Girl Scouts: More than cookie sellers

leave to go to a meeting. But my guess is that what do you think? I think, Yes, I think there's actually a one in three chance that she was, because Chuck, that is the stat, the astounding stat at one and every three American adult women were a girl Scout at some point in time. Yeah. I think they are currently around the two point six million level, and it varies between two and a half to three million,

kind of depending what's going on. And I think in recent years it's numbers have gone down a little bit, uh, and they're always trying to get those numbers up. So, but but what what I've seen is that it is remarkably steady, though it's it hovers around that same that same amount, and I've seen that that's the total number

of Girl Scouts. Have also seen that that includes the adult volunteers, and that at any given time there's about one point seven million Girls Scouts active Girl Scouts in the United States and that they usually hang in there for about four years is the average length of time, which is pretty good. That was longer than my boy Scout or cub Scout run. I can tell you how long was your run. I think it was not a year.

I had a real problem at a young age of idea of giving respect to elders just because they were old. Like I was like, no, I feel like there's a lot of old jerks out there who don't really deserve to be treated particularly special. So that was my big issue with it. The problem is is my dad was the den leader and he decided to be a good role model and stick it out so without you, yes, but with me watching TV like in the house at

the same time when they were having Yeah. So the upshot of all this long story shorts my dad doesn't really like me, right, Uh, that's the upshot of most of your stories. Um My, cub Scouting lasted one meeting. That was my tenure because I went to a cub Scout meeting and I guess I went during the candy drive and literally at the first meeting, they were like, here's a bunch of candy. You gotta go sell this stuff. And I kind of was just like, what, I don't want to. I don't want to do this, Like I

don't even know what's going on yet. Yeah, I'm not working for you. That's got to be an odd time to jump in feet first, you know, you kind of want to ease into it a little more. I guess so, but it I didn't do it my and you know, maybe we'll do one on the boy Scouts at some point too. But my nephew Noah, who is now a grown adult who was getting married next weekend. Actually, oh hey,

congratulations Noah. Yeah, no and Ella are getting married, which is great, but he is now an adult college graduate. But he scouted. He went all the way through, and I was I always thought that was very cool and that really shows a stick tuitiveness, whether you're a boy scout or a girl scout. Um to go all the way through the whole process. He's so Noah is Scott's son, right, correct, Yes, Yeah, I'm not at all surprised that Noah made it an Eagle Scout because also I'm sure that like when Scott

was born, there like just give this guy the Eagle badge. Now, he didn't. He didn't boy scout either. He didn't need to. He was an Eagle Scout by birth. Well, and we also, you know, my dad raised his camping, so he was always just sort of like, you guys don't need to do that stuff because we do all that stuff anyway, right right. Yeah, And plus also there's some dudes money, you know what I mean? Yeah, exactly, Yeah, that's sort of the thing. I think Girl Scouts dues money is

twenty five dollars annually. Uh, they do have financial assistance and then you have to pay for some other you know, program stuff along the way. But that is a very low fee. And we'll get to this, but the reason is low. It's because those Girls Scouts can print money with those cookies. Yeah. I was not familiar with the Girl Scout cookies until I started researching this episode. Oh min, they print money, man, They make like four or five

million dollars a year off that thing. My friend, the gross revenue I think last year was eight hundred million dollars I'm sorry, in five hundred net I think five or six Okay, yeah, And that's why those dudes are slow, because they actually stay with the local councils, which we'll we'll talk more about that. But speaking of Girl Scout cookies, I want to give a shout out, um to a couple of troops, one in particular, TROOPO, because my friend Annabella King is a Girl Scout, a junior Girl Scout

in that troop. And yes she is the daughter of Hum's very close friend. Uh wheezy and um. She actually wrote a little bit about what it means to her to be a Girl Scout. If I could share a couple of passages, I think it really gets the point across. I would love to hear it. So Annabella says, and she's been doing this for years by now. She said she's working on her Star or her Silver Award, which there's bronze, silver, and gold, and these are like very

prestigious awards for a Girl Scout to go after. So she said she's working on the silver one right now and in parentheses it's something really good to have on your resume, by the way, But she says that Girl Scouts is a great opportunity for greater jobs in life. Gives a pathway to pioneering your own business. They train you to be an entrepreneur in the early stages of life. And here's that cookie thing. Selling the cookies is the way they examine your skill and take note of the

abilities you may have. It is also showing you what real life situations may be like. For example, when having a cookie stand out and advertising that you are selling something, you have to put in some enthusiasm. You can't just stand there and wait for others to come walking by if interested. You have to grab their attention. She is

an up and coming person. She also says that back when she was younger, so she's in the seventh grade, she was saying that um to her before she was in the Scouts, that Girl Scouts were just annoying little girls selling cookies and stealing your money. But I have to say that as probably what a lot of people think as well. But Girl Scouts is something that impacts

the community. It brings people together. I love that I've also got a quote from our good friend John Hodgeman, who was a girl Scout, and he said, a Yale man never talks about the girl Scouts. That's right, that's

a that's a great, like all purpose quote from Hodgeman. Yeah, and you know what, that'll that's a joke that will be lost on many people because it's a call back to our Ivy League episode in three D that not many people probably even got through because it was in three D. So yeah, yeah, I guess sorry saying chuck, Yeah, sorry about the three D episode everybody. We have made sure that that will never ever ever happen again. All right, Should we go back to the early days of girl Scouting.

We should. But while we're at it, I want to give one more shout out to another Girl Scout troupe I'm affiliated with two. I want to shout out Troops seventeen one oh seven. That is my niece Mila at the Movie Stars troupe. Oh that's great. I like to call it Troope Beverly Hills. Shelly Long the leader Long, Shelly Long, and she is actually the leader. Yeah, it's wonderful. Yeah,

all right, So let's go back in time. And congratulations to both of those young ladies for pursuing this, because what I learned from researching the Girl Scouts is that it is a pretty great organization and they have, um you know, I tried to dig into controversies and stuff like that, but um, and I'm not disparaging the Boy Scouts. They're great two or Scouts USA, but they they have certainly had a little more controversy over the years in the Girl Scouts. Well. One of the reason that the

Girl Scouts tend to be controversial is because they're inclusive. Yeah, exactly, it's the problem that people have with girls because let the other human being in there a little different than the other human beings in this troop. That's the controversy that comes up. Typically. Yeah, they have always been more conclusive. I think in the nineteen fifties the Girl Scouts desegregated and it's oh the way to nineteen seventy and a lot of pressure from the Double A CP for the

Boy Scouts to do so. And also of note, Chuck is by the time I'm the Boy Scouts fully integrated their troops, the Girl Scouts were already on their first African American President so they have in progressive from the outset and then um, even though it took to the fifties, I guess to integrate. They were um inclusive of girls with disabilities too, because the woman who founded the Girl Scouts,

Juliette Gordon Lowe, UM, she was deaf. She became deaf after an accident, so she made sure that girls with disabilities were included from the get go. That's right, and we want to shout out by name Gloria D. Scott, first African American president of the Girl Scouts in nineteen. But let's go back in time to Juliette Gordon Lowe, who was a Southern gal from Savannah, Georgia. Yeah, no, it's it sounded like a cross between Andy from the Office doing a Southern thing and Kevin Spacey and Midnight

in the Garden of Good and Evil. Not good all the way. Yes, Julia Gordon lowis from Savannah. She was raised in the South, and um, you know I had came from. I don't think it was like a rich family or anything, but a family that was doing well enough to where she got a really good education compared

to some of her peers. And she uh ended up getting involved in a marriage that wasn't so great, a husband that was um an alcoholic and a gambler and a philanderer, and their whole marriage and divorce saga lasted many, many years because it was a time where getting a divorce wasn't super easy. And then he had a stroke and she thought she maybe should stay with him, but he had a mistress who he left his money too.

He eventually died during divorce proceedings. But long story short, she ended up a widow and went to London where she had a very faithful meeting at a luncheon party one day with Sir Robert Baden Powell. Yes, and this guy is the guy who co founded the Scouts, the Boy Scouts and the Girl Hides. If you are a at least back in the day, if you were a Girl Scout over in the UK, you were a member

of the Girl Guides. But they're all affiliated under a single umbrella, basically a whole a bunch of different scouting groups around the world. And at first Um Juliette Low her nickname was Daisy by the way, Um, she was a Scout leader, a troop leader for Girl Guides over in England, but when she moved back to the United States full time, she said, I'm gonna set up my own shop basically based on my experience that is there.

And she set up the first Girl Scout troop meeting in March of I believe nineteen twelve, um, and it included eighteen girls and the first registered Girl Scout was her niece, uh Daisy Gordon, who I take it was named after her. That's wonderful. And I think they were even called the Girl Guides at first. Oh is that right? I think so, And I should have had that down Cole, but I'm pretty sure that I saw that. But regardless, they either were Girl Scouts initially or became Girl Scouts.

And you know, she just the whole thing appealed to her, teaching girls, um how to be self sufficient, how to know their way around a campfire, how to um be meaningful to their community as a lot of community service involved.

It really all spoke to her. And these days you can get involved in the Girl Scouts if you're between five and seventeen and they are broken down thussly uh Daisy Scouts, which I guess comes from Juliette's name right, her nickname Daisy Scouts with the little list the most adorable. I imagine brownies. I never knew that. I thought brownies was the first step in. So Daisies come before Brownies. Then you have your Junior Scouts, and then Girl Scouts

rounded out with eleven to seventeen year olds. And I believe they used to be Cadet, seniors and ambassadors, but um now those are the names that they take. I've seen them heard two still as Cadets and ambassadors on the Girl Scout site, so still use that some, I guess so. But yeah, once you once you reach a certain age, I guess eleven, they lump you in together with all of the older girls. That's right. The Daisies are five and six, like I said, and they meet

with a couple of adult leaders. They earned pedals learning pedals, which is super super awesome and sweet. I mean, this whole thing is overflowing with just you know, sugary goodness. Well yeah, and those petals too. They're based on the ten points of them the Girl Scout Law, which are things like, you know, be considerate and caring. So that's a pedal courageous and strong as a pedal, honest and

fair responsible for what you say and do. So it's like some pretty great, you know, character development from a very young age. Yeah, and those ten laws are also represented by the Girl Scout dime, isn't that right? Yes, so you can get a free dime just by becoming a Girl Scout because one of the ceremonies is time, the ceremony of the dime, and that dime ten cents represents the ten points of the Girl Scout law. And the girl Scouts are like, wait a minute, I just

gave you. They're like, you just learned your first life lesson, chump, Welcome to the Scouts. But regardless of which group you're on, you are earning these pedals, these badges, these patches in various ways. A lot of times it's by completing a craft project. Uh. Sometimes an older group may like present the American flag at a professional baseball game. Uh. Sometimes

there's a lot of stem activity these days. Yes, Uh, you know, it's just started out sort of with more you know, as as you would think back in the nineteen thirties, things like cooking and stuff like that, and I think they still don't shy away from that. But these days it's all about STEM and getting girls into science, technology, engineering, and math and uh, you know they're doing full on coding and stuff like that. So they really kind of rolled with the times. Yeah, and a lot of that

develops over time. So like if you're a Daisy, they'll start introducing you to that STEM stuff where it's like, you know, this is a car, draw a picture of a car, and it's kind of like automotive engineering. Is that just the very beginnings of it. But then by the time you're like a Brownie, you're like building prototypes of a car that's of your own design. So it starts to progress pretty quickly. And then yeah, coding is a really big one too, So there's like a foundation

of those kind of things. Um, but it just gets a little more advanced as the girl goes through the Scout ranks. Yeah, and I gotta say, you know, it really struck me today how brilliant the badge ideas for boy Scouts and Girl Scouts and giving kids something to work for and like seeing them through to an endpoint of a goal so they can earn something because kids really love to earn a little prize for accomplishing something.

It's really meaningful. Yeah, they Aside from these individual rule things that they can earn, there are also group service projects where the whole troop where they you do a lot of community service. They might collect food and clothing for a homeless shelter, or they might decorate a nursing

home over holidays, uh and stuff like that. And the older they get, you know, the more the more advanced these things are, and the more um not autonomy necessarily, but just just the more advanced these projects are that they can bite off. Yeah, and as they get older, they're expected to do projects on their own community service projects. Um. They go, they do what are called journeys where they

learn about a new thing. Um, and they that my friend Annabella says that this past winter or no, this coming winter, they'll they will likely buy a bunch of clothes and presents for two or three families who do not have enough money. We will then wrap the gifts and someone brings it to that family. This is just

a great example. Sure, as they progress, and you know, by the time they're in that final group of el Scouts from eleven to seventeen, they start to focus on potential careers and what these girls are interested in and what they might want to do, and then steering them towards that, whether it's um eco action and environmentally friendly

and cleaning up parks and stuff like that. But all of these service projects and all of this stuff is really all about just building skills as well as building confidence absolutely absolutely and independence and UM self reliance and also just kind of being like a generally good person too, you know, not self reliance or independence by taking advantage or exploiting others weaknesses, but becoming independent and self reliant while also being like a person of character and somebody

you can trust. It's important that second part is important too. Yeah, that's tech bro camp that you were talking about, right, or farmer broke farmer brokemp. Oh boy, let's take a break on that one and discuss whether we'll even edit that out. No, let's leave it. Okay, we'll be right back everybody. I'm still laughing at that. That's good. That's a good sign, chuck. UM. So, yes, there's a lot of focus on STEM careers now UM or just even

interested in STEM hobbies like coding, UM. But there's also like still very a very large emphasis on being outdoorsy, you know, UM, which is one of the original things that the Girl Scouts were into back when Juliet Gordon Lowe was uh, the founder and still active, and she like poured herself into this, by the way, says like we really breathed past her biography. But she was a very interesting, very worthwhile human being with very little of that.

You know, when you're talking about somebody from a hundred years ago, you're like and then well, it just kind of glaze over this because she was a proctor of her time. Now, she was a very progressive person who would fit in quite well today, I think. Um, and she she was just a good person. But um, she emphasized things like outdoors nous in addition to you know, learning how to cook and run a home, um, that kind of stuff. So that that whole emphasis is still

around today with things like camping. Um, that's still a big part of being a Girl Scout is spending time at camp and spending time outdoors too. Yeah, Brownies, I think by the time you were a Brownie and then a junior and then a full on Girl Scout, you definitely go on camping trips. You go on overnight trips sometimes there at established camps. Sometimes it's a little more

of rustic kind of style camp thing. Uh. Sometimes they Scout leaders can kind of bite off all of their responsibility if they're comfortable with that, And sometimes they go to places where they have what's called a core staff who are kind of doing meals and stuff like that. There's really no exact setway it can go down, but the point is is to get these girls out in

the woods, adventuring, building campfires, rock climbing, doing crafts. Making s'mores um just something that really speaks to me and that I really believe in, of course, because I grew up doing that stuff. And by the way, if you like smores like I do, I like s'mores anything, sure you can thank the Girl Scouts for that, because they are the ones with the first recorded recipe for smore yes um back. I don't know if they invented it,

but they told everybody else about it. Back in there was a Girl Scout handbook that had the first printed recipe for s'mores. It was so old timey. They were called some moors. They wasn't It wasn't turned into a contraction until the seventies. I never knew that's what it's for. I never thought about it what. I don't know. I just I was just called them smores. I never thought about the fact that it was a contraction. It stands for some mores some mores, yeah, because once you have one,

you want some more. Yes. But apparently in this article it says that while they're called some moors, just one is plenty filling. Basically, I'm paraphrasing, I got a level up recommendation for your small game. And I'm a small traditionalist. I don't like to get too fancy, but I have lately started. Um, I'll get the Garadelli dark chocolate caramel square instead of a regular old Hershey. I'll throw one of those dark chocolate caramel s'more squares in there, and

it's really pretty good. The addition of the caramels nice. Yeah, basically, and I'm so sorry to the good people of Pennsylvania. But the Hershey chocolate is is basically anything is level up from that, as long as it's not like the generic store brand version of chocolate, not really good chocolate. To tell you, there's so much better chocolate out there, especially if you travel eastward across the Atlantic. All the chocolate over there is amazing. And then if you keep

going east and you hit Japan. All of their chocolate is amazing, and then you come back around you're like, we're back to Hershey again, although you hit Gary Delli Square first, and then you keep going eastward and you hit Pennsylvania and things get sad. Is Japan has good chocolate. Oh yes, Maisie chocolate products. They make a chocolate covered almonds, chocolate covered bacadamia nuts, and you can get them here in the States. Just I'll get you something and you

can take me forever. Okay. Oh, by the way, I should tell everyone you you very sweetly sent a postcard to me with the Fred Rogers stamp and you set here to start your stamp collection. Yes, yeah, I'm good, I got it. Man. Uh. We should also mention quickly that if you do not have a girl Scout troop near you, or if you just would rather freestyle it, you can become a Juliette named after um Juliette obviously.

And that is just sort of it seems like in something you do on your own, maybe with your parents help, you can still earn badges and stuff like that and just pay a smaller fee. But you're not I think officially part of a troop. No, but you're part of a council, and so we we should we should say that the Girl Scout organizations are divided into councils UM, which I think there's by my account literally accounted. I went on the Wikipedia page and counted all the councils UM,

and it's like a hundred and thirty. I can't believe. I didn't write down the exact number after going to that trouble, but it's like a hundred and thirty councils around the United States. That includes like Puerto Rico, UM, and a couple of other areas. But there's a hundred and thirty councils. And then the councils are further divided into troops and UM. The I don't remember what you said that made me think about to start talking think

about councils and troops the Juliets. Oh, yes, but if you're a Juliet, if you're basically a solo Girl Scout, you can do all the same things that a girl Scout does with an adult mentor. But you're a member of the council. You're just not a member of a troop. But like when the troops get together for like a

GM brie or um then go to camp. You might be affiliated with the troop or something You're just you've lived too far away to go to like the weekly meetings basically, but in boy, I hope those girl scouts are nice to those Juliets. I hope so too. It kind of made my stomach a little upset thinking about

what it must like for Juliet. I was thinking that a Juliet that takes a leadership position at like a council meeting or something like that deserves like double the patches, because you know, you could really easily be like a shrinking Violet in a situation like that. I know, I would you have like that kind of like tenacity and self confidence to to you know, be yourself in front of a group that like hangs out with one another every week. It seems like, you know, hats off to

the Juliets, I guess, is what I'm saying. Yeah, I like the idea of Josh Clark going around the country to these meetings and just saying, raise your hand if you're a Juliet, double that girl's patches. And there everyone's like, who is this guy who I don't think he's allowed here. Yeah, I didn't actually see that. Are there Is it exclusively female leadership as far as the troops go, or can

dadoum by the River Valley Council. I'm not quite sure what what area they are in charge of, but um, they had a handy handbook about you can be a male girl Scout leader. That's great. You can you can rely on the fact that there will always be a female co leader president with you. They would never leave

you alone with the girls. Yeah, that's good. I wasn't sure, but I figured there are plenty of dads who would want to be involved, especially if you're a single father, that you wouldn't want to be shut out of something like that, that kind of fun activity. So that's great. Yeah, they're so well known for being inclusive that they're like, no, we can do this. There's there's a way to do this.

You know. That's great. Uh, they wear their these days, and I think for a long time they have their uniform, which I think it used to be more of a full uniform kind of head to toe, and now you kind of wear your regular clothes and you might have a sash or a vest or something or scorts, as this how stuff works are Oh it does scorts. Scorts. It's that's such an ugly word to hear, but seeing it written down it's even worse somehow, uh it is. Um,

there was one other thing. I'm sorry. I want to give another shout out to a different um sentence in this how stuff Works an article, because it is so like two thousand ten how stuff Works, so that it's talking about how one of the traditions of girl scouting is to take ashes from a campfire and save it until the next time you build a fire, and then you put those ashes in that fire. So there's this continuous kind of chain of fires no matter where you

build the fires or win. And then it says, um, if more than one scout collects ashes, they're pooled before adding them to the camp fire, as if there anyone would have even thought about what might happen if more than one scout collected ashes, as if they would say, no, no, no, don't. Scout is much more good looking and popular than you. Your ashes are you just dump them on the ground right now, We're going to put only Jenny's ashes in. Yeah, we don't want your garbage ashes. I know that. I

mean that was us. Yeah, I don't think I have written this one. You did. I don't think I did. I don't think I did either. So Uh, speaking of inclusivity, the Latina population, by one in three girls in the United States will be Latina and it is a really growing population. And the Girl Scouts of America recognize this. They've created Spanish language website. Uh, they have bilingual camps.

They try to incorporate some of the culture into their meetings. Uh. And and I think from a two thousand eleven to two thousand sixteen, Anna Maria Chavez served as the CEO as the first woman of color, and today that is Judith Batty who was the CEO, who was the first African American woman. She is a former Scout herself from

Nassau County, New York, which is just great. And I think a lot of times, if you scouted when you were young, you grow up and try and pass along that tradition to your children and at least try to get them involved in then serve as as a Scout leader. Yeah. I think some some really high number like pent of former Girl Scouts end up volunteering for Scouts when they have kids. That's right, um, And then all you said that Judith Batty was the first African American CEO. People

are probably like, what a minute. You guys mentioned a woman named Glory back in the seventies. She was the first African American president CEO of the relative a new position for Girl Scouts. I think in the twenty one century it was created. Can we talk about these cookies? Have we taken a second break yet? No? We should take a second break because I need to go gather some cookies to fortify myself before we start talking about

cookies for like ten minutes. Alright, go get a cookie, everybody. Okay, I'm ready cookie time. Like you said, eight hundred million in sales I have from and it was about the same in twenty nineteen. I think, yeah, my friend, that is more than OREO generates into giving. That's amazing. And this idea goes way way back. In nineteen seventeen, a Girl Scout troop makes some cookies. Troop from Muskogee, Oklahoma shout out the high school cafeteria as their service project.

And then in nineteen twenty two, in their publication The American Girl, they gave out the recipe, and they basically said right away, hey, listen, we're gonna make some money off these, because you can make six or seven dozen of these for a little more than a quarter up to thirty five cents, and we're gonna sell them for that amount per dozen. And they were like, this is how we're gonna fund our organizations. And people loved them.

I mean, it's become a part of American tradition, is the Girl Scout cookie drive because that's the only place you can get these exact cookies and people love them, including me. Yeah, so yeah, they're good cookies, of course, obviously, without question, the tagalongs are the best of the best by far. That is my number two. Oh you're kidding? What is number one? The docy dough is my favorite, which is the peanut butter sandwich. I always find those

hard to find? Are they? Are they out every year? Oh? Yeah, they're the third most popular. Maybe I'm just like, no, I'm set on the tag alongs and I've always skipped over the docy Does all have to try those? Those are your number one? Huh? Number one is a docio dosy do tag along is my number two? And then I will rock a Samoa. Even though I'm not the biggest coconut fan, I will still rock up Samoa. Okay. So one of the things you'll see about Samoa's, which

were introduced in nineteen seventy four. By the way, um, they are frequently called Caramel d Lights depending on where in the country you are, because there are two bakeries in the in the country in the world I guess that are licensed to make Girl Scout cookies every year, and depending on the bakery, they're either producing Caramel Delights or Samoa's, And I guess the bakery decides what they want to call and people will say that's the only difference.

Those people are liars, liars, liars. There is actually a very big difference between Samoa's and Caramel Delights. Samoa's are made with dark chocolate. Caramel Delights are made with milk chocolate, which means, having only ever had Samoa's, I have not truly lived yet, because I can imagine a Samoa with milk chocolate rather than dark chocolate is probably exponentially better, unless the milk chocolate they use as Hershey's, Oh you

would rather have the milk chocolate? Yes? Oh? Interesting? Yeah, totally. You're a dark chocolate guy. Huh. I mean I like all chocolate. I'm a chocolate lover. But um, I do like dark chocolate. Developer will taste for it in the best fifteen years or so. Okay, Yeah, I mean like I I would. I just wouldn't even go near it when I was a kid. I think because I ate some Baker's chocolate once, like I learned a harsh lesson, even though it was the wrong lesson. Um. But yeah,

I think it's an adult thing. Like you don't like Scotch when you're eight, but you love Scotch when you're thirty. You know, Yeah, when you're eight, you're totally a beer person. Sure. I think by popularity, thin mints are lead the way with sales. Summos a number two at nine, dosy does or number three at sixteen, and then tag alongs come in at thirteen, and then you've got your your tree foils at number seven. I'm sorry with seven percent, and

those are the short bread cookies. But there's still such a staple that I believe trefoils are one of the leading ones in production at least, so tree foil or trefoil if you've ever wondered what that means. That's actually it's it's I think both work man um the the uh the I was just gently trying to put out the alternate so um. It's actually referring to the shape of the cookie. And remember we talked about in the Adidas versus Puma episode, the Adidas logo as a trefoil

has three lobes. Well that that three lobes shape, it actually looks like four, but the bottom ones supposed to be kind of like a point. It refers to a clover that was part of the original logo for the Girl Scout cookies that was turned into It was kind of blown up and really kind of turned into this minimalist icon by a very famous and incredibly prolific um logo designer named Saul Bass. Oh yeah, he did uh Hitchcock posters, Oh he did. He did the Shining poster,

the very famous the Shining Poster. Um, he did Minol, Warner Brothers, Kleenex, Dixie Cup, the Hanna Barbaras Star, a T and T United Way, I mean basically everything. And one of the signature things about Saul Bass's logos is the ones that he created in the seventies are still in use today. Like they may have you know, made him like three dimensional or chain the color slightly, but it's basically the same thing. That guy was that good.

But he came up with this. Um this, this new updated trefoil version of the girl Scout logo back in nineteen seventy nine, and they're still using it today. And if you look closely, it is um The three lobed clover that was part of the original logo makes up the hair of the girls. And there's three girls. The middle one is a girl of color, the other two are white, and they're all smiling and looking to the right toward the future, which is pretty cool if you

think about I love that. I got one something I want to play for you real quick, okay, trefoil, all right, I'm sure I can find one. This a truff foil. Go find one. Then you'll build a robot. I know you. You won't be defeated. So there I was looking one other thing about cookies, real quick. I was looking at the at like all of the cookies they ever came out with, and there were not a bunch that I

was said to miss. But I did see two that escaped my attention that I wish I had had eaten one We're Apple Cinnamons, it was out from two thousand one. Done that sound good? And another one We're Savannah Smiles, which I just missed because I wasn't paying attention. But they are lemon coolers that were out from two thousand twelve to two thousand nineteen. So if we haven't any clout with the Girl Scouts whatsoever after this episode, I want to put in a personal request to bring back

Apple Cinnamons and bring back Savannah Smiles. And what if they just sent you a VHS copy of the movie Savannah Smiles from nineteen eighties something I'd be okay ish with it. Uh. Here's the kind of neat thing about the Girl Scout Cookie Drive is they can earn um badges, uh the Cookie connection badges, cookie biz badges, uh, dough charms. They can earn things, but it's not by selling the most, which is what happens at Farm of Brocamp. Like the biggest markup in the most sales is what gets you

your badges there. It is for setting a goal and accomplishing that goal, whatever it is. It could be for making a really great advertisement or poster or maybe putting an advertisement in the local paper. Uh, it could be writing a story about the sale and getting that published

or something. There are all kinds of cool ways to earn those cookie badges that don't and I don't think any of them include well, we sold the most, Uh right, No, it's it's it's the local press that that hops on who sold the most or you know, but the girls got themselves. They're like, yes, you go out and sell it.

But the point is setting goals, reaching goals, learning, Like they have a digital like it's basically like Salesforce, but for Girl Scout cookies called Digital Cookie, and these little girls are learning how to like run that kind of stuff. It's more of a focus on entrepreneurship than anything else. And for a long time I was very critical of

Girl Scout cookie drives. I wasn't to the level where I was like complaining that like the Girl Scouts had set up on a public sidewalker um that that like there somebody was selling their kids cookies for hum at the office. I would never It wasn't to that level or anything like that, but I thought I was under the impression that the Girl Scouts of America was basically selling sending these kids out to basically send all the

money back to the central like group. And that's just yeah, apparently almost all of it stays with the councils and that money goes back into the local troops. That it's it's really like self funding thing. And I didn't really fully grasp that. And I also didn't realize how inclusive the Girl Scouts were. But now, I mean, like, I'm just I'm gonna buy all the cookies all the time. You thought Queen tag Along just sat on her throne of money pretty much no, no, no goes to the

council's goes back to the bakeries, um. And then about twelve to seventeen percent go to the actual individual troops from the council. And that's why those annual dues are solo twenty five dollars. Is you know, most families can swing something like that a year, but they still do have financial assistance if you can't, which is which is wonderful.

But I mean, just that's off, you know. So the Girl Scouts, like we said, and again we're not trying to disparage Boy Scouts, but they have always been more inclusive. They have always had policies of nondiscrimination from very early on.

And UM, like you said, some of the controversy comes from people of of certain political persuasion perhaps that think, Um, the Girl Scouts are too independent and feminists oriented and they're run by militants and lesbians and this this the worst things that you could possibly say, uh about like a really about a really great group like this. UM. In the seventies they had Betty for dan are old In, who we've spoken about before, UM, very much a noted feminist.

She sat on the board of directors, which was a great thing. But of course that didn't a squage any fears that it was a feminist organization because that was back when that was a dirty word. UM. Now you know, and are we in the third wave of feminism? I honestly don't don't know. I mean, the third waves definitely come about, but I don't know if we've reached the fourth or not by now. That Well, we'll do a show on that at some point and we'll figure out

all the waves. But the Girl Scouts have always been behind UM supporting legislation relevant to women, stuff like Title nine, which we've talked about, which is equal funding for female UM supports activities and stuff like that in colleges, and it's it's just always encouraged young girls to be independent and to do their own thing because that's what it

takes to succeed in the world. And I don't think they tagged that as feminism necessarily, but they just said these are rate traits to learn so you can be an an independent woman in America or all over the world. Because they do have troops all over the world, we should mention. Yeah, And they're usually like raked over the coals whenever you know, they they salute or they support UM, like a feminist leader of feminist activist, often pro choice activists.

They're they're usually one and the same or very often one and the same UM. And so you know, the far right will just like go crazy over that and say the Girl Scouts are like this brainwashing machine for producing you know, leftist agenda kids, right, and UM, that's

just doesn't seem to be the case whatsoever. I think really what it is is the the far right seems to to to think of groups like that, like the Girl Scouts, as as having some sort of agenda and not realizing that the groups like the Girl Scouts like have the values that they have which tend to be counter all right, because mainstream America doesn't share the same values as far right, and these are fairly mainstream things like inclusivity, UM equality, uh, female independence, like those are

pretty mainstream ideas. Uh. And I guess that's all I have to say about that. And and for those of you that want to write in, note, Josh is saying far right, he's not saying all Republicans. It's a big difference. Thanks for that. But this is uh and was also basically uh the beginning of and the the the left jumped all over the Girl Scouts for tweeting out a congratulations to Amy Comy Barrett for becoming I think the fifth um woman Supreme Court justice in history. And they

even like put the other women on there. It was like a Twitter card with all of the women Supreme Court justices pictures on there. But everybody on the left jumped all over them. So I think, just like the A. C. L U, if both sides are mad at you, you're doing you're you're right, you're doing everything right, then yeah, the Girl Scouts is a non religiously affiliated UM secular group.

But they do have UM the my Promise in my Faith pin which uh they say, compliments existing religious kind of recognitions, allows girls to further strengthen the connection between their faith and Girl Scouts. And there is the phrase on my honor, I will try and serve God in my country. But the official policy now for the g s USA is that you can swap the word God out if you want, and you can just say serve the community, or serve others, or serve humanity, serve my country,

or you can just drop it all together if you want. Again, in the spirit of inclusivity, you can also it's they also ruled it's okay to swap out my country for the socialist agenda, which I mean some people on the far right were like ce ce a problem with rainwashing machine. Um. Also, that gold award is did you say that your ey's friend's daughter is going for that gold award or the silver? She is working on her silver. I will be surprised

if she doesn't go for the gold. Well, only five point five percent of Girl Scouts who are eligible even get that gold to it is very prestigious. Indeed, so let's hope that she can get there. Yeah, let me. I want to wrap up with a couple of words from her. She said that she got to read one of her essays about going to see Wicket on Broadway on Broadway, and she said, um, I can now say that I was literally on Broadway. Ha ha. She said, I didn't win the competition, but out of all the

girls who submitted their essays, I got in. That trip will stay with me forever. It is these small moments that will stay in my mind forever. Girl Scouts will always stay with you. You make friends and you learn new things in life. It is so fun and amazing, amazing, amazing. Uh. And I guess my last thing is I want to

shout out some famous girls Outs. I was listening to the podcast the other day with Jason Bateman and Shawn Hayes and Smart lit Arnett SmartLess, and they had Amy Saidarison, who is one of my favorite humans, and she was talking about being a Girl Scout, which is no surprise, so Amy Saidarris is a veteran and by the way, one great Instagram follow if you don't follow her, um Sally Ride, Venus Williams, Carrie Fisher, Hillary Clinton, Michelle Obama,

Taylor Swift, Nancy Reagan, Gloria Steinhum, Lucille Ball, Natalie Merchant, Martha Stewart, Cheryl Crow, Katie Curic, Laura Bush, the Code of Fanning, and many, many, many more. Yeah, you and I saw the same Good Housekeeping slide show. Apparently know it took so long to get there? Did you say, Natalie Merchant, she's got to get a shout out? Yeah, she was in there. I used to be a big

ten Thousand Maniacs fan. How could you not be. I'll bet they're one of those bands where if you went back and listen to him now, you'd be like, what, They're even better than I liked, or then I realized back then, well I still listen. Okay, Well there's a little tip for all you girl scouts out there and boy scouts too. Don't be shy. Start listening to ten thousand Maniacs and see what you think. Agreed, and thank you very much to our special guest, Annabella from Troop

in Maryland. I hope we earned you a badge of some sort for this double or badges, I say badges, and since I said double, the badges it's time for listener mail. UH. This is Kiva plug you know, many many, many years ago. I think we started our team in two thousand seven. I'm looking now, Yes, it was okay, oh no, no, two thousand nine, we started a Kiva team. And for those who don't know, Kiva is a micro lending website. UM. They are not perfect, but they do

a pretty good job. UM where you can donate very small amounts of money to UH entrepreneurs and develop nations UH and all over the world that not even developing nations exclusively anymore, to help people out give him a leg up. And it's called micro lending because ideally they repaid this money and most of the loans do get repaid. And we started our team many many years ago. And

let me read this email first. Hey, guys, recently decided to start the catalog from the beginning again and reach the two thousand nine episode who were the first Americans where we plugged the Kiva team for the first time. I thought it would be good enough for Reason to write in and request that you plugged the team again. Because it's been a while. There may be a lot of new listeners who discovered the podcast since since then

and aren't aware of the Kiva team. Uh. And this is from Lee Rondorf in Minnesota, so I appreciate the nudge, Lee we Uh. I am very proud to say. This is amazing, dude. I haven't been to the site in a while. The stuff you should know. Kiva Team since its inception has loaned nine point almost nine point three million dollars uh threety loans almost twelve thousand members and about thirty loans per member. That is spectacular. That beats my number. I gotta tell you, it's amazing. And um,

I got the reminder the ad relan. I had about a hundred bucks in there sitting there in my account. That's how it works. They'll give you the money back, it'll be in your account and then you can go reland that money. And I'm still working off that first deposit I made many many years ago. That's nice. I've got to go look at my account and and it's been a while. I stopped getting those nudge emails because they really work. Like when they come here, I'm like, oh, yeah,

I need to go relind that. So I gotta go check it out and also figure out what why I'm not getting those emails anymore. That's right, So we should encourage people to look into Kiva. If it's something you feel like you want to support. You can start with just a twenty five dollar loan to get your account started. And uh, let's let's get this thing well over ten million dollars. And I meant to tell you too. I refreshed our page a little bit. Oh nice. We had

some terrible old picture of us, like in the video studio. Yeah, I remember that picture, so I updated that with a picture of us that we like to use. And I also just change the name of the team to stuff you should Know and not stuff you should know from how stuff works dot com. Oh wow, Chuck, very nice

modernizing stream. Well, if you want to join our Kiva team, go to kiva dot org slash team slash stuff you should Know, right, Yeah, and all the does have underscores between stuff you should know, But you can just go search teams for stuff you should know and make sure you do it through our team. So we're all collected together. It's kind of nice, and we don't discriminate whoever you are. Were as inclusive as the girl Scouts are, so join up and if you want to send us an email.

In the meantime, we always like to hear from everybody. You can send it off to Stuff Podcasts at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. H