COOKIE QUEENS – Review by Monique Jones

Cookie Queens shows both the fun and questionable sides of the Girl Scout Cookie industry, as it were. The girls shown in the documentary are all selling cookies for different personal reasons, but one of the overarching reasons for all the girls is to help their troupe. However, how much is the Girl Scouts organization helping its little cookie sellers if the girls only get a dollar from the cookies’ six dollar price point?

I’ve often thought about the ethics of Girl Scout Cookie selling. Like most people, I do love the cookies themselves. But does selling cookies actually teach every girl things like persistence, resilience and responsibility? Maybe, and to be fair, the girls in this documentary seem to learn quite a bit about personal responsibility in business. But does selling cookies for the whole summer also rob children of time to be a kid? Should we have kids selling stuff when the organization should support them in building these skills? And do the Boy Scouts do any of this? Why are girls relegated to “selling,” i.e. people pleasing and relying on looks (in this case, cuteness) to make a profit? Is this cookie-selling industry really about teaching girls about business? Or is there an element of exploitation involved?

I don’t think Cookie Queens fully answers those questions, but I don’t think that was its intention, either. The documentary does raise these questions, though, while showing these girls as fully-formed individuals who have varying motivations–to be like older sisters they idolize, or to excel at topping a personal best, or to get their footing in their troupe and earn a badge. Cookie Queens is fun, but it also subtly challenges viewers to think more critically about the Girl Scout Cookie selling season.