It's that Time of Year...Girl Scout Cookies

Girl Scout Cookies is one of several varieties of cookie sold on neighborhood tours by Girl Scouts of the USA (GSUSA) as fundraiser for their organization. Members of the GSUSA have been selling cookies since 1917 to raise funds for their units. Top-selling girls can earn prizes for their efforts. There are also unit incentives if the unit as a whole does well.A Girl Scout cookie is one of several varieties of cookie sold on neighborhood tours by Girl Scouts of the USA (GSUSA) as a fundraiser for their organization. Members of the GSUSA have been selling cookies since 1917 to raise funds for their units. Top-selling girls can earn prizes for their efforts. There are also unit incentives if the unit as a whole does well.

Individual troops began organizing cookie sales as early as 1917, to fund the troop's activities. The first record of such a sale was by the Mistletoe Troop in Muskogee, Oklahoma, in December of 1917. In 1922, the Girl Scout magazine The American Girl suggested cookie sales as a fund-raiser and provided recipes. In 1933, Girl Scouts in Philadelphia organized the first official "Girl Scout Cookie" sale, selling homemade cookies in the windows of local utility companies. The first Girl Scout cookie recipe was a sugar cookie. In 1936 the national organization began licensing commercial bakers to produce them.

[edit] Overview
Most Girl Scouts sell cookies to their relatives, friends, neighbors, and to others in their town or city. Customers place an order for the number of boxes of each cookie type (Thin Mints, Samoas, etc.), and Girl Scouts tally the boxes and total for each customer on a paper chart. Parents of Girl Scouts sometimes assist their daughters and their troops by selling to co-workers and friends. In recent years, due to safety concerns, an increased emphasis has been placed on cookie booths, where girls make sales from tables in well-frequented public areas, under the supervision of adult troop leaders.