SALT LAKE CITY — As parents across the state spend the weekend preparing for a state-wide soft closure of schools, some families are ramping up efforts to get rid of their supplies of Girl Scout Cookies.
Starting Monday, kids will not be going to school and Girl Scout Cookies booths won't be set up at your local grocery store.
On Friday afternoon, 8-year old Astrid and 9-year old Emeri waived bright pink posters on 2100 South in Sugar House.
"Stock up special," one read. "Last chance," said the other poster.
"Because of the coronavirus," Astrid said. "Everybody is so worried about it."
Their cookie business isn't immune to all the COVID-19 closures.
"This weekend is the last chance to get Girl Scout cookies, because they closed it," Emeri explained.
The Girl Scouts of Utah will stop cookie booths one week early, according to their website. Online sales will stay open.
While out on the sidewalk advertising the sale, Astrid's mother Melanie Jenson learned about the next, latest closure-- Utah's K-12 schools. The state announced Friday a 2-week soft closure that begins Monday.
"It's a huge surprise," she said.
In addition to Astrid, Melanie said two of her other children attend schools in Salt Lake City.
Astrid doesn't mind the closure.
"Happy I don't have to wake up at seven in the morning," she said.
But mom will have to juggle some schedules around.
"I don't really know what we'll do," Melanie said. "I kind of planned for it a little bit in my head."
Thankfully, Melanie said she and her husband already work from home.
"So that's very helpful," she said. "But I know a lot of parents, that's just not an option. So, that's really hard."
She said she hopes they come together as a community to help each other out. Melanie said it's nice to know that the state is being proactive, and felt the decision was a responsible one.
A silver lining for parents-- some districts including Salt Lake City were already set to go on spring break during one of those two weeks.
As Melanie spends the weekend looking at how the next two weeks will go, she's also focused on cleaning out their Girl Scout cookie stock.
In a two-hour span Friday, dozens of people stopped by and in some cases purchased entire cases of cookies.
"Normally people only buy like two boxes, but we’ve had lots of people buying like 12 boxes," Melanie said, with a laugh.
Which meant good business for Astrid and Emeri, even if they are forced to end their selling season early.
