Troops recruit local artists to give trailers spectacular flair

It’s been a while since we’ve asked Scouters to share their unit’s trailer designs. It’s great to see Scouts and adult leaders’ creativity and how they advertise their unit and Scouting. We still receive submissions, including the two below, which were done thanks to local artists the troops recruited.

Many units pay a company to create a vehicle wrap, while others devote a day to painting the trailer themselves.

Troop 69 of Burr Ridge, Ill., asked one of the parents in the troop, who is an artist, if she wanted to take on the project of producing original artwork for the trailer. For one side, Joanne Kubinski interviewed all the Scouts in the troop to find out their favorite activities.

“She weaved the top answers into the final design, making it truly reflective of our troop while representing [Scouts BSA] as a whole,” Scoutmaster Bob Fierke says.

On the other side, she recreated the troop logo, which her son Nikolas had designed several years prior for the troop’s neckerchiefs. It had a tree, tent, American flag and campfire, all in front of a sun. The trailer’s backside used vinyl lettering to feature the names of the troop’s Eagle Scouts dating back to 1962. When they run out of room, they’ll start adding names to the front of the trailer, Fierke says.

While Kubinski worked on the trailer’s exterior, Fierke recruited other volunteers to outfit the interior with LED lighting, aluminum shelving and flooring, solar panels and a power source for a ham radio.

The project took a few years to complete, with the finishing touches done last year. Troop 69 took its trailer to South Dakota for summer camp, and it garnered a lot of attention from Scouters.

Troop 901 of Marathon, Fla., also asked a local artist to design their trailer. The troop wanted to pay homage to Norman Rockwell’s classic Scouting paintings, so the leaders decided on featuring the Scout Law and images of Scouts in vintage uniforms. The artist Thomas Florez offered to paint the troop’s trailer for free.

More spectacular trailer designs

We asked on Facebook for Scouters to share their unit’s trailer designs. Here are a few that were emailed to us:

Troop 600, Oak Ridge, N.C.

Troop 198, Plano, Texas

Troop 126, Wilmington, Mass.

Troop 185, Jenks, Okla.

Troop 186, Lake Orion, Mich.

Troop 346, Sioux Falls, S.D.

Share your unit’s trailer

We’d love to see your unit’s trailer as well, either inside or out. If your eye-catching design has helped in recruiting or you’ve found an interior layout that works well or if you are just really proud of your trailer, let us know by visiting go.scoutingmagazine.org/showandtell or by emailing us at [email protected].