Girl Scouts Drive Financial Literacy with Groundbreaking Digital Cookie Initiative

The legendary Girl Scouts Cookie Program is among the best known annual fundraising traditions in the world of non-profits and philanthropy, but the program also is a central component of Girl Scouts’ financial literacy and business education initiatives. As such, when Girl Scouts of the USA unveiled its revolutionary Digital Cookie initiative in December, it sparked a new wave of energy and focus on the financial education activities of the century old leadership development organization for girls.

The Digital Cookie initiative represents the very first national digital platform rolled out in the history of the cookie program and is an interactive and fun way in which girls can sell cookies beyond their traditional in-person sales. Since the announcement of the Digital Cookie launch, financial education professionals have been buzzing over the program’s expansion of the information, tools and resources that will enable over one million Girl Scouts to create and manage their own cookie businesses. These girls will learn and utilize a broad range of financial literacy skills, including budgeting, saving, money management, financial decision making and business ethics.

Even before the rollout of the national digital initiative, the Girl Scout Cookie Program experienced significant success with its traditional sales strategy. More than two-thirds of females heading Fortune 500 companies in the role of CEO have reported that they learned financial and business skills while selling Girl Scout cookies. Yet few women currently serve as CEOs or other C-level executives as compared to their male counterparts. Moreover, according to a study by the Girl Scout Research Institute, most girls report that they do not feel confident about making financial decisions. However, Digital Cookie is poised to change that fact by bringing the program into the more technological and digital world and, in so doing, providing girls with vital exposures to financial education that will empower them to become personal finance leaders in their families, and business leaders in their professional lives.

The Digital Cookie program is receiving accolades for its teaching of e-commerce and online marketing skills as well. These broader financial and business proficiencies mirror the more expansive topical areas on which financial education professionals have been focusing their teachings in recent years.

Industry observers are watching closely the developments of the Digital Cookie initiative and expecting strong results from the program’s focus on financial and business education for participating girls throughout the nation and beyond.