Facing Increased Costs, Girl Scouts Downsize Cookie Boxes

It’s always seemed a little too effortless to finish off a box of Girl Scout cookies, but if they are a little easier to dust off this year, it’s not just in your head. To offset the cost increases of cookie ingredients, Girl Scouts of the USA made the decision to shrink its cookie boxes by a centimeter, package fewer cookies into boxes of Thin Mints, Do-si-dos, and Tagalongs, and reduce the size of its Lemon Chalet Crmes.

According to the organization, the cost of flour rose by 30 percent, assorted cooking oils by 40 percent, and cocoa by at least 20 percent. The company felt this was the best method of dealing with increasing raw material prices. Alternatively, Girl Scouts could have used cheaper ingredients, or raised cookie prices from their current price of $3.50 per box.

This doesn’t come as a surprise to me, since last year producers began rolling out shrunken products in reaction to the price of food on the rise. I’m secretly a bit excited — for once, the downsized box may be enough for me to stop short of a stomachache.