Girl Scouts of Central Illinois will join Girl Scout councils February 23–25 to participate in National Girl Scout Cookie Weekend 2018, which celebrates all the fun, learning, and excitement that selling cookies has powered for girls over the last 101 year. The weekend highlights some of the most creative and successful Girl Scout Cookie entrepreneurs, as well as the positive change that cookie earnings make possible in communities across the United States. One hundred percent of the net revenue raised through Girl Scout Cookie sales stays with the local Girl Scout council and troop, so customers who purchase cookies are making an important investment in their communities and supporting millions of fun and formative leadership experiences for girls.

During Girl Scout Cookie season, each amazing young G.I.R.L. (Go-getter, Innovator, Risk-taker, Leader)™is not only selling delicious cookies but also building essential life skills, such as goal setting, people skills, and business ethics—which are essential for 21st century leadership. And the more cookies girls sell, the more earnings they have to power impactful community projects and personal enrichment experiences, such as camping and traveling. From a Brownie troop that prepared meals for residents at a local homeless shelter, to a Senior troop that saved two years’ worth of cookie earnings to travel to the Amazon basin in Ecuador to help build a high school, Girl Scouts are doing amazing things made possible by each and every cookie sale.

“National Girl Scout Cookie Weekend is one of the most significant occasions on the Girl Scout calendar,” states Sylvia Acevedo, GSUSA’s interim CEO. “It is one of our signature opportunities to convey how the Girl Scout Cookie Program effectively prepares the next generation of female leaders. For more than a century, selling cookies has served as one of the most powerful and successful paths toward transforming girls into entrepreneurial trailblazers. The earnings generated from the cookie program benefit Girl Scouts and their communities by empowering the girls to take meaningful and important actions to effect positive change.”

National Girl Scout Cookie Weekend offers go-getter girls a chance to show off their cookie-selling skills by participating in booth, door-to-door, and digital sales throughout the country. During this year’s cookie weekend, hungry customers will be able to get their hands on their favorite Girl Scout Cookies, including the best-selling Thin Mints® and Samoas®—so join in the fun of National Girl Scout Cookie Weekend 2018! Visit www.getyourgirlpower.org.org or use the official Girl Scout Cookie Finder app, free on iOS or Android devices, to find Girl Scouts selling cookies near you.