One of the most frustrating, incomprehensible things about textbooks occurs during end-of-semester buybacks. You take a book that you bought brand new from the bookstore for $140.00, walk up to their buyback table, hand it over & wait for the offer…

“We can’t buy this book.”

“What? Why? I paid $140 just four months ago!”

“Sorry, it’s going out of edition”

If you’ve ever been a college student & sold your textbooks at the end of a semester, you’ve at least heard something comparable. It may be that the book is changing editions, that the bookstore has reached their max-allowed quantity, or that the professor isn’t using the text anymore. But regardless, the bookstore won’t buy it back & as a result, there’s an extreme distaste for selling textbooks. Everyone talks about it around campus, on Twitter & Facebook, and in blogs or news articles.

“Selling textbooks is a rip off!”

“You only get pennies on the dollar.”

“My book was worth $140 in August. Now it’s worth nothing?”

Admittedly, sharing this frustration is what led me to start FreeTextbooks. I couldn’t figure out how, in a free market system & with other buying choices, the majority of Samford University students would file into such a tiny bookstore, stand in line for hours & pay full price for their textbooks.

Problem is, this is the situation at campus bookstores across the United States. So why do bookstores continue to get so much student business? Answer: location and peace of mind. You see, most students wait until they actually attend class to buy their textbooks, then they’re stuck when their professor says, “You need your book by the next class.” That doesn’t leave you many buying choices, does it? It’s Monday & you need the textbook by Wednesday? “Oh well, I’ll have to buy it at the bookstore.”

Back on topic – why is a book purchased four months ago worth practically nothing?

Because publishers frequently issue new, updated (often sparingly) editions. Why? To combat the used textbook market. Think about it – if a new Human Anatomy textbook is published in January 2010 and is adopted by 500 professors around the U.S. with an average class size of 50, the publisher will sell 25,000 copies. By August 2010, many of those 25,000 books are on the market as used, cheaper copies, which means the publisher may only sell 10,000 new copies. By January 2011, there are about 35,000 used copies floating around, causing publisher sales of new books to fall further. This repeats for the life of the book & publisher sales continue to decline each semester. So, in order to sell more books, the publisher puts out a new edition & makes sure those 500 classes adopt the new one. It’s a constant game of cat-and-mouse.

That tells you why books go out of edition, but it only leads us to the most important part. If you purchase a book for $140 and it’s worth nothing four months later, it’s mostly your fault.

What in the…? Are you serious?

Unfortunately, yes. Because that $140 book you bought at the bookstore was available elsewhere for MUCH less. How can you be sure? If it’s not worth anything, then it’s going (or already is) out of edition. If it’s going out of edition, it’s been in print for at least three semesters. If it’s been in print that long, there are plenty of used copies available all over the internet. How much are they? A fraction of what the bookstore charges.

Here’s an example:

Mario Triola’s Elementary Statistics updated to an 11th edition just after the start of the August 2009 semester. For many colleges, the 10th was required for fall classes, as the 11th wasn’t in full distribution yet. Your bookstore’s new price was $149, and it’s used price was $99. But the market for the 10th edition was sinking in anticipation of the upcoming 11th edition, which means it’s real value was closer to $35-40. In August, FreeTextbooks sold the 10th edition for $33. At time of writing, the 10th edition had a used marketplace price of $11.79, but if the 10th edition is still required this January, your bookstore will still be selling it for $149 and/or $99. Why? Because bookstores adhere to strict pricing strategies no matter what the market conditions are (see previous blog post, How Your Campus Bookstore Makes Money).

We anticipate getting a lot of questions about how books are valued during buybacks this year, so I hope this helps answer some of the most common questions. Some of our angriest customers are those that purchased books at their bookstore, then get furious when that expensive book is only worth $8 or so at FreeTextbooks. Well, $8 > $0 & our price was a lot less to begin with. Since our prices are set by the entire used market, you always get the “best-case-scenario” for buying & selling books.

In closing, we know it’s frustrating. Very frustrating. But we’re here & trying to help by selling for less and buying for more. Plus, tell a few friends and get $5 per referred buyback. There’s an easy way to boost your total…

Beat your bookstore. Use FreeTextbooks.

________

Coming up next, we’ll revisit how books are valued, what drives buyback values, and most importantly, how FreeTextbooks beats your bookstore & other online buyback sites.

Questions or comments? Let us know below!

When we started Free Textbooks in January 2009, it didn’t take long to realize that we could use our customer base to tackle some pretty big social tasks. Believing that all people are inherently charitable, we began brainstorming ways to harness that goodwill both as a company and through our customers.  The idea we developed is based on that often-made $1 donation at the end of your shopping transaction. How many times have you been asked to add $1 at Publix, Target, or Walgreens? And how many times have you declined? I hope none, unless you really couldn’t spare a dollar.

For most of us, it’s easy to spare $1 for an honorable cause. We actually want to – we’re just not asked enough. Compare the associated feelings when asked for $1 to your feelings when asked for $30. Odds are you declined that $30 request unless you’d premeditated your giving.  And, when it comes to actually planning to be charitable, we seemingly talk ourselves out of it, as we’re left to think through other ways that $30 could go to use. As a result, I’d argue that the most effective way to raise $30 for charity would be to ask 30 people for $1 each.

At the same time, if you try to solicit $1 from 30 strangers on the street, my guess is that a mere handful would offer support. How many of you decline giving $1 to a beggar? You question their motives and how they’ll actually use it. Rather, place people in an organized setting (e.g. the grocery checkout) and assign a specific organization or cause, and I bet you’ll get almost as many dollars as customers. Granted this is all unproven, it’s just a product of my observations that we’ve chosen to test at Free Textbooks.

So if we can recruit a significant number of donations, how should it be distributed?  I recently read a study by The Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University that discussed the patterns and allocations of charitable donations by American households. The central question the study sought to answer was this: To what extent is charitable giving by individuals directed to agencies that are working to provide for the needs of the poorest? A shocking fact from this study is that “only 8 percent of households’ donated dollars were reported as contributions to help meet basic needs – providing food, shelter, or other necessities.” (p. 2)

Rather than targeting donations to higher education, healthcare research, or planting trees, shouldn’t more of us be concerned with meeting humanity’s most basic needs? Admittedly, the former should not be neglected, but the real needs of a helpless man are obvious – food, clean water, education, and health.

As a result of this conviction, Free Textbooks has partnered with four non-profits that strive to meet these basic human needs – Feeding America, charity: water, Room to Read, and Doctors Without Borders. While we donate $1 for every book purchased on FreeTextbooks.com, we hope customers are willing to add a dollar or two of their own. To offer a little more insight, we’ll be profiling these four organizations over the coming weeks and discussing how they use the money we’ll collect & give. You’ll be amazed at what your $1 can do.

Questions or comments? Post your thoughts below…

What is Free Textbooks? Founded in January 2009, FreeTextbooks.com is an online textbook buyer and seller with a real-world presence at the University of Alabama, Samford University, the University of Alabama-Huntsville, Auburn University, and Troy University. We sell for less, buy for more, and offer a unique cash back program (translation: free books).  FreeTextbooks.com is also a social venture, helping to meet the underprivileged’s most basic needs – food, clean water, clothing, education, and health.