Girl Scout Cookies have taken over my life!!!!

I lead a secret life: I am a Girl Scout cookie pusher! With both children being involved in scouting and their dad as an active Boy Scout, I am constantly reminded that I was never a scout or ever wanted to be a scout. I loved 4-H and raising chickens. So, when my girls wanted to be Girl Scouts, I was some what curious about scouting but I was terrified of becoming the "Cookie Mom." I do not know how to sew or do anything that I thought that would be "girl scout related" but I have learned over the last few years that Girl Scouts do some pretty cool stuff. But in order to do all that cool stuff, they sell cookies and a lot of them! Supposedly, the Middle Tennessee Council out sells other councils in tagalongs cookie sales alone. I just have to say that is a lot of peanut butter and chocolate!

What makes them so awesome is that Girl Scout cookies are only available through pre-order late December through mid-January and the cookies usually arrive sometime around Valentine's Day. If you do not submit a pre-order you can find a Girl Scout troop pushing trefoils, thin mints, samoas, tagalongs and the other assorted cookies at your local Wal-Mart, Lowes, Krogers or Home Depot for just a few weeks a year rain, snow, sleet or shine.

Interesting enough it may be one of the most ingenious uses of a marketing strategy I have witnessed. If folks know you have a scout in your family, you might as well spend January, February and the first week of March pushing cookies. I refer to it as "Girl Scout Cookie Season" and I have turned down birthday party requests, sleep overs and other fun things because we are committed to a cookie booth or delivering pre-orders. As a family, we resemble a small time dealer with a trunk full of cookies peddling in the parking lot behind my office with enough dollar bills to make it rain in a strip club.

I think Little Brownie Bakers are spiking the cookies with an ingredient that makes you crave cookies all year long. I know folks that stock pile thin mints and tagalongs as if this will be the only source of food in the event of a global catastrophe. Maybe the Federal government can use Girl Scout cookies as a form of currency. Just imagine if a store clerk said "That will be 20 Girl Scout Thin Mints to purchase a pack of gum, please." My reply would be, "can I trade you Taglongs or Trefoils for your Thin Mints or how about some Samoas?" I would constantly be broke because I ate my currency!

Oh well, as you can see pushing, I mean selling Girl Scout cookies has started making me crazy. Now, where did I hide that last box of Tagalongs......