the walk with a wagon full of cookies...it's a sure sale at my house.

Pre-order? Meh. Probably not. I don't like waiting.

I think if you have sold cookies for a few years you would have a feel for who will buy and how much of a risk to take, we take preorders, the cookie mom orders the cookies, we deliver and collect cookies then turn money in.
I know three people in our neighbor hood always buy 2 boxes of thin mints each, so if i were doing what you are trying I might pay for 8 boxes of thin mints. show up on their door and say would you like some? and they may stick to their usual 2 or they may buy more, If one house wipes M. out, then i would stop selling for that day and go back to cookie mom and get 8 more and go from there,
I would also NOT order any for M. personally, although i usually get 2 thin mints and 2 savanah smiles. then i have 3 thin mints left from the door to door i would J. buy them and try to not think about the savanah smiles i was missing.

I J. didn't realize it was "gs legal" to sell door to door in that manner, I though the only cash and carry was set up at Booth sales. I might check into this.

WHAT????? That is not how it's done here. For our troop, each girl is given an order form to go door to door or to family to take ORDERS. Then the cookie leader tallys up all the cookies and places the order with the baker. Our troop orders extras for our booth sales and any "late" sales done after the selling deadline. Our deadline was the 28th. I've never heard of doing it the way you are being required to do, and quite frankly, I would withdraw from the troop if that was the case. I'm a stay at home mom, and I don't have that kind of money to "front" for cookies in the hopes that they sell....My daughter J. sold over $400 worth of cookies, and sorry, but that would not be coming out of my pocket. Call your local counsel to see if this is correct procedure for your area. Good luck!

We do it the same way "1growingupfast" does it. You do order the cookies that you think you can sell ahead of time, but you do NOT prepay.

Half of the money that troops owe GSA for cookies will be deducted out of the troop's bank account, halfway through the sale (for us here in Texas, that is today!). The other half of the money for the INITIAL order is due at the end of the sale. If you had to order additional cookies during the sale, that money for the reorders is due a short time after the end of the sale (I have to look up that date - this is my first year to actually have to reorder!). But we don't pre-pay - we J. have to make sure we keep up with the bank deposits, so that the withdrawals are funded.

If you HAVE to, you also have to option to return complete cases (they can be opened, but must be full). However, if the troop doesn't return any cookies, they get a small bonus. I have found out that quite a few troops don't allow their girls to return cookies, but I think that is a troop policy (you could return them last year, anyway; I haven't looked up if you still can - we decided to order light and make reorders if needed, instead of ordering heavy and risk returning anything). It may be, that if your troop is requiring you to pre-pay, then they are avoiding the stress of getting that money in the bank on time, and also eliminating the likelihood of having to return anything.

However, yes, it means that you have a kitchen or garage full of cases of cookies (but everyone takes what they asked for - the Cookie Mom distributes them, and unless the troop has a "troop pantry" of extra cases, she keeps only what her daughter intends to sell). We had 14 cases allotted to us. I am lucky that my husband has a sense of humor about it. If he didn't, then we wouldn't have asked for that many cases.

If you are curious if this is your council, service unit, or troop policy, google your council. They have a website, and I'll bet they have the Cookie Handbook on there, too. Even if you aren't the Cookie Mom, you can still access the information. It's helpful for when you have a question like this, but can't get hold of her.

Our troop takes orders, places an order based on orders taken, and then the cookies are delivered at a later date. I've never heard of it being done the other way.