Troop sponsored Webelos Fun Day

[gcan]

I honestly don't think you NEED too actively 'pitch' your troop- have a table/display set up advertizing 'what you can do as a boy scout', which obviously has all the activities that your troop has done, lol. And put your boys and your signs right out there for everyone to see- they will get the hint. have your most outgoing boys 'socialize' with the parents, too- THAT will really impress 'em!

[GKlose]

Sorry, B-Skip -- I've been busy for a few days.

 

On our pack open house night, the only overt thing I did was hand out flyers, because I felt most of the Cub Scout parents there didn't know anything at all about the troop or what the troop does. The flyer, of course, also had contact information.

 

Why everyone else was concentrating on watching Cubs and having fun, I was "working the room", so to speak. I've been in constant contact with the Cubmaster, and I've met his assistant (next year's cubmaster) several times too. I checked in with the Webelos II den leader, and he introduced me to the two members of his den that I hadn't met yet. I said hello to the ones I knew.

 

I didn't catch up with the Webelos I den leader, although I have talked to her before and told her about some of the troop plans to help facilitate their year (one of those plans to is repeat last year's very successful "Outdoorsman Overnight" -- where the den joins us on an overnight specifically geared around our scouts helping their Webelos earning the Outdoorsman activity badge, with some other fun thrown in).

 

At our open house, we had Cubs snacking while they watched video from a couple of our recent outings. We're hoping just that them seeing Scouts have fun is enough of a sales tool.

 

My followup plan is this: we're working specifically on a Webelos open house for one of our troop meetings coming up. At this one, we'll extend an invitation to all second-year Webelos in town (there's only 8 to 10 total). I'm not sure what that program will be yet, but I am hoping the SPL will plan a good sales pitch. Just to be sure I'm not misunderstood -- so far, all of my contact has been with adults, except that I have also met all prospective crossover candidates. I try to remember their names so that I can say hello to them the next few times I see them, but I haven't really had conversations with them. Our SM is a charismatic guy, and when the time is right, he'll do a conference with each of them (also hits an AoL requirement).

 

Guy

[Buffalo Skipper]

Well, we had our Webelos Fun Day on Saturday. We had been watching the weather closely; there was a threat of rain (cold front) which was expected to move through that evening, but it looked good for the morning. Right before the WFD began (9:00 am), a shield of showers sprung up on the radar, and soaked everything. I would say it washed us our, but we had were conducting this right beside a church building which was large enough to move most everything inside. It was our planned backup.

 

I really pushed our SPL to prepare, setup, and run everything. I have run many of these events (day camps, camporees, and sea scout regattas), and I could have done it with my eyes closed. The SPL resisted organizing things in advance, and put off everything until the last minute on Saturday morning. In spite is this, in the end he executed the program near flawlessly.

 

We were short a couple of scouts, and we reorganized and dropped one event (no big deal). The end result was that we had 25 webelos show up from 3 packs and 7 dens. We were hoping for double those numbers, but we will take what we got. Everyone had a great time, webelos and scouts alike. We even got compliments from all the webelos den leaders, some of whom are registered ASMs and CMs in other troops.

 

The troop spent about $30.00 on ribbons, $50.00 on lunch, and about $45 on promotional items and supplies. We don't yet know how many of these scouts will actually join the troop, but there are several dens are coming back for a troop visit early next month. In the meantime, we do have several hard commitments.

 

I believe that 5 dens from 2 large packs did not show because they were scared we would recruit their cubs to troops other than their own. I am debating exactly how to prevent this, as our scouts are already talking about how they can make the event better next year.