Dive Brief:

• Girl Scouts sold about $10 million worth of cookies online in the first year the organization allowed them to sell through e-commerce, or 2.5 million boxes.
• The “Digital Cookie” initiative launched last year helps scouts sell cookies through personalized websites and a mobile app, and accept payment through Visa Checkout. 
• The organization sold 194 million boxes of cookies in 2015, or about $776 million, down slightly from 2014 figures. 

Dive Insight:

The Girl Scouts’ move late last year to allow its members to sell cookies online as well as in person has paid off. While the organization projected that revenues from cookie sales would slide at least 6% from the year prior, some $10 million in e-commerce sales during 2015 filled much of that gap. Sales were down just 1 million boxes from 2014’s 195 million, or less than 1%.

While shoring up funding for the 103-year-old organization, its “Digital Cookie” initiative also serves to teach girls about commerce and entrepreneurship in the multichannel marketplace. While Girl Scouts can still opt to set up a card table outside the local grocery store, they can now also build websites, send e-mail blasts, and process payments via Visa Checkout.

In the forthcoming sales season, Digital Cookie 2.0 will offer additional digital tools including analytics girls can use to track sales, like any multichannel retailer. The initiative also allows girls to ship cookies to customers, solving what has been a persistent problem for customers eager to stock up on Thin Mints, Do-Si-Dos and Samoas: They can’t find or don’t know a Girl Scout.

The Girl Scouts calls Digital Cookie “the largest multichannel business run by girls,” and in about five years, its participants will start to enter the workforce, ready to sweeten sales for all kinds of e-commerce businesses. “It’s all part of Girl Scouts’ legacy of teaching cutting-edge skills relevant to today’s girls, while staying true to the core values of our mission,” Anna Maria Chávez, CEO of the Girl Scouts of the USA, said in a release. “Digital Cookie 2.0 is allowing us to do this on a whole new level, which will help girls in school, in their careers and in life.”