The finical cost of Scouting

[BartHumphries]

For Christmas, one grandma would usually give me another year's subscription to Boy's Life. For my birthday, that same grandma would usually get me something from the Scout Shop. She was an accountant for the Council in Ventura, so employee discount in the scout shop, you know -- my family shops smart.

 

My troop has a once-a-year 4th of July pancake breakfast -- I think this is our 20-year anniversary mark this July, I'll have to make a note to check that out for certain. Anyway, that's our major fundraiser for the year -- we make more doing that than I think we could by selling popcorn unless we sold a literal metric ton of popcorn, which isn't too likely.

 

The boys buy their own uniform, their own pack, sleeping bag. We have some troop tents and a troop stove. We usually use the fundraiser money for camps and trips, but if a person has a real financial problem then we would help them beg/borrow/buy a pack/sleeping bag. They're always on their own for at least the uniform shirt, though -- when people buy that themselves (especially when they have trouble buying it themselves) it miraculously tends to avoid rips and stains much better, or so it seems.