Smartphone App Helps Girl Scout Cookie Fans Find Local Booth Sites!

It’s not too late to locate Girl Scout Cookies! Girls will be selling cookies at area locations from March 1–24. Cookie Booths are the final phase of the Girl Scout Cookie Program and allow customers to buy Girl Scout Cookies through direct sales. All locations accept cash and checks payable to Girl Scouts. Six varieties of cookies will be on sale for only $4 a box.

Fans can find nearby Girl Scout Cookie Booths with the free Cookie Locator mobile app! Searching by GPS location or zip code, customers can find booths in their neighborhoods, map the locations, and even add them to their calendars. They can also get details about favorite cookies and discover their cookie personalities. They’ll choose a favorite cookie and learn why it's a taste they crave. Samoas? They’re "brainy, complex, and mysterious." Customers can share their Cookie Personality and more with friends on Facebook, Twitter, and email.

The highly rated Cookie Locator App can be downloaded for free by calling **GSCookies (**472665437) from a mobile phone or by searching for “Cookie Locator” in the iPhone App Store or Android Marketplace. The Cookie Locator App was developed by Little Brownie Bakers of Louisville, Kentucky, in 2011.

Girl Scouts of Northern Illinois (GSNI) is also introducing 5 for Five. In honor of the five skills girls learn through the Girl Scout Cookie Program (goal setting, decision making, money management, business ethics, and people skills), customers who purchase 5 boxes of cookies will receive a coupon with a unique code. Once they enter the code online, they will be entered into a drawing to win 25 boxes! The contest runs from March 1–29 with the winner being announced via social media on March 29. Visit http://www.girlscoutsni.org/cookie.html for more information and to enter your unique coupon code!

Other Ways to Locate Cookies - If you’re not approached by a Girl Scout or can’t visit a local cookie booth, you can e-mail cookies4you@girlscoutsni.org and your cookie order will be passed on to a local Girl Scout. Customers can also visit http://www.girlscoutsni.org and use the cookie locator on the homepage.

Girl Scout Cookie Program Benefits - Through Girl Scouting, girls become leaders in their daily lives and prepare for their futures. To millions of girls, Girl Scout Cookies provide an opportunity to travel, explore science and math, and learn about a career. Because not only are these cookies great, but they are at the center of the largest business and economic literacy program for girls! The Girl Scout Cookie Program provides an important ingredient for leadership by helping girls develop five key skills of goal setting, decision making, money management, people skills, and business ethics.

Through the Girl Scout Cookie Program, girls participate in carefully developed, age-appropriate cookie activities that help develop these skills that they can apply throughout their lives. Even the youngest Girl Scouts gain self-confidence and poise by learning how to greet customers and offer cookies for purchase. As girls grow, emphasis is placed on getting to know their product—ingredients, calories—to designing innovative and creative marketing strategies and tools. Girls learn to plan, set goals, build teams, speak up, make decisions, solve problems and manage resources. Over time, the skills girls gain set them on a path to be leaders, in their own lives and in their communities.

Girls also have the opportunity to give back to their community through the Girl Scout Cookie Program with the Gift of Caring: Cookies for the Military or the Community Gift of Caring. Girls can choose from offering customers the chance to purchase cookies for soldiers, or purchase cookies for a community organization designated by the troop.

Girl Scouts of Northern Illinois serves nearly 18,000 girls and 5,500 adult volunteers in parts or all of Boone, Carroll, Cook, DeKalb, DuPage, Jo Daviess, Kane, Kendall, Lake, LaSalle, Lee, McHenry, Ogle, Stephenson, Whiteside, and Winnebago Counties. For more information on how to join, volunteer, reconnect or donate to Girl Scouts, visit http://www.girlscoutsni.org or call 1-800-242-5591.