Customized cub uniforms....possible?

[Momleader]

Here is an interesting solution from a cub parent. I'm wondering if its feasible / allowable. Local Boy Scout Troops have custom neckerchiefs they wear. Cubs have rank neckerchiefs they wear fr 1 year then either pass down or keep. What is stopping a cub pack from designing a custom neckerchief for a pack and wearing it from Tiger to Crossover after Webelos, with the official shirt and an appropriate rank slide that changes from year to year. Long the same line, what about a pack baseball hat rather than the BSA one. We have troops in the area that do the same thing and they are considered by council to be in compliance. I know of a pack that presents the kids their necker and hat for the next rank at their blue & gold. They have a mom that dutifully washes and irons them to recycle, problem is not every kid/family turns them in for the recycle so more have to be bought. This group went to this because parents were struggling to but uniform shirt, neckerchief, hat and book. The pack heads thought the inform shirt and book were the most important 2 items to have (kinda agree with them here) What do you all think?

[ADCinNC]

Capâ€â€Official navy-blue cap with orange front panel and tiger cub emblem for Tiger Cubs, yellow panel and wolf emblem for Wolf Cub Scouts, blue panel and bear emblem for Bear Cub Scouts. Webelos Scouts wear an olive cap with a plaid panel bearing the Webelos logo.

Neckerchiefâ€â€Triangular neckerchief is orange with navy-blue trim for Tiger Cubs, gold with navy-blue trim for Wolf Cub Scouts, light blue with navy-blue trim for Bear Cub Scouts, and plaid for Webelos Scouts. Official BSA neckerchiefs are the only neckerchiefs boys should wear. Packs should not make their own pack neckerchiefs for boys.

http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/cubscouts/parents/awards/parents.aspx

 

See also these old threads on the matter:

http://www.scouter.com/forum/cub-scouts/15770-cub-scout-neckerchief

http://www.scouter.com/forum/uniforms/12908-pack-hats

[Tampa Turtle]

I'd just not go there. Stick with the BSA standard. If you wish to do something unique do some special Pack patches for campouts or events.

[Momleader]

I ask because it is a $ thing in my area. Add the increase in fees by national, packs that used to provide them now have less $$ to work with since more $$ gets to national. The other reason is why are the older scouts - Boy Scouts allowed to do this but younger scouts not? We have parents that really struggle to come up with the $65 in yearly dues then to have to buy a new book, necker, and hat every year it makes it hard. We have a council that has said no den dues allowed too. So that $65 has to cover all awards, boys life, national's money, council money and a pinewood car. This didn't come up until the fee increases.

[Stosh]

I ask because it is a $ thing in my area. Add the increase in fees by national, packs that used to provide them now have less $$ to work with since more $$ gets to national. The other reason is why are the older scouts - Boy Scouts allowed to do this but younger scouts not? We have parents that really struggle to come up with the $65 in yearly dues then to have to buy a new book, necker, and hat every year it makes it hard. We have a council that has said no den dues allowed too. So that $65 has to cover all awards, boys life, national's money, council money and a pinewood car. This didn't come up until the fee increases.

Shhhh, you're not supposed to letting the cat out of the bag as to what National's up to.

 

I'm a bit of a rebel, but the hypocrisy between Cubs and Boys has always irked me. Heck 95% of the Cubs are out there in partial uniforms anyway. If you want to have a pack hat and necker, go for it. Financial conformity is not as important and unit pride in my book. Remember, the uniform is not even required in the first place, as long as all the boys look "uniform" then it's a good thing.

 

Stosh

[King Ding Dong]

I ask because it is a $ thing in my area. Add the increase in fees by national, packs that used to provide them now have less $$ to work with since more $$ gets to national. The other reason is why are the older scouts - Boy Scouts allowed to do this but younger scouts not? We have parents that really struggle to come up with the $65 in yearly dues then to have to buy a new book, necker, and hat every year it makes it hard. We have a council that has said no den dues allowed too. So that $65 has to cover all awards, boys life, national's money, council money and a pinewood car. This didn't come up until the fee increases.

Just out of curiosity is your CO LDS ?

 

So just who is supposed to pay for all the crafting supplies ?

[Momleader]

Nope not LDS. We are chartered by a church in town. As for craft supplies - we work on a few crafty things a year but we put the word out and supplies show up. Also the church does a rummage sale and they let me look first while I help them set up - if it's for scouts I can buy early & cheap :-).

[dedkad]

I ask because it is a $ thing in my area. Add the increase in fees by national, packs that used to provide them now have less $$ to work with since more $$ gets to national. The other reason is why are the older scouts - Boy Scouts allowed to do this but younger scouts not? We have parents that really struggle to come up with the $65 in yearly dues then to have to buy a new book, necker, and hat every year it makes it hard. We have a council that has said no den dues allowed too. So that $65 has to cover all awards, boys life, national's money, council money and a pinewood car. This didn't come up until the fee increases.

I can't imagine purchasing a custom neckerchief is going to be cheaper than just buying the proper rank necker off the rack at the Scout store. Also, our pack has decided this year to not automatically buy the Boys Life subscription for every boy. We are going to ask families to seriously think about whether or not their son actually reads the magazine, and only then check the box if they do. We are also going to put up a magazine table at the pack meeting check-in table to pass on magazines to those who don't have the subscription.

[TSS_Chris]

It sounds like the uniform questions could be moot in a year or two.

 

I don't have any details, but the chatter I'm hearing from my Council pros is that when the Boy Scout Oath and Law go into effect, there will also be and major changes to the rank requirements. I've heard changes to the uniform are being discussed to make it more "friendly" for the kids, possibly even going to a Girl-Scout style vest or sash.

 

The official timeline is for rollout in the 2015-16 program year. We provide the rank book with our dues. My DE advised me this fall not to buy any more books than we need for this year.

[qwazse]

Stockpiling books is generally a bad idea. Boys barely read the current editions, and there are constant revisions.

 

Uniforms, on the other hand ... once official always official, so it is a good idea to have a drive for gently used unis. (Yes I know what age range we're talking about, but it happens.) Discourage the use of "patch magic" and other heat-transfers that would ruin a shirt for the next kid. Create a "hand it down" culture ... especially with the neckerchiefs.

 

Never tried it myself, but wish I had: At the end of the year, have a bridging ceremony where each scout signs/stamps/or somehow tags his necker and hands to a boy moving into the next rank. After a few years, have some kind of recognition for the boy with the "most signed" necker. Or maybe try to see if you can find cubs with four neckers with the same boy's name on it, get the cubs to all pose in the same picture, then send it to the boy with a big "thank you". Who knows? If the boy is no longer a scout, it might just make him reconsider.

[K1986]

A few years ago for Pinewood I was wandering through my local Hobby Lobby and found that they sold race checkered bandannas. I bought many, brought them home and cut them in half so each bandanna became two neckers the same size of the official one. Then I took them to the meeting the week before pinewood and as a skill we sewed on (with lots of parent help) a generic pinewood patch in the middle of the necker. We took a two inch section of 1/2 in PVC and sanded down the ends and hot glued on a mini matchbox car. This was their "official" race day gear. It took a whole meeting and they had a blast!! Usually I cannot get kids in scouts for pinewood, they show up in jeans and a t-shirt. But this year everyone was crisp in uniform with their special necker which they continued to wear to meetings several weeks after.

 

For family camp I went back to the Hobby Lobby and got a neutral blue bandanna, cut them up like I do to be resourceful and took them to camp. The boys were given fabric paint and stencil cut outs of camp things (fires, trees, leaves, animals) etc. They were also given letter and number stamps. The only requirement was that they had to have our pack number on there somewhere and their name so we knew who's was who. They turned out great! We took our PVC and they found a pinecone and glued it on.

 

Here is the moral to my story, "Do your best", just like BSA asks. Try to get them all in official neckers, don't worry about hats most kids won't leave them on their heads. Have hand me down drives and shop your local thrift stores and yard sales, they turn up. But if you want to create a pack necker, do it! The kids will wear their uniforms more proudly if they feel as though they have had some control over their attire.

[AKdenldr]

I love these ideas about recycling scarfs and signing them, creating a special event or pack scarf. And new slides projects once in a while will really cut down on that lost slide problem.

 

This is what I did, and hope it helps.

 

Most parents after that first tiger hat purchase quit purchasing them. I could pick up bear, wolf, web hats and scarves and books at the thrift shops and keep them as a den leader. Then when we did a public event I would equip the boys that came without their own. (Collecting at the end of the meeting.) This gave us the clear appearance of scouts (even with coats on). Once my den was done with a rank I handed down the whole batch to the younger den leader. Often scouts and their parents would hand down their stuff. If den leader had a big enough bag they would use them when the boy moved up in rank. Sometimes we would hand out experienced Tiger scarves at the tiger recruiting tea as prizes. Used tiger books might go to parents who were interested in leading.

 

Regarding the books, most books I found had only a few markings in them. I'd keep a few in my den kit and let the boy who forgot his book use it. Boys who lost their book part way through the rank could get an experienced book (used) from me as a replacement.

 

(We did have on den leader in our pack who only used pencil with the idea to pass down handbooks. It didn't really catch on with our pack, but might work for yours.)

 

- AK

[Scouter99]

I can't imagine purchasing a custom neckerchief is going to be cheaper than just buying the proper rank necker off the rack at the Scout store. Also, our pack has decided this year to not automatically buy the Boys Life subscription for every boy. We are going to ask families to seriously think about whether or not their son actually reads the magazine, and only then check the box if they do. We are also going to put up a magazine table at the pack meeting check-in table to pass on magazines to those who don't have the subscription.

I was literally dumbstruck the other week when our Advancement Chair told me that we only paid something like $5 for the troop necker we award at First Class; it's two-colored and has a custom patch. A plain necker from National is now $10, which is unconscionable.

 

I don't know about a custom necker for your pack, but if you're seriously serving families that are that cash-strapped what you could look into is making knock-offs. You can get yellow cotton fabric for ~$1-2 per necker, sew the corresponding rank patch onto it, tada! you just saved $5 or more per boy.

[Stosh]

I remember the day when camp and activity neckers were as popular as t-shirts. Oh, how times have changed. Now it's like pulling teeth to wear a necker, let alone scout pants.

 

Stosh

[jpstodwftexas]

 

I remember the day when camp and activity neckers were as popular as t-shirts. Oh, how times have changed. Now it's like pulling teeth to wear a necker, let alone scout pants.

 

Stosh

 

Maybe it is a Leadership Thing...Back in My Days Leadership always wore Uniforms at Meetings including Neckerchiefs and Slides...Now Days it is Jeans and "Troop T shirts" something about it being Hot in the Summer here in North Texas...but I always Wear a Official Scout shirt, Neckerchief and Slide..My Pants are 5.11 Tactical Pants that are not Switchback style like the BSA Pants..same Color..Noboby knows the Difference..and a BSA Web Belt..Scout Socks.

 

and I wear it at Outdoor Events..Never with Blue Jeans like I did as a Youth till I could afford a Complete Uniform..I miss the Unifoorms of the 1980's, I hate the Newer shirts..Always seem to stay wrinkled..Never clean as well either.