How far does trustworthy go with your scouts?

[moosetracker]

We had to decide on how to work a fund-raiser. The council wants us selling tickets for the Blue Angel event. We have no problem doing that, we did have issue with how they wanted us to sell them and we changed the method.

 

The tickets are $20 a piece per day. Our troop needed to sign someones name to a contract when we took a wad of tickets by a specific date, either we would sell the tickets or return with the ticket cost in hand. Loose the ticket, you owe the money. We had no problem doing so in the long run, just not on the night they wanted us to, which was at a round table without speaking to the committee about how many tickets we should sign out.

 

Then they wanted us to hand out a wad of those tickets to each scout so that they could sell them door to door. There theory was if you don't have the tickets on you the people wont buy them..

 

Well with fund-raisers we have done this passing out of product before the scout had the product sold like this before. first-aide kits ($3 cost, $7 retail). Cookbooks (cost free, $5 retail)..

 

We hand out popcorn only when they return a list of what they sold.

 

We have sold wreaths in a blitz day where we have the product in hand, but we go out for the one day in groups to sell them.

 

Bottom line the first-aide kits and cook-books were lost or returned without sale months after the event. Parents scouts did not feel it their responsibilty to pay for the loss of first-aide kits even at cost for us.

 

We truely don't think many will buy at the door on the first knock, unless they are single and do not have to consult the family on who wants to, and are free to go that day. So, a blitz day may not work so well.

 

But, without the blitz day, we are not handing out $200 - $400 dollars ($20 cost, $20 retail) worth of product to the scouts of small paper tickets and hoping they do not loose them, leave them out in the rain, stick them in their pockets or just not return them on the required date.

 

Based on history we do not think they (is it really them or their parents?) will honor to pay for each ticket not returned on time, even if we get them to sign our own contract.

 

If we don't do a blitz day, then the boys will go with a sign up sheet, and when the return with the sign up sheet, we will then trust them with the tickets they sold to take them from us to those they sold to. If we did we fear the troop would be responsible for hudreds of dollars.

 

So trustworthy to our troop, I guess only goes so far.. There is a limit with money matters. How much do you trust your scouts?

[Lisabob]

I am not sure if the question should be "how much do you trust your scouts," or if it should be "why is your district pressuring you into a fundraiser you aren't comfortable with and what obligations do you have to respond to this tactic?"

 

In the latter: My answers would be "I can't imagine, and there is absolutely no obligation for units to participate." If pressure continues, tell the council/district folks to stick it in their ear. At a bare minimum, they need better advance planning and communication with unit leaders about any future fund raising efforts they conduct.

 

 

[RememberSchiff]

What council wants and what makes sense can be two different things.

 

Do you really want scouts going door to door with a wad of per person per day tickets overvalued at $20 each? For an experiment in trustworthiness, why not just hand scouts a wad of $20 bills and ask for all the money back in two weeks? Gamestop here I come.

 

The sales transaction for a family of four would be $80 with no refund or transfer if the weather is bad. Yeah that will be a fast seller door to door three months before the event in this economy. You might be able to sell some to parents at a troop meeting...maybe. A supervised, group selling event with decorated booth at a mall, etc. would be better than door to door. Still this is alot of bucks to dish out as families are scaling back summer plans.

 

When was the last time you paid money to see the Thunderbirds or Blue Angels? BTW, their performance is free, courtesy of our tax dollars.

 

Ask what percentage after expenses does the Council get back from this national airshow promoter.

 

Probably not what you wanted to hear, so you get a 50% Schiff discount.

 

My $0.01 (which is more cents than this council idea)

 

 

(This message has been edited by RememberSchiff)

[Basementdweller]

Soooo, for your fundraisers you just hand a Scout $100 worth of candy bars to sell with no tracking?????? Of course not.

 

No different in my opinion, I would have the tickets signed for by the parent and at the designated date either the tickets or money are due back. No big deal in my book.

 

Sounds weird to me that they would blind side you with it at Roundtable. I would ask if I sign for the tickets if I could return them if the Pack Committee decided not to participate. Sounds like they are trying to circumvent the politics.(This message has been edited by Basementdweller)

[moosetracker]

Oh, the troop wants to do the selling, and they are excited to go and many we have talked to are excited to get tickets. So not an issue of selling. Or them expecting our help in selling. No issue there. Maybe in your neck of the woods the blue angels are around all the time.. I have never seen them any where near her. Just the thought that we would trust the kids with costly merchandise..

 

for the scouts they can camp overnight go for 2 days food, t-shirt, show etc included for $45.. Our troop is looking into it. Those who want the $20 for 1 day, no food or t-shirt etc have that option too. Or they can not attend if $20 too much for them.

 

Considering what people still pay for sports events, there are still people who can afford this, and those that could not.

 

Even with the parents signing a contract, some would still not honor it.. Anything with money and you just get the weirdest responses which get into heated arguements.

 

Yeah the blindside was short sided on their part (ha,ha). If they thing SM and CC go to roundtable for each unit they are sadly mistaken. Since SM & CC have enough to do, we send a representative. The poor lady rep of our troop is fairly new, she lucked out that our family was their doing district buisness (not always the case). She was very nervous at even the thought and was so relieved to hand the assignment to us. So we decided to get the packets per scout, but not the tickets until a committee vote which was less then a week away.

 

My son was sent up. He said the guy (Council level for fundraising) was definately in high-pressure sales.. He told him he would take the packets not the tickets. The guy and him went round and round. Finally my son took the packets and walked away.. Again imagine trying to force a young man age 19 into signing to be the responsible party for $800 - $1000 dollars in merchandise!

 

Someone from our troop who works a block away will go over to sign for the tickets..

 

Well Basementdweller responded that with a contract he would hand the scouts the costly merchandise.. So, I would put you at a higher level of trust with your scouts.

[Eamonn]

A few thoughts.

I'd look at what the options are.

1/ Return all the tickets and inform the Council that the unit is not selling them.

2/Restrict the sale. Sell only to people who order them from an adult who can be contacted. Maybe an email to the friends and families in the unit, when they hand over the cash they receive the ticket.

3/ Set a date to sell the tickets and manage it the same way as wreaths in a blitz day was done.

4/ Limit the number of tickets you give each Scout to sell to only a few (3 or 5 tickets.) and keep your fingers crossed! That everything works out OK.

 

 

I'm a real softie when it comes to buying stuff from a cute little kid who knocks on my door.

I really dislike popcorn, but will buy it.

The Girl Scouts no longer sell my favorite cookie, but I still buy a few boxes.

I'm not so sure that I'd want to buy a ticket ahead of time to see the Blue Angels.

Not when I know that I can buy a ticket on the day at the door. It is un lightly that the event will be a sell out, so I'm almost certain that I'd get in.

I'm way too cheap to buy a load of tickets not knowing what the weather would be like on the day.

Most of the stuff I buy from kids who knock on my door doesn't involve a big sum of money. I'm not sure that I'd be willing to hand over $100.00 or more on the spur of the moment.

 

 

A few years back there was a big golf tournament at a course in our Council (Not sure which one, but Tiger Woods was to play.) The Council was given a lot of tickets. The tickets had a face value of $75.00 the Council was selling them for $50.00 with the idea that the unit would keep half and the unit the other half.

It turned out that everyone in the free world had been given a load of these tickets. So many that it was just impossible to sell them.

The Ship took 100 and tried selling them to the CO (The local Elks.) But the Elks had been given so many tickets that they were having a hard time just giving them away for nothing.

We ended up selling just one ticket and returning 99.

The organizer of the event really thought that he was doing a great thing giving these tickets to everyone, he just went a little overboard.

Even though the tickets did have some value, the cost to the Council was zero as the tickets were given at no cost. So while of course everyone should be held accountable, I'm not sure if going after a Lad for a ticket that was truly lost is exactly kosher?

Eamonn

[qwazse]

If at all possible, we have scouts pay for merchandize up front. Most of them and their folks would pay us back, but people are blitzed with so much paperwork already that they don't always keep track of it all. So, unless someone on your committee is willing to politely "nudge" the late payers every week, don't even bother with fundraisers that advance merchandize.

[Beavah]

Yah, there are several things here, eh?

 

I think generally speakin', you trust people with small things first, then bigger things. An 11-year-old ADHD lad with a wad of tickets? Probably not the best choice until he's demonstrated trustworthiness with keepin' track of other things of less value. A 15-year-old Life Scout? Probably a safe bet.

 

Problem is that when yeh add parents into the mix, it gets complicated. Some parents are busier/more distracted/less trustworthy than their kids, eh? So while occasionally havin' the parents involved will allow you to give tickets to that 11-year-old ADHD lad, it'll be the exception rather than da rule. And sometimes, if the parents are involved with how the 15-year-old Life Scout handles the tickets, they might get lost.

 

Yeh gotta go with your prior experience, eh? I know some troops where giving the kids the tickets wouldn't be a problem at all. They'd pair up older and younger boys from their patrols for selling; the older boys would handle the money and the younger boys would bat their big brown eyes and do the sales . I know some troops where the parents would take the tickets and yeh would see returns of less than 50%.

 

If your troop doesn't have da "trustworthy" thing down yet, no point being naive about it. You're at where you're at, and yeh have to take that into account intelligently. I reckon it's a fine thing to teach boys to be trustworthy, but yeh have to do it with a plan, some reserve for contingencies, etc. And yeh might want to start with somethin' that has a bit less risk (or not, depending on da margins on this and what fraction of your annual budget it is).

 

Other thing is that da longer the sale goes on for, the more people get distracted. Try to keep it short and sweet... maybe only a week. Or yeh can break it up into smaller timeframes and issue limited tickets for a timeframe. For example, one way to go is to get everybody together in the morning, hand out tickets, have 'em go out selling, and then collect receipts at the end of the day.

 

Shame on your council folks for da high-pressure tactics and surprises, though. That's not what we're about. Yeh should be sure to have your COR offer that firm feedback to da SE and council officers.

 

Beavah

 

[jhankins]

One troop in my district does a crab feed every year where the tickets are $35 each. The adults mostly sell the tickets and the boys work the event, but in some cases a boy will be trusted by his parents with 1 or 2 tickets at a time.

 

The idea is that the parents are also in the loop of responsibility with that kind of money.

[CalicoPenn]

Frankly, if you can't trust the Scouts (or their parents) with the merchandise before hand, then you have no business doing a fundraiser like this at all.

 

Our council used to hold an annual Scout Show - Scout-O-Rama. Prior to the event, the Scout units would ge given tickets to sell (door to door, Dad at office (yes - I said Dad - the world wasn't very enlightened in the early 70's). Prizes could be won with different prizes at different levels. Most units followed the suggested way of handling sales - give the lad an initial amount of tickets (usually 20) and if he thought he could sell more, sign out more to him as requested. Sure, the tickets were only $1.00 per, but there were boys (and parents) selling a few hundred of them - and $500 in 1971 was real money - (not that it isn't now but these days, you're lucky if $500 will buy you 4 replacement tires for your car - in 1971, you could buy 4 new tires, and new rims to mount them on, and get a brake job, and still have money left over for a full tank of gas and lunch for the family at Jack-in-the-Box.)

 

 

Trustworthy? You can't get trust if you don't show trust. If you go in to a situation with an attitude of mistrust towards your Scouts and their parents, then that's what will be reflected right back at you.

 

Make it clear up front that lost tickets are the responsibility of the Scout and stick to it, and they won't lose the tickets. If the Scouts aren't turning in the money or unsold tickets, then get tough with them - It's amazing how quickly action gets taken when you say "No, Mrs. Scout's Mom - Billy can't go on the canoe trip next Saturday until he turns his ticket money in" or "That's right, Mr. Scout's Dad - if Jimmy doesn't turn in his ticket money and/or unused tickets by next Monday, we'll be cancelling his spot for Summer Camp" and then you stick to what you say.

 

[Twocubdad]

If that's the potential outcome, CP, I wouldn't participate at all.

 

Let's do a little cost-benefit analysis here:

 

Benefits to the troop are the good will generated by going along with the council and, indirectly, the benefit of the funds being raised by the council. If I'm reading MT's post correctly, there is no profit to the troop "cost $20, retail $20" says to me all the money goes to the council. Attendance at the event isn't really a benefit as each boy still has the option of buying a $45 ticket and going.

 

Cost to the troop includes the time and effort of conducting a fund raiser (no small thing), the loss of good will from the people you are hitting up for another fundraiser (you can only go to the well so many times), the cost to the families who buy tickets (we all know who buys the most popcorn, wreaths, wrapping paper and candy bars)the risk of loosing and having to pay for tickets, and now -- with Calico's suggestion -- potentially loosing your priviledge to go to summer camp with the troop.

 

Tell me why you want to participate in this?

 

 

[Lisabob]

Totally in agreement with Twocubdad. This sounds like a poorly thought-out idea on council's end, with real potential costs to the troop even if nothing unexpected happens.