College Students Save Money on Textbooks
Ebay & Amazon.com Lower the Cost of Education.
Most college students start their semesters by purchasing books they can barely afford from the booksellers that have positioned themselves on their campuses. While the stores they patronize usually offer to buy those books back at a small percentage of the purchase price, most students complain that the buyback offers pale in comparison to what they originally paid.
In addition to the consistently low buyback offers presented to students, it is common for college textbook titles to be retired by publishers after just a year of use. Students are left frustrated when they learn that their $125 Biology books have been listed as “ineligible” for the buyback process due to the publisher’s choice to print a new edition.
With this in mind, students all over the country have been finding creative ways to save as much money on their books as they possibly can. Quite a few of them have started saving as much as 80 percent on their textbooks by avoiding traditional bookstores and buying the texts they need online.
Buying Online
Websites like Amazon.com and Alibris.com rank at the top of the Google search engine when a query for books is conducted, but most students aren’t aware that those very same websites can be used to search for textbooks that are being sold by other students. How are students able to benefit from becoming sellers on websites like these? The answer is simple. Imagine this scenario:
Bill enrolls in Biology 101 at a New York college. He learns that the school’s bookstore is selling used copies of the textbook he needs for $100. At the same time, Jane has just learned that her Los Angeles area bookstore is only paying $25 to students seeking to sell back their Biology 101 books. She has decided to sell it on a well-known website geared at book buyers. Within one week of listing her book, Jane sells it to Bill for $50, saving him 50% off the normal price of a used copy and gaining an additional $25 for herself.
Scenarios such as this have become so common that Ebay has launched a spin-off website called Half.com. It has an entire section devoted to the sale of college textbooks. By charging a small fee to sellers, Ebay has tapped the underground trade market and made a profit from its popularity.
Fee-free Sales & Book Trades
Savvier students are aware that they can sell their books without paying the listing fees charged by sites like Half.com and Amazon. They list textbooks and office supplies on websites such as Craigslist, a free virtual message board meant to simulate local want ads. Through modern technology, students network on Craigslist, trading everything from furniture to study notes.
Students also make agreements with friends to take courses during alternating semesters so that they can trade books with one another or sell to one another at low prices when their course schedules change. While these agreements can be somewhat difficult to maintain, they are worthwhile when possible.
Keep This in Mind:
Shipping can take several days, so students who are interested in buying their books online should do so early enough that they arrive in time for class. Buyers should also pay attention to the rating systems that are used by the websites they choose. Ratings help buyers to gauge the reputations and reliability of online booksellers, and should be used to avoid regrettable shopping experiences.
While Amazon, Alibris, Ebay, and Craigslist are not directly involved in the process of educating students, they have become vitally important in the struggle to keep education costs low. With the cost of college attendance on a steady incline in our country, there is no doubt that there are more innovative ideas to come. In the mean time, it will be interesting to watch how the online textbook boom will affect America's on-campus booksellers. If they are half as savvy as the students they serve, they will find ways to accommodate this new generation of bargain shoppers.
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