Interesting article in the Minneapolis paper about aggressive book scouts, online pricing checking, and hoarding at library sales. Not many facts, but it makes the point that sale volunteers are getting irritated with sellers, but most sales haven’t got so far as to ban price-checking.
Don’t miss the comments at the bottom. The first one makes several brief, valid points.
The article portrays book resellers as the rude villains. What is the purpose of a library sale, anyway? Is it to provide a pleasurable community event? Or is it to raise money for the library in the most efficient way possible.
They should have included some comments from booksellers, collectors, and people from The Friends of the Library.
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9 Comments
It seems there is the beginning of a trend in the Twin Cities to ban scanners at library sales because the sales have gotten so out of control and people just looking for a book to read must feel uncomfortable. I was to one where the volunteers tried to ban scanners – they just keep repeating “No scanners”. People continued to scan books! It wasn’t advertised that scanners were banned on BookSaleFinder or in any of the ads – so I figure people thought the heck with the volunteers. Needless to say, their effort was not successful.
It seems a no scanner policy would be easy for volunteers to enforce [especially since there was a security person at the sale I mentioned].
1) Clearly post no electronic devices are allowed [first day / first hour / ever] or charge people $20-25 to use a scanner/electronic device [after all, the money is for a good cause]. If you pay to use one you get a clearly visible, unique ink-stamp on the back of your hand.
2) If anyone at any time – volunteers or otherwise – sees you scanning when either electronic devices are not allowed or you do not have a stamp indicating you paid to use one – you are asked to leave AND all the books you have accumulated up to that point are returned to the tables.
This policy in combination with one that does not allow hoarding [no books stashed for later scanning / all books picked are considered sold and after you cannot carry them yourself you pay for them and put them in your car and return to the sale - or, space providing, you set them in a holding area where volunteers total them up as they will be considered sold when checked-in.
Clearly, rude people at sales is not a new topic - but at least around here banning scanners/electronic devices seems to be.
What is happening elsewhere in the country? And how do seasoned sellers view this in contrast to novices?
P.S. 1) With both Neat-o-Scan and MediaScouter based in the Twin Cities it seems everyone here is scanning books - people need to realize why pay for information you can get for free with any web-enabled phone?? Just go to Amazon on you phone! and check prices.
2) There must be a "Get Rich Quick" myth associated to scanners. Half Price Books [local chain] held a warehouse sale recently. There were hundreds and hundreds of people lined up for the sale – many, many with the tell-tale earpiece stuck in their ear with one end connected to a PDA price checker hidden in their pocket. Why else would anyone stand in line clearly knowing they would never even get into the sale [Half issued an apology today via email stating they were clearly unprepared] if it were not for a “I’m gonna get rich by scanning” attitude.
3)Any library that gives its books to BetterWorldBooks [bLogistics.com ??] in my opinion is cheating the local economy. Why not sell them locally and keep the money local, afterall, the books sold came from our local taxes – why ship that elsewhere?
Urrghhh!!!!
My local library has actually chosen to embrace book sellers. At the last event, they almost fell over backwards trying to help and accommodate dealers. They created a supervised holding area with claim check numbers (so you knew your books were safe and not being stolen by book seller, which happened to me once). Then they shipped my books all the way downstairs and out to the car and helped us load!!!!
I was simply stunned with disbelief. I must have complemented them a hundred times on their incredible effort. It’s never been like this before, and I go there twice a year.
They said: We would like to make it as easy as possible for dealers, because they represent an important customer segment. We want them to spend as much time as possible picking out books and NOT waste time schlepping them all over the place. It takes away time from buying. We want them to feel that their books are safe, so – yet again – they can go out and get more books.
And to accommodate our other shoppers: We would like to keep the aisles clutter-free; and no messy piles of horded boxes and bags in the corners. No overburdened book sellers bumping into people. You fill a bag, you check it, it’s gone….
It worked like a charm. I got 2 – 3 times the books I got there last time, They made 2 – 3 times the money off me, so it must have paid off very handsomely for them to to implement this new customer service concept and train their volunteers (who were nice rather than hostile, believe it or not).
All in all, I wish I could get the point across to all the other book sales I attend, that this is the way to go: Facilitate the shopping, especially for the customers who buy large quantities. This is how you can make MOST money, which is the point of the sale, isn’t it?!
However, all other book sales I attend I am treated more or less as undesirable scum, and I don’t even have a scanner. They are nice at first, but as soon as my boxes pile up somewhere, I am tagged as “one of those sellers” and the attitude changes. Why not tag me as “one of those big ticket customers”?
tx for this interesting article.
just came across: “the most successful book scouts don´t need a scanner but follow their gut instinct” http://ask.metafilter.com/87160/Help-me-be-the-a-better-bookscout
I am a writer who has been selling used books for years to make a few dollars. Few being the operative word.
I do not own a scanner. However, more and more people are coming to the sales that do have them. For me, I hate it, because so many are very pushy and aggressive and I have to grab much faster than I normally would to get anything.
But I can tell you this, the book “dealers” spend more money with the Library than anyone else who attends the sale. BY A LONG SHOT! Additionally, the “rush” is only on for ten minutes or so, therefore people looking to browse for a good read virtually have all day and there are still LOTS of good books to choose from. So yeah, it is obnoxious but it’s also money for the library. As for me, I make almost nothing and it’s the only income I have. Literally.
I do see both sides to the story. In Wyoming and Colorado many libraries have banned scanners, and one even has a policeman they hire now to enforce it.
Not to sound conceited but I saw this coming a few years back. Look at the Fols board now. Gone are the “seniors” who have been replaced with the “younger” crowd. That is to say, books are being scanned before they hit the sale.
Fols are being runned by booksellers.
Now I had a incident at a Library sale where a issue arised. There is two sides to this story but I will give the brief rundown of it. I was told no scanner or no bookdealers allowed. I consulted an attorney and was briefly told it could be pursued. A quik note , to pursue does not equal a win etc .
I decided against it in the end, I mean comeon , who wants to be the ass that sues the local library?
Times have changed. No longer is it a few patrons on members night, its a lot of patrons and dealers .
One more note. If you local library refuses to let dealers in on preview night,based on your choice of employment, call the local press etc.
I too have dabbled in book reselling, but once I saw the ugly behavior at book sales I didn’t want to be a part of it.
Book sales ARE community events, and avid readers go to them hoping for some great books to read. I used to like to go as a reader, but I’ve given up because I know that the people with scanners will have taken all the good new books and left the trash behind.
Maybe that’s why the libraries want to ban scanners. They go to a lot of effort to sort and display the books and advertise a large event, and eventually people will quit coming if they know they’ll only find junk there.
People donate books to the library assuming they’ll be added to the stacks, or that someone else in their community will enjoy them. If they knew that their generous donations were actually just making a big profit for a sharp-eyed guy with a scanner, they’d quit donating them.
As a buyer with a scanner I can’t tell you how many people are rude to me.It works both ways. I was just stopped a few days ago at a thrift shop by a woman who just demanded to know every detail of what the scanner showed, even the relavancy of sales rank.She became quiet angry when I would not stop and explain. I am used to this but she would not take no for an answer. I leave the books as I find and keep to myself. I am sick of the nosey non-scanners!!
Here we go with this old argument again. All dealers are villians and all of the public are poor put-upon souls who never get a chance to buy the books they really want to read.
Here’s the bottom line. For the public there are huge amounts of books left, despite what dealers buy. Most dealers don’t want the brand new books. They printed millions of those and they aren’t worth anything much of the time. I see tons of those left over at every booksale, yet the public outcry is the dealers are “getting them and leaving the trash behind.”
I don’t use a scanner as a dealer I like to use my “gut instinct” and my accumulated knowledge on books and “that trash left behind” is often my bread and butter. The public doesn’t usually pick up the older beat-up copies and those are often the collectible copies, ones that need repair but can still be sold.
In addition, book dealers, the majority of us, aren’t making a fortune on selling books, especially not with FOL sales anymore where there aren’t many valuable books anymore (I just went to a local one where I usually buy 400 books, this time I bought 10 books over the 4 day sale because they had already been so finely picked over by the library. Of course, the library has just as much right to sell them online as I do, and more power to them, but I’ve noticed the dealers who were spending at this sale have diminished greatly.)
And here’s the thing, a lot of dealers “take chances” on different titles. So they may buy books that might be more than worth their while or they buy books that they find out are worth nothing. Those books get culled and most dealers, like myself, donate them back to the library, a used book sale or some other charitable organization.
Bottom line, all dealers aren’t the culprits here (although we are all certainly treated as such lately) and all of the public aren’t angels. Sometimes dealers are very rude, to the public and to each other. Other times, the public is rude, to dealers and to each other. A lot of dealers with scanners can sometimes be a nuisance at a small booksale, but, even with that, if you have a good gut instinct and know what you’re doing and are willing to take chances on books, or if you’re just looking for books to read at a cheap price, quit whining already, there are plenty for everyone.
And the bottom line for all those in charge of the library sales is that the public, each person buying one or two or maybe five books, is nice, yes. However, it’s the dealers who buy 200 to 400 to 800 books and they’re the ones who are bringing money into your sale, and isn’t getting as much profit as possible for the sale the name of the game.
I can see how the rudeness of some dealers can become an issue, especially at a small sale, but to begrudge every dealer who buys at your sale is ludicrous. Have a night just for dealers, leave some of the newer books behind for the public, a lot of dealers don’t want those anyway, and then put all your books out after that preview night and have the rest of the sale for anyone who wants to come, public or more dealers.
I tend to join a lot of Friends of Library groups, whenever they have a preview for a sale before the actual sale. It’s mostly dealers then, some public, but the public there understands that it’s going to be mostly dealers. The library makes a lot of money from dealers on preview night (at least the libraries do who aren’t silly enough to restrict the number of purchases that night) and everyone walks away happy for the most part.
So libraries need to stop assuming all dealers are devils and everyone who makes up “the general public” are angels. It can be one way or the other at different sales, but libraries need to do what they can to accomodate both dealers and the public and stop just deciding that all dealers are villians.
Easy solution. Just have a volunteer or commission person scan the books for the library and sell the ones online that fetch prices of $15 or more. Pay the commission person half the money or just expenses to the volunteer.
The FOL gets more $ per book for the really good ones, the dealers stop coming to the sales, and the sale goes back to being a peaceful , fun event that your kids won’t get trampled in.