Solicitations

One thing that bugs me more than most things is door-to-door solicitors. Sometimes it is so bad that they come to our house once a day. When they do it is always during nap time, which means that they wake up the kids.

I do not think that I am alone in my unfavorable view of these peddlers. Some communities have even tried to prohibit them. The first such community was Green River, Wyoming. The ordinance aimed to make it illegal for any business to sell their items door-to-door without permission from the household beforehand. The only way a solicitor was welcome would be if the owner of the household put up a sign that said, "Solicitors Welcome." It is now common to call any ordinances with this aim a Green River Ordinance.

Green River Ordinances have been successfully challenged as a violation of freedom of speech when the ordinance includes religious proselytizers or non-profit organizations. It is also thought that while in the past commercial speech had not been protected under the first amendment by the Supreme Court, through precedent of more current Supreme Court cases any ordinances challenged by commercial organizations would probably go in favor of the solicitor.

With any legal recourse unlikely, the way that I once dealt with solicitors is to ignore the doorbell unless I had invited someone to ring it. This worked fine before I had kids taking naps, and before I lived in a neighborhood where it is not uncommon to have one drop by every day of the week. Once they started depriving my son naps on a regular basis, I started answering the door and telling them that they and their in-your-face marketing practices were not welcome at my door, which did seem to decrease the occurrence. I also sometimes engage the religious proselytizers prior to telling them that they are not welcome at my door because it is sometimes fun to poke the obvious holes in theology. This did not seem to decrease that occurrence. I learned from that error.

The one occurrence of solicitor that is most difficult is the child solicitor. I am talking about Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, and school fundraisers. It is near impossible to get the message to these types of solicitor that what they are doing is a practice which, if they were an adult, would be considered by most to be rude. Not to mention that, unbeknownst to them, they are the pawn in a common marketing tactic of using children in advertising.

I do not have a problem with these groups trying to support their organization or school trip; I have a problem with they way they are taught it is an ethical business practice to invite themselves to private citizens doorsteps. I would fully support the Girl Scouts (who I am focusing on because they have the most published information with regard to intent) when they have a booth set up in a market as I have often seen. My favorite method is to support them through a relative who might be a member. I would love to support them through a more conventional means such as online sales, but at this time the Girl Scouts prohibits the girls from selling online.

According to the Girl Scouts website selling Girl Scout cookies teaches five life skills including goal setting, decision making, money management, people skills, and business ethics. While I do not dispute the first three, I would think that when using the door-to-door tactic they are certainly violating anything that could be called an ethic by inviting themselves to a persons home. As they grow older they will also find that this tactic is a poor people skill to have as well. If the organization would really like to help teach life skills where business is concerned, they should leap forward into this century and encourage online campaigns rather than forbid them and leave far behind the ancient practice of door-to-door pedaling.

While most would argue that they do not mind and even enjoy getting a visitor from the Girl Scouts or Boy Scouts once a year, the long term effect of supporting them through this means is that we train generations after generations of kids to become the adult vacuum, lawn care, and satellite peddlers that most of us abhor. The solution seems to be to find a booth or a relative that you can support directly or support the organization directly through a donation.