NOTES

1.    What is our Greenery Sale Campaign?

• It is our annual fund raiser
• It generates the funds needed to run the troop
• It also generates funds that go directly into your own scout account to help pay for your dues and you trips such as Cima, Philmont, high adventure, etc…
• Our goal is to sell $55,000 this year. We sold close $51,500 in 2005.
• The process will also teach you important skills such as how to communicate with others, and especially how to be courteous towards your customers.
• It will also teach you good record keeping habits as you keep track of orders and submit your weekly turn ins.
• Members working with me are
  1. Roger Hennington Vice Chair
  2. Susan Snelling – Wednesday night turn ins
  3. Ken Schneider- Past Chair Emeritus and always willing to help.

2.    Pick up your packets on your way out today after the meeting today.

I would also like the Patrol leaders to take the responsibility of ensuring that each Scout in their Patrol has picked up or received the Packet

3.    What is in the Packet?

We sell only Christmas Greenery 

• A letter on yellow paper that has schedules, details, instructions, commission calculations etc. – Put this letter up on your fridge.  It will act as a reminder and you will be able to refer to it for all kinds of information.
• Christmas Greenery catalog describing the various items that may be purchased.  Note that we do not take orders for the “Berried English Holly” item, which is crossed off on the catalog.
• Christmas Greenery order summary sheet.  The summary sheet will allow you to keep track of your customers’ addresses so you’ll remember where to deliver the stuff after you pick it up from the scout house.
• Form to identify any Greenery that is to be shipped directly to Customers.  When you order greenery, it will show up here at the Scout House for you to pick up UNLESS you want Sherwood Forest to DIRECTLY ship order to your out of town customers.  There is of course a cost associated with this direct shipment, which is added to the base price of the item.  So any order you are placing for someone out of town that you want Sherwood Forest to mail the item to directly, you must fill out their names on this form and hand it in to us with your weekly turn ins.
• Five Green Weekly Sales Form for our five weekly turns ins.  What these forms are for is to summarize all the orders that you are turning in for us.  These forms do not track each individual order but lump together all the orders you are placing in.  It is up to you to keep track of individual orders by using the Greenery order summary sheets and/or the white customer form we include ONE copy of as described below:
• A white Customer Order Form on which you will record what each one of your Customers has purchased from you.  Please make your own additional copies of this form since you will need one for each of your customers.  You can even enter let’s say on the back of that form the customer’s address and phone number.  These white forms are an alternative to or may be used in conjunction with the Greenery order summary sheet.

4.    Let’s review again the use of the Green and White forms that are in your packets

• You will record each customer’s order on the white form.  This is why it is important for you to make copies of these white forms BEFORE you start using them for your customer orders.  One white for per customer.
• Then you will add up all your customers’ orders, come up with the aggregate order and then enter that in the green form.
• It is the green form that you will turn in each time along with the money for that week, and any direct shipment orders.  Remember these are orders you want the Greenery company to DIRECTLY ship to your out-of-town customers
• Every Wednesday, we will be set up in the back bay where there will be 3 or 4 volunteers who will collect the forms and the money.  Make sure you turn in your orders either before the meeting or at the break.  We will not process orders turned in at the end of the meeting until the following week.  That’s because I need to total up the moneys before the end of the meeting.
• Some words of caution:

Ø     Please make sure that there is 100% accuracy – we will be placing orders based upon what you enter on the Green forms – if you make a mistake then we will make a mistake and then you will have a dissatisfied customer – and correcting an error costs time and money.

Ø     Make sure that the money that you turn in matches with the sale total that you show on the form – if there is a discrepancy then it means that you have made a mistake so go and re-check your customers’ orders

Ø     Take time to complete the forms – do not do this at the last moment just before the Troop Meeting on Wednesday or at the Meeting itself – this is bound to lead to mistakes

o      What have we done to help you minimize mistakes?

Ø     We have added a box at the bottom of the form where you will enter the total of both the checks and cash that you have collected from your customers so you can see if this matches with the sale total

Ø     We have also set up the Green Form in MS Excel with the built in formulae so you only need to enter the quantity of each product that you have sold and the work sheet will automatically calculate the total sale amount – I will be e-mailing this work sheet as an attachment to everyone early next week

5.    Prizes

o      Weekly winner

o      Top 5 overall salesmen.

o      A drawing from amongst all scouts who did not win weekly or overall sales prizes and have met their $200 minimum.

o      Top selling patrol (computed on per scout basis and all scouts in that patrol must have met the $200 minimum sales)

o      What type of gift cards do you like?  Best buy, Oshmans, REI?

6.    Some do’s

• Study the sales materials. Be careful when you take an order.
• The Greenery catalog cut sheets do not have prices – enter prices on them so that when you are showing it to a customer he/she will know what each item costs
• Get started on making your sales calls right away – the holiday season is right upon us and people are planning parties and are thinking about how to decorate their houses and this means that when you present them with the products, they will jump at the chance to make a purchase – if you are an older scout, then you know that your past customers are waiting for you – catch them right now before they commit to some other kid from another troop or school – if you are a new scout, then make notes about whom you have sold to so you can go back to them next year
• Most likely customers are going to be your family, friends and neighbors and your Dad’s and Mom’s business associates – so make a list of your likely customers and go after them
• Go back to your last year’s sales records and try to sell at least 10% more than that total

6.    Some don’ts

• Don’t be afraid to sell – we sell very high quality stuff and it is very competitively priced – so people will appreciate it if when you ask them to buy – the greenery sells itself – you will actually be just an order taker
• Don’t sell on street corners
• Don’t wear your Field Uniform (sometimes referred to as Class A) – this is a Troop activity, not a BSA activity – you can however wear your Troop T-shirt and Cap
• Don’t wait to turn in the last week – turn in something each week

7.     In case you have any questions, you may contact me, Mr. Roger Hennington, or Mrs. Susan Snellling.  Our contact details are on the yellow letter.

8.   Every scout is expected to meet the $200 minimum.  If you do not meet the minimum, you will not be allowed to advance in rank! Last year, I had the very unpleasant task of having to call about 10 scout families to urge them to meet the minimum.  I do not want have to do this again!

9.  Remind them at end of meeting to make sure patrol leaders inform scouts not in attendance of need to pick up packets from them.

SPREADSHEET

Here is the link for the Automated Greenery Weekly Turn-in Spreadsheet: Spreadsheet (right click and select Save Target As)
You will need a Unzip program (WinZip, WinXP, or similar) and obviously, MS Excel.