I just delivered Girl Scout cookies to my colleagues here at the Register on behalf of my daughter, but first had to apologize. Thin Mints, the most popular Girl Scout cookie by far, are thinner. Not the cookies themselves, the package. The box is about two inches smaller than in previous years. Those two hefty strips of tasty minty goodness inside the box are shorter. Basically, customers got fewer cookies for the same $4 price.
Here’s why, and it should come as no surprise. Michelle Tompkins, spokeswoman for Girl Scouts of the USA, told the Associated Press that steep rises in the costs of cocoa and flour, as well as rising transportation costs, contributed to about two fewer cookies in some boxes and to smaller-sized cookies in others.
“We had a weight reduction on a few varieties of cookies,” she said, adding it’s the first time in a decade the Girl Scouts have downsized the cookie weight in each box.
That may be true, but there’s no way just two Thin Mints were taken away. I’d estimate at least 10.
Here’s the good news: you won’t feel as guilty when you whorf down a whole strip while watching “30 Rock.”