Have you ever stopped outside the grocery store to make a purchase from a friendly Boy Scout?
You probably did this with the intention of helping them while also getting yourself some great popcorn.
However, when you see the pricing on the popcorn, it may make you want to run away from the table.
Boy Scout popcorn is very expensive, and the pricing only seems to go up every year.
With the increase in pricing, it seems hard to understand how so many people are still buying this popcorn.
If you have ever wondered why popcorn is so expensive, here are a few reasons that may help you understand.
Why Is Boy Scout Popcorn So Expensive?
1. Learning Experience for the Boy Scouts
When you purchase popcorn from Boy Scouts, you are not just getting popcorn for yourself, but you are supporting a much larger cause.
One of the main reasons behind this popcorn being so expensive is that it is a learning experience for young Boy Scouts.
They will learn how to interact with customers, how to handle money, the ability to make a profit, and how to complete a task at hand.
Although it is not technically your responsibility to pay for this, it is sort of built into the price you pay for popcorn.
There are not many people who would be against training and teaching a young child about how the world of business works.
The popcorn project is one of the things that most of the older Boy Scouts will remember the most.
They will remember how they went from having their mothers handle this process to getting increasingly involved themselves.
As the involvement increases, so does the understanding of economics and the ability to truly learn from an experience.
Although this won’t increase the cost of the popcorn all that much, it does play into the pricing being so high.
2. Organizing the Effort
If you think it is easy to coordinate the entire Boy Scout popcorn sale, you are certainly mistaken.
This is a very large process, and each of the steps takes multiple people and organizations.
For instance, a popcorn distributor needs to be set up, and then all of the choices, the pricing, the website.
Then each Boy Scout troop in America needs its materials and systems for selling popcorn.
Once the popcorn is sold, there are still more steps to coordinate delivery and shipping.
Essentially, this process is complicated, and it has only become more complicated as years have gone on.
When you add in lots of people and a complicated system, the pricing of the popcorn is undoubtedly going to increase.
There are also mistakes and mishaps along the way that will end up costing the entire effort quite a bit more.
These are all built into the price you pay for your popcorn.
3. Cost of the Actual Popcorn
Let’s not forget that there is a price for the actual popcorn.
The Boy Scouts sale is not just a fundraiser, it is also a sale.
Therefore, products will be exchanged for money, and there is an initial cost of the popcorn.
Although the Boy Scouts are able to get their popcorn for a very low cost, it is certainly not free.
It is also not the Boy Scouts who are producing the popcorn themselves.
If a company produces the popcorn, they will have a much easier time setting the price.
When you have to purchase a product that you are then going to sell, you become the middleman.
The middleman has no choice but to raise the prices.
If the prices are not raised, there would likely not be enough profit for those in the middle.
Luckily, because of the volume of popcorn the Boy Scouts sell, they get some good pricing.
If not, the pricing of the popcorn you purchase from the Boy Scouts could be even higher.
Essentially, this means you will pay less for a prime rib than a bag of cheesy popcorn!
4. Money Raised for Boy Scouts
The price of the popcorn that you purchase will have a built-in profit for the Boy Scouts.
If your child has ever been a Boy Scout, you understand how much goes into this process.
Between meetings, projects, and trips, the process of becoming a Boy Scout is long and difficult.
Each of the individual levels has many events, and frankly, this gets quite expensive.
The money raised by the Boy Scout popcorn sale is going to help keep the costs down for all Boy Scouts.
This is truly important as access to the Boy Scouts is supposed to be available to all people.
It should not be so that only children with extra money can participate.
Part of being a Boy Scout is learning how to work with all different types of people to complete a project.
Since this is a fundraiser, a portion of the price you pay for the popcorn will go to the Boy Scouts.
Certainly, this is not a problem for most people.
However, some people will admit that, with the high price of the popcorn, they would rather just make a direct donation to the Boy Scouts.
This is certainly acceptable, and it is a great idea as well.
If you can do without the popcorn, but you still want to support the organization, they will be more than willing to accept your donation.
5. Shipping and Delivery
Some popcorn that is sold will be handed over to the customer that day.
However, there are also order forms a customer can take with them which are specific to the Boy Scout pack they interacted with.
A person can take this information home and place an order for popcorn on their own time.
Of course, this is entirely acceptable, but now you will need to also consider the shipping and delivery charges.
If you purchase from a neighborhood kid, they may hand-deliver the popcorn to you as soon as it becomes available.
The popcorn will come right to your doorstep, and you probably won’t have to pay anything for shipping or delivery.
When that large package of popcorn that needs to be distributed is sent to the Boy Scout, there are going to be shipping costs built in.
These costs will absolutely raise the price of the popcorn as well.
As you can see, there are many different angles to this process, and none of them helps the pricing of popcorn go down.
6. The Popcorn is Higher Quality
You will not have to worry about the quality of the popcorn you purchase from the Boy Scouts.
In fact, most people will admit that, even though the popcorn is overpriced, it is also quite good.
Higher priced popcorn tends to have more flavor, and it usually has more crunch as well.
This is not the kind of popcorn that will taste stale or soggy by the time you get to eat it.
High-quality popcorn is also a really good snack.
As long as you choose something that is relatively mild in flavor, popcorn can be a good food when you are trying to lose weight.
Overall, popcorn won’t have very many calories, and it can be a good snack to get you from one meal to the next.
Even with people being shocked by some of the prices you will see on popcorn, the product you receive does taste good and will be worth it.
Again, if you think it’s crazy to pay $9.00 for a bag of popcorn, simply give the Boy Scout the $9.00 and purchase your own popcorn in the store.
Indeed, the kids selling the popcorn have nothing to do with how the prices are set, so it won’t be worth complaining to them.
7. Hard to Compete with Girl Scout Cookies
The Boy Scouts have been selling popcorn for quite some time.
However, the Girl Scout cookies are an icon in America.
You may have a hard time finding a person who has never heard about Girl Scout cookies.
These cookies are unique, they taste great, they are only available during certain times of the year, and they are extremely well known.
People generally have no problem paying for Girl Scout cookies regardless of what the cost is.
Unfortunately for the Boy Scouts, this only makes their sale that much harder.
Not only do they need to compete with other charities and other popcorn distributors, but they have to compete with the Girl Scouts as well.
Of course, the Boy Scouts and the Girl Scouts don’t look at this as a competition between each other, but there is really no way to avoid it.
People seem to have no issues spending money on boxes of cookies.
Most likely, this is because they see cookies as being something that is time-consuming to bake, and it is quite a treat.
Popcorn is looked at more as a convenient snack than as a treat for a special occasion.
The competition with the Girl Scouts is just another reason the pricing continues to go up.
8. Parental Involvement
The Boy Scout popcorn sale takes quite a bit of parental involvement.
Although the parents being involved is not going to directly increase the price of the popcorn, it is just another factor in this large system.
Parents are involved, community leaders, popcorn companies, local organizations, the list just keeps on going.
With this many people involved with the process, the price just continues to go up.
The overall objective of most of the administrators and parents is to raise as much money as possible.
Although this is a valid goal, it has also been a major reason behind the increase in the pricing through the years.
This is no longer nearly as simple as your bake sale on the corner.
The Boy Scout popcorn sale is complicated, and therefore it gets expensive.
9. Variety of Options
When was the last time you looked at the options the Boy Scouts have to sell?
Years ago, the options were very simple, and you could look through the one-page catalog in a matter of seconds.
Like almost all things in life, the popcorn buying process has gotten much more complicated.
When you look at the popcorn purchase options now, you will be very surprised by the number of choices they have.
Some of these choices are simple popcorn, and others will be very involved in packaging and gift sets.
This, of course, adds to the price.
To have the facilities and the infrastructure to produce and distribute all these different types of popcorn will be expensive.
When things were a bit simpler, the pricing could stay much lower, and a profit could still be made.
If you want to save some money on the Boy Scout popcorn, look for things that have minimal packaging.
When you start looking at things that come in containers, jars, or special packages, you will spend quite a bit more money.
The money will go towards the packaging and not the actual popcorn.
Again, the more money you spend, the more the Boy Scouts will make from your purchase.
You will have to balance how much you want to spend with how much you are willing to donate.
10. Too Many Hands in the Jar
The last item on our list is the fact that there are too many people who are trying to make a profit from the sale of the popcorn.
Trail’s End is the brand of popcorn the Boy Scouts sell.
Trail’s End is going to sell their popcorn to the Boy Scouts for a considerable discount, but they still need to make a profit.
The Boy Scouts of America is also going to benefit from each sale of popcorn.
Beyond that, you will have the BSA Troop and individual Boy Scouts also receiving a cut of the profits.
When a Boy Scout sells a lot of popcorn, he is going to benefit the greater Boy Scout community but also his direct troop as well.
This is the only fair way to make sure that the Boy Scout popcorn sale is properly conducted.
Of course, by the time everyone makes a profit along the way, the price gets quite high.
The tough part for many people to understand and comprehend is how little goes to the actual Boy Scout troop in your community.
Honestly, if you want to make a difference to the troop, see if there is a way you can donate directly.
You will be happy to know that this process always has the best intentions in mind, but there are better ways to support a Boy Scout if you so desire.
Conclusion
Hopefully, you can now see why Boy Scout popcorn is so expensive.
It is not because this is some rare premium popcorn; it has more to do with the fact that this is a fundraiser.
If you just have a craving for popcorn, go to the grocery store and pick some out.
If you have a strong desire to help out a Boy Scout troop, talk to the local leader and find out the best way to help and support them.
NEXT: Why Are Girl Scout Cookies So Expensive? (Top 5 Reasons)
Lee Beckner says
All of the details in your article are probably very true. However, Girl Scout cookies at $5.00 per box and the same reasons hold true. Teaching public interaction, marketing, etc. I looked up your article because I went to the grocery store today and was about to buy a bag of popcorn, but I only had $15 cash. Sorry, too expensive.
Michelle J says
Where are you that $9 popcorn is an option? The cheapest here is $20 for a 6-oz bag! The 9 oz bag is $30 and another is $50! A 10-oz bag of caramels is $30! And that’s not including another $9-10 for shipping on one bag. The $5 box of cookies seems like a bargain compared to this. And all that selling experience? We were texted by the parents with an online order link.