When January rolls around, the Girl Scout cookie craze begins. Packaged in bright colors, cookie flavors range from the popular Caramel deLites, cookies topped with caramel and coconut, to Lemonades, which utilize a tangy lemon-flavored icing.

The Girl Scout tradition of selling cookies stemmed from the scouts’ need to finance troop activities, and first began in 1917, when a group of Girl Scouts baked cookies and sold them in a high school cafeteria.

On Sept. 28, 2023, Girl Scouts of the USA, a parent organization behind local troops, acknowledged that prices would be rising in 2024. Due to inflation, cookie prices have gone up to fight rising production and material costs.

“I think that it makes sense to raise prices, but it slowed down sales by a lot this year,” Girl Scout Farzana Khan ‘26 said. “It also hindered our sales advertising because we used to [sell] four [boxes] for $20, which usually made people buy more than they intended, but now we can’t do that sales pitch anymore.”

In 2016, cookie prices rose from $4 to $5. Boxes are now $5-$7 each, depending on where they are sold.

“I think it’s absolutely stupid,” Sahana Suryanarayan ‘26 said. “I was very happy paying $5 for girl scout cookies. [Now], you have a $5 bill and then you add $1. It just becomes very inconvenient because the next number up is 10, and it was much easier before. And you could also buy more with a $20 bill. Now, you can only get three [boxes], and are $4 short for another box.”

Additionally, a cookie that had been released in 2023 and rose quickly to popularity, Raspberry Rallies, will be discontinued, though it is not specified if the flavor will be gone forever. The Girl Scouts of the USA have decided to focus on supplying their yearly classic cookies, such as Thin Mints.