The Final Word: CS Leader Unit Numbers

[Snow_White]

There still seems to be confusion about this. The local Scout Shop is telling CS Leaders and Webelos buying the Centennial uniform that they should get green/tan unit numbers. I thought all CS and CS leaders were to have red/white unit numbers, regardless of which uniform?

[Eagle92]

Snow White,

Welcome to the forums. your local scout distributorship is incorrect. CS and their leaders, including Webelos, do wear the red and white numbers. I posted links to the national website with the correct info.

[Twocubdad]

Our troop still has a sleeve of about 75 red-and-white custom two-digit numerals with an integral service bar. The troop will stick with the red-and-whites until we run out.

 

A Scout is Thrifty

[eghiglie]

Our troop has about 80 of the custom troop numerals left, economics says we use them up before ordering new ones. They cost abut 1.25 each when we bought them.

 

When I went to RT, with a new shirt and old numbers someone got in my face about it, that I need to toss out the old numbers, meaning $100. I kindly asked him for his uniform police badge. He turned and walked away.

 

Our next order is going to be a custom set with the city and state on them. Many of the local troops are wearing those now.

 

 

[Scoutfish]

I am fairly new to scouting, so in the rare case, I might actually be able to help.

I just bought my first leaders shirt 3 weeks ago. The very knowledgeable girl at the Scoutshop helped me pick the "NEW" correct colors. Tan and green.

 

See, I'm not officaily a leader yet, but wanted to hurry up and buy a shirt at the 75% off advertised price.

Turns out I couldn't. They didn't have my size. See, there are these new shirts that came out along with new designs. 75% off was a sale to get rid of the old shirts...whatever they were!

 

 

Since the design was new, somebody decided to change the colors too. Something about the "new and better, we've been doing it 100 years" scouts. Or something to that extent.

 

The problem is that all the info printed in this years books wasn't just gatherd in a week. Collecting and sortng through all the relavant data takes a very long time. Some stuff just carries over. Somebody either wasn't paying attention, OR the shirt change was made after the data gathering, and unfortunatly, too late to change the books.

 

Now, where does me being new benefit anybody? I'm not stuck on traditions or habits. Now don't get me wrong.... I do not mean to insult or down play any traditions what so ever,

 

Just saying how many folks had issued with EFI in cars and still wanted to tap the gas before starting? You'd flood out your car. Dimmer switches went from the floor to the steering column.

You no longer use telephone operators to call anybody. Self service gas stations....All changes that were hard to do...AT FIRST!

 

There is an old saying: "Old habits die hard."

 

 

Blah blah blah.

 

Basically my point is: The shirts probably changed after the books were already printed. The next set of books will probably show and list green and tan numbers only. Of course by then, the numbers may be purple on pink,,,but that's next years problem.

 

Oh yeah, one more thing- I did read..somewhere..can't remember where: The red and white numbers are still correct, and do not have to be changed. You can wait until you buy your next uniform shirt to do that!Red and white can be phased out with new scouts too.

[ScoutNut]

You lost me with all of that stuff about a sale, old cars, new book, blah, blah, blah. Not sure what all of that has to do with the color of the numerals you should wear.

 

However, what I do know -

 

The red/white numerals are NOT being "phased out".

 

Per the BSA links referenced above, the red & white numerals (#10400-10408) are for Cub Scout Youth (Tiger, Wolf, Bear, Webelos), and Cub Scout adult leaders.

 

The green & tan numerals (#18070-18078) are for Boy Scout Youth & Boy Scout adult leaders.

 

Many Boy Scout Troops still have stocks of the red/wht numerals because, prior to the brand new BSA Uniform which came out last year, those were the colors they have worn since the Oscar de la Renta uniform came out in 1980.

 

So, Fish, the "very knowledgeable" girl in your Scout Shop was not quite so knowledgeable, which is not unusual on this matter. As a Cub Scout leader you should have purchased the red/wht numerals for your BSA shirt, old, new, on sale, or full price.

 

However, you are not alone, many other Cub Scouters did the same thing.

 

Somehow, I think that an organization that has lasted 100 years will not collapse because some Scouts, and Scouters, are wearing the wrong color numbers on their shirts!

 

Now, the wrong color shoulder tabs, THAT could well be the end of civilization as we know it!

 

 

[Eagle92]

EG,

Actually according to the official literature that came out prior to the Centennial Uniforms (CU) coming out, you ARE allowed to mix and match ODL and CU items. What national did NOT specify was did that mean only major items, i.e. pants and shirts can be mixed, or minor items like insignia can be mixed or match, ie. tan and green numbers on the ODL shirts, red loops on the CU shirt, etc. So the UP was incorrect.

 

Scoutfish,

In case I haven't already wlecomed you to the forums, welcome. In referecne to your scout shop, is it a national supply shop, or a local distributorship, ie council owned shop or a store selling Scout merchandise in addition to other wares? There IS a big difference as national scout shops are owned by Supply Division and have the most up to date information AND must honor the lifetime guarentee of uniform items. Distributorships are local businesses, like JC Penny and your local council office, that agree to sell BSA merchandise. They set their own policies and prices, do not have to honor the lifetime guarentee as THEY are charged for returns to national, AND do not necessarily get the most up to date information.

 

Give you a great example of how out of the loop local distributorships can be. I found out about a new uniform and new handbooks BEFORE the local council did. I found out about the mid-year price increases in the uniform before the local council and a local store did. The local council still has July 2008 literature posted on the uniform b/c they have not recieved an updated poster yet. So a local distributorship may not have the most up to date information. Caveat emptor.

 

Now in reference to the uniform literature coming out with the CU, that was a major, stress MAJOR screw up with national as a new Insignia Guide (IG), uniform inspection sheets (UIS), etc did not, stress NOT, come out with the intro of the CU. Only thing folks had to go by was a brochure in a pdf file.

 

To make matters worse, national kept changing information around between the intro of the CUs in August 2008 and the IG in May of 2009. I've posted some of this info above. It was so bad that even nationally owned scout shop employees didn't know what was going on as they were even out of the loop. An example of this would be calling my old scout shop to find out the most correct information, esp. Since I heard/read about the uniform number issue, I called them up for clarification and was told by an employee that he didn't know what was going on, the IG was chock full of errors despite being published 8 months late, and to the best of his knowledge based upon the literature he had on hand (the pdf brochure), CS leaders in the CUs wore tan and green numbers and trained strip as national completely did away with tan and red strips. And as we all know now this was incorrect.

 

My advice is that if you haven't sewed on the numbers yet, return them ASAP and get the red and whites as that is what all the current lit says found here http://scoutstuff.org/BSASupply/images/pdfs/Male_Leader_Checklsit.pdf

 

If you have sewed them on already and the UPs are after ya, tellthem yuou have a vintage August 2008 cub scout leader uniform, I'll be happy to PM ya with the pdf file of the time

 

PS. even national screws up their info, that link I provided says a leader needs a MB sash

[emb021]

Actually, the red & white numbers are for BOTH Cub Scouts and their leaders AND Venturers and their leaders.

 

We do not wear the green/tan numbers on the forest green Venturing uniforms.

 

Also, there are 2 trained strips: a green/tan one and a gold/red one.

 

The gold/red one are for Cub Scout leaders and Venturers & Venturing leaders, while the green/tan one are for Boy Scouts and their leaders.

 

Again, there is a lot of confusion about that one, as I have some insist that Venturing wear the new green/tan trained strip and claim the gold/red is ONLY for Cub Scout leaders...

[Eagle92]

EMB,

Actually the literature I'm looking at does NOT show or state that trained patch is even worn with the venturing uniform, let alone which trained patch.

 

http://scoutstuff.org/BSASupply/images/pdfs/Venturing_Checklist.pdf

 

http://scoutstuff.org/BSASupply/images/pdfs/Venturing.pdf

 

Thankfully ebay still has a bunchof the old ones, and I got a small stash of the old trained emblems for my Venturing uniforms.

 

Would be nice if National made one in Green and White similar to the VLSC ones, hint hint .

 

 

[emb021]

"Actually the literature I'm looking at does NOT show or state that trained patch is even worn with the venturing uniform, let alone which trained patch."

 

Uh, using National Supply as a resource doesn't work. In fact, the World Crest is too far down in those pictures. Its supposed to be centered between the pocket and the shoulder seam.

 

If you check out the Venturing literature or even the Insignia Guide, you will see that both youth and adults in Venturing may wear the Trained strip. We always had. Adults who have completed basic training and youth who have completed Crew Officer Orientation may wear the trained strip.

 

[Eagle92]

Emb,

Hear ya lound and clear. I knew leaders wore the trained strip, but believed that Venturers actually wore a green and white VLSC strip, and not a trained strip. Have they done away with the VLSC strip.

 

I actually liked the color combo of the VLSC strip, and was hoping national would come outwith a trained strip in those colors. Saw an unoffical one, and it loooks spiff.

[emb021]

"but believed that Venturers actually wore a green and white VLSC strip, and not a trained strip. Have they done away with the VLSC strip."

 

The Venturers wear the VLSC strip IF they've gone thru the course. The literature has ALWAYS stated that Venturers who go thru the Crew Officer Briefing (or whatever the session is) are entitled to wear the trained strip. No different then Boy Scouts.

 

I can tell you that from day one of Venturing, I have NEVER seen a youth wear the trained strip. And there is certainly no guidance as to if/how one is to wear a trained strip and a VLSC strip together (obviously one on top of the other, but which is one top? There was talk 2-3 years ago about further courses like "Mentoring Others" and "Teaching Others" which would ALSO have strips, and the idea is the youth would wear them all, one on top of the other).

 

The VLSC strip has NOT been done away with. However, considering some of the radical changes they have planned for some of the youth training courses like VLSC, Kodiak, etc, I won't hold my breath.

 

 

"I actually liked the color combo of the VLSC strip, and was hoping national would come outwith a trained strip in those colors. Saw an unoffical one, and it loooks spiff."

 

Would agree. I have a few of those. While I am pretty much a uniform purist, I have no issues with those strips, tho I don't wear one (or any trained strip), in part because there is no official training for my position...

 

[BklynEagle]

My Troop, and its affiliated Pack, have a real simple solution to the red/white vs. tan/green conflict - We've got custom shoulder patches that identify our council, ourselves, and where we're from.

[Eagle92]

Brklyn,

Welcome to the forums. You may need to be care/get your council's approval for that. BSA nationally and some local councils, are really getting anal retentive about BSA 'branding" and ARE going after individuals and units. There is a troop in my district that had the lawyers coming after them b/c they designed an all in one patch that had my council's old CSP design in it. Looked great, but it violated the law and they had to quit makign them. Came to someone's legal eyes via an ebay sale.

[Scoutfish]

Okay, I wasn't very specific since the title thread was only about leaders. I just assumed everybody would get that I was refering to leaders.

The local scout shop USED to be local, but went NATIONAL since I had bought my sons wolf stuff at the begining of last year ( well actually ... after the August round up).

The phase out was only to apply to the leader's shirts/ centenial shirts. No, I don't know why.

The girl at the scoutshop said that the old stuff would not be dropped for everybody in one time frame, but slowly phased out as your old shirts and stuff either wore out, got tore up, as you had to buy new uniforms for whatever reason..

You didn't suddenly have to go out and buy new numbers, but just got them whenever you had to buy new stuff....whenever that happened to be.

 

As far as references to cars and whatnot...I was just saying... trhe biggest problem with change is change itself. We get accustomed to certian things and settle into a routine. Whenever something new comes along..we get upset, gripe, complain and get bent out of shape.

Are the green and tan numbers gonna cause scouting to suddenly collapse?

NO! Will people suddenly stop joining? NO!

 

Personally, I like the red and white better. It "just Looks better" in my own opinion. Sorry I can't explain better, but I just like it better than the green.

But at the same time, The green and tan numbers will not change how I feel about scouting, they won't affect or change the way I get involved , nor will the scouts suddenly stop learning.

 

Now, I do have to ask though...If even National gets it wrong...who is to say that Green and Tan are not the right colors? Maybe a memeo was supposed to be sent out saying that everybody is supposed to change at the beginning of 2009 or 2010.

Then again, if even National can be wrong....maybe tan and green was just some joke said in jest at a meeting and the secretary/ minutes taker wrote it down,typed it up and sent a memo to the patch maker not knowing it was a joke?

 

 

(This message has been edited by scoutfish)