We are certainly gonna have different viewpoints from differnt professional Scouters, because of the diversity of the cultures and communities that we represent. My area is a border community in deep South Texas. I've got a lot of young generation X and Y parents that all use cells phones and use texting rather then emailing. They use the fast tracks rather then the program helps. They sell popcorn, give to FOS, and order a lot of stuff online rather then go to the Scout Shop. They get really frustated with our program, because they want a "one stop shop." Many of them have girls in the family and would rather join the BSA then another Scouting program. They don't care about our membership standards, because they're "too busy," however, then want their kids to earn advancement and "win, win, win." They want it quick, simple, and cheap, but they are also highly competative. They don't want excuses, they want results. Many of the parents that I come across with just want the organization to just make it happen or they'll join another program that will. I never thought I would see such a change in society. The old Leave it to Beaver Days are gone. We need to take girls in Scouting in the BSA seriously or we're gonna regret it in the future when some other organization beats us to the punch. I think that our national board of directors, which are successsful business people would certainly appreciate and entertain a growth potential of another 2 million traditional youth members. We would have stronger units, stronger districts, stronger councils, etc. The positive results would not only include strong positive public relations about the BSA supporting American families, but the financial gains would be awesome.
I agree that short cuts are bad, but marketing our product to different generations of parents has become more challenging over the years. In my service area I recruit on average about 600 - 800 Scouts yearly. I'm currently at a 25% increase. My recruitment of volunteers has really increased also. Advancement is awesome right now in my district. Most of my new volunteers no longer use the program helps, but rather the fast tracks thas was introduced earlier this fall. Differnt generations require new ideas with a bit of the old. My staff wears the new uniform to push trading post sales also. It's working.
Wow, that's pretty amazing that you're able to do that. Where do you live?
Many huge companies have changed their name to a more simple our easier to market name. For example; Nike changed to just using their logo, Sears Roebuck changed to just Sears, and I'm sure you could think of a few others to. I would rename our organization "Scouting, BSA." Then in a few years to just "Scouting."
I think that everyone would love this to happen, but the reality is that if we did that we would price ourselves out. We're a business that is accountable to boards who should be successful business people. They expect us to be good stewards of the money that they help us raise. We need to purchase items where they are made of good quality at the lowest possible price. This makes the items affordable for our clients and profitable for our organization.
I totally agree to allow girls in our program. It's good for buisness and the last I heard we were in the buisness of growth. If we moved to this direction we'd grow by probably about 2 million traditional. That's a lot of membership, membership fees, uniform sales, product sales, and family fos.
I no longer use the name Boy Scouts, because it is a distraction when I conduct boy talks in classrooms and the girls interupt by saying "it's not fair." I simply say "Scouting." I do the same when I visit middle schools where I say either "Scouting" or a "youth high adventure program."
I agree that we should allow kinder kids to join. I also think that we should allow cub scout buddies to join both boys and girls. Cub Scout buddies attend meetings and participate in cub activities anyway. Supply even has a cap and t-shirt for them. They need to be included in our insurance also.
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