Where, Oh where ...?

The never ending crisis - Ok, maybe crisis is a bit harsh, dilemma (?) in regards to where to find books. Especially books suitable enough for re-sale. There are many, many whole sale distributors out there, but for someone like me (a poor student with no financial backing), the bulk lots are not always obtainable because they usually require minimum orders of a couple hundred dollars, plus at least 3 copies of each unit. Never mind the financial issue, storage is just about the same concern. So for me, at least for now wholesale bulk lots are not an option.

While the thought of one of these 'gaylords' (pallet of books) makes me absolutely giddy (it was hard to avoid the obvious pun there ....), I am forced to explore other options. The other online sites - no need to name them all here, you know who they are, can be fun to look through. Especially if you have a specific book in mind that you just got to have. However, these sites are not that simple if you do not have a particular book you are searching for and then by the time you pay the extra cost of shipping the chances of you reselling that book to make a decent profit, while not impossible, are slightly less likely.

Library book sales are a wonderful option. Whether you are looking to increase your personnel stock or searching for resale items. Often lots of books are donations, so all of the books are not "ex. lib" copies which are usually valued less. While some of the larger libraries have constant or ongoing sales, usually the best option to snatch up a few goodies is at the annual or occasional (depending on your local library) book sale. Problem is, there are lots of other people hoping to snatch up a few good ones as well. So it becomes a bit of a competition to snag up the best books, and I have been at a few where the competition was pretty fierce. Off setting this dangerous contact zone is the cheap prices which are usually outstanding. I love, love, love it when there are $1 a bag events, talk about picking up some books for literally pennies. Yet some downfalls (aside from the competition) include; the condition of the books are not always ideal, leisure browsing is not always possible, and again, storage of your vast payload until you have time to research, price and resell. Another problem is having to make the fast decision on the value of the book. becoming familiar with the more valuable ones is helpful, but the value of the book can often be just a hastily made guess.

One last issue with the library sales is that it is not always possible to make it around to all of them. I happen to know there is a local sale this weekend, and due to a prior commitment, I cannot attend the sale. The idea of missing this sale is just killing me - aww the possibilities of what is there, but alas I may never know. There are still a few other options for finding some cheap books, but for the sake of brevity, we will leave that discussion for another post. In the meantime, find out when and where your local library sales are and go support your library, they often are the only source of revenue for the library and is what keeps them open.