Read on for End of Season Finances, Reflect and Celebrate with Your Troop, Cookie Booth of the Week Winners, Cookie Spirit Award Winners, Volunteer Cookie Sweatshirt Orders Due May 7, Service Unit Reward Shipments, and more.
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Reminders
For Service Unit Cookie Managers
That’s a wrap! While it seems like our winter will never end, you did make it to the end of the 2023 Cookie Program. Thank you for all you did to help your Girl Scouts learn and practice their entrepreneurial skills, troubleshoot issues, and learn lessons that last a lifetime. We’ll be sure to share the results with you as we continue to finalize sales numbers over the next few weeks. Watch for the end of season totals and annual cookie survey in a future issue of The Cookie Press. After this week, The Cookie Press will be updated every other Thursday. Watch for the next post on April 20.
End of Season Finances
The Girl Scout Cookies have been transferred, the sales season is officially over, and now only two tasks remain for you:
- Ensuring the troop bank account is ready for the final ACH
- This is the time to ensure all money collected from families has been deposited into the troop bank account. If families used mobile payment services (such as Venmo or CashApp) to turn in money, verify the money has been credited to the troop account. Refer to your Troop Balance Summary for the troop financials including the final PGA, the final troop proceed total, and the balance due for cookies for the final ACH on May 3.
- If your troop receives an NSF check or incurs bank fees due to high deposit activity, complete a Finance/ Inventory Issue Form by May 30.
- If your troop only participated in online sales and/or is due a refund for troop proceeds earned, Girl Scouts River Valleys will process that refund to the troop bank account via an ACH on April 21. Be sure the troop bank account information has been entered in Smart Cookies.
- Juliettes that are paid in full will show an overpayment in their Troop Balance Summary that equals the troop proceeds.
- Keep copies of all deposit tickets and bank receipts until December 31, 2023.
- This is the time to ensure all money collected from families has been deposited into the troop bank account. If families used mobile payment services (such as Venmo or CashApp) to turn in money, verify the money has been credited to the troop account. Refer to your Troop Balance Summary for the troop financials including the final PGA, the final troop proceed total, and the balance due for cookies for the final ACH on May 3.
- Distributing rewards
Reflect and Celebrate with Your Troop
Even though each Girl Scout Cookie year is different, some things don’t change, like reflecting on what your Girl Scouts learned and making time to celebrate. Schedule an end of season wrap-up party with the troop while things are still fresh in their minds.
- Talk about numbers that mean something to them such as sales numbers, the troop PGA, and the proceeds earned. Which of the 5 skills did they use?
- Celebrate those who crushed their goals and all the challenges they overcame.
- Inquire about how they overcame challenges, and what went really well this year. Why do they think they were so successful?
- Reflect on what they may want to do differently next year.
- Encourage them to also make time to thank everyone in their “cookie crew” that helped them succeed.
What do your Girl Scouts want to do with their proceeds? With the weather warming up and summer vacation coming soon, this is a great time to schedule a fun outdoor activity to celebrate their accomplishments. Maybe they want to use some of their proceeds to make a difference in their community? Let the troop work together to decide what they want to do. After all, girl-led is the way we roll.
Cookie Booth of the Week Winners
Keep sending those CBOTW submissions in, we love to see them! Congratulations to our Week 6 Cookie Booth of the Week winners Troop 18702 and Troop 57795. After we gather as many submissions as possible, we’ll announce our Cookie Booth of the Year on April 20.
Week 6: Daisy/Brownie/Junior Booth of the Week
Troop 18702
Week 6: Cadette/Senior/Ambassador Booth of the Week
Troop 57795
Cookie Spirit Award Winners
Woot-woot! It’s time to give a shout-out to the final fin-tastic winners of the Cookie Spirit Award.
Bethany Bertsch: “Bethany is so committed to making sure our service unit is educated on cookie selling, securing additional booths, helping troops organize their cookies, and answering questions. She goes above and beyond every year, and our service unit couldn’t do it without her. I’m so appreciative of her support, and she deserves this award!”
Ryan Shiek: “Ryan was the first parent to volunteer to help during cookie season! He’s been outstanding—we didn’t even need any other volunteers b/c he did the bulk of the work. He set up meetings with the parents and would stick around after Girl Scout meetings in case parents had more questions. He was quick to respond to emails and was thorough in his communications to parents. He even created his own spreadsheet and shared them with us to make it easier to keep inventory. He helped pick up cookies for the initial order, ran to the cookie cupboard, and stored cookies in his garage! He made our first cookie season seamless, easy, and fun!”
Both Bethany and Ryan will receive a $25 Target gift card and a big high-five from Girl Scouts River Valleys!
Volunteer Cookie Sweatshirt Orders are Due by May 7
Volunteers who wish to order a “Go Bright Ahead” Girl Scout Cookie Program sweatshirt can complete the order form by May 7—One order per troop, please. Payment for the sweatshirt must be made by ACH from the troop account or for Juliettes, a reduction in Juliette Program Credits. The cost does include UPS shipping fees.
Sweatshirts will be shipped to the address entered on the form later this summer.
Service Unit Reward Shipments
The shipments of the girl and troop rewards are scheduled to arrive the week of May 22. If you are planning to print out reward reports for packing items, remember that some items will be tracked outside of Smart Cookies. For those items (initial order patches, online rewards) you will receive a packing list with the totals by troop and Girl Scout in your shipment.
