Volunteers in Agawam, West Side gear up for Girl Scout cookie season

Jan. 20, 2021 | Ryan Feyre
rfeyre@thewestfieldnewsgroup.com

AGAWAM/WEST SPRINGFIELD – The annual Girl Scout Cookie Drop took place at four different locations in Central and Western Massachusetts on Jan. 9.

Along with Springfield, Pepperell, and Worcester, the Cinemark Theater parking lot in West Springfield also hosted the four- hour event. During this gathering, Girl Scout staff and volunteers unloaded over 3,600 cases to bring back home and sell to people who are interested in buying.

To follow COVID-19 guidelines, each volunteer at Cinemark wore masks while spread out throughout the parking lot. Each had their own one or two flavors of cookies on a crate-like platform that they would then load onto a parent’s car when they passed through the parking lot. All the parents/volunteers who passed through to pick up these cookies are now in the process of selling these cookies in their respective locales.

Suzanne Smiley, the COO of the Girl Scouts of Central and Western Massachusetts (GSCWM), was present in West Springfield as one of the volunteers. She has been a part of the organization for 34 years.

According to Smiley, Girl Scout volunteers are still very much active in the community, even with the many COVID-19 guidelines. For the cookies in particular, she said that many parents and girls will be conducting online sales and drive-thru booths for cookie transactions.

“Some are doing a lemonade-style booth too,” said Smiley.

Girl Scout troops throughout the country are participating in new sales strategies due to COVID-19. Local troops will promote their virtual cookie business through emails, door hangers, or other contactless purchase and delivery options. Drive-through cookie booths, which are what Smiley alluded too, will also be an option, along with traditional storefront cookie booths. Also new this year, customers can order their cookies through Grubhub, but only in select areas.

“The Girl Scout Cookie Program will look a little different this season,” said Dana Carnegie, the communications manager for GSCWM. “Girl Scouts will again embrace their entrepreneurial spirit, and fine tune the meaning of ‘pivot’ as all businesses have this year.”

Vanessa Rossini, who is the leader for Troop #65068 in Agawam, told Reminder Publishing that every troop in the town is using whatever sales method fits their specific troop.

“For our troop, a lot of the girls, their parents have been using the digital cookie platform,” said Rossini. “So, a lot of their friends and families are able to submit their orders electronically, which is wonderful.”

Outside of this approach, parents and girls in Rossini’s troop are also going the traditional route of calling people up and asking if they want orders. Parents are also going into their workplaces and getting orders that way, according to Rossini.

Unlike in past years, Rossini’s troop – which features 21 girls between the ages of five and nine – will not be participating in a public booth this year, but they will be conducting booths outside of some of the girls’ driveways.

“As long as the weather is nice on Sundays, I’m going to be out in the driveway with my daughter, and a couple of her other friends,” said Rossini, with regards to how she will operate her own driveway booth.

For girls who have registered for the online method of selling cookies, they can share their own personal shopping link to social media, or they can email and text the link to family and friends, according to Rossini.

“They can share the link with everybody, and it’s safe, and obviously contact-free,” said Rossini. “And then, you just arrange the drop-offs.”

Outside of the cookies, Rossini’s troop, like many other troops in the area, is staying active in the community. In the fall of 2020, Rossini and the girls organized a laundry and dish detergent drive for the Western Mass. Empowerment Center, which is a local center for veterans and their families to obtain food and other household items.

After donating around six cases of cookies to the center in the spring of 2020, Rossini met with a former Girl Scout leader who worked at the center, and connected for the fall detergent drive.

“We collected dish detergents and laundry detergents from community folks, and the girls solicited donations from family and friends,” said Rossini. “And we dropped off a ton of detergents back in November.”

The girls, according to Rossini, also want to donate to a local pet shelter, and possibly drop off valentine cards to a local nursing home. The latter is still up in the air, according to Rossini.

“We really are trying to stay within the Agawam community, and make sure those connections are there,” said Rossini. “I think it’s very important that people stay connected so they don’t feel isolated.”

The Girl Scout cookie season in Central and Western Mass. officially began on Jan. 15.     All of the money made will go towards Girl Scouts essential leadership programming.

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