College Textbook Mythbusters
BetterGrads author David Miller is also the CEO of SlugBooks.com.
With your final college preparations looming as spring moves into summer, a painful cost is about to enter your reality: college textbooks. I started SlugBooks.com because I wanted to make it easier for college students to save money on their textbooks; there are a lot of misconceptions at the beginning of college about the cost of textbooks and the cheapest places to get them. Here’s a list of common textbook-buying myths and our rebuttals to help give you a better understanding of the process and how to maximize your savings!
MYTH: “If you have financial aid, you always need to buy books from the campus bookstore!”
Wrong! Just because you received a loan doesn’t mean you have to overpay for textbooks. Many forms of financial aid allow you to get reimbursed if you provide proof of payment (like a receipt from Amazon). If your book is $100 at the bookstore and only $25 online (we see this happen all the time), it might be worth it to cough up the $25 now and get reimbursed later.
MYTH: “The bookstore is the only place that has the right books - if you shop online, you might buy the wrong ones.”
Incorrect! The bookstore is just as prone to ordering the wrong book as anyone - if you want to be 100% sure you are buying the right books, e-mail your professor. If you do decide to shop around online - all you need is the ISBN number of each book (a unique 10 or 13 integer code specific to the book). Websites like Amazon.com and Half.com allow you to search by that number and get you straight to your book. You may hear things from your college bookstores about how the internet is not trustworthy; conveniently, the bookstores have an extremely vested interest in discrediting online retailers - don’t fall for it.
MYTH: “I’m going to get a USED copy at the bookstore!”
USED prices are often deceiving. Yes, the bookstore’s USED prices are much cheaper than NEW prices, but pay attention to these two qualifiers. First, when the bookstore has used books, there can be a pretty limited supply, so there’s no guarantee you’ll be paying the lower price! Second, we’ve seen occasions where the campus bookstore features a USED price for a book, even though they have no plans to receive any used books; in these cases, everyone is forced to buy at the NEW price. This usually happens because the bookstore has two different people ordering books and pricing books and these two folks aren’t always on the same page (in other words, this deceptive practice is not intentional). Bottom line: if you want a shot at getting a used book at the bookstore, plan on getting as early as possible, and confirm with the bookstore that they’re actually going to have used books!
MYTH: “The bookstore is always more expensive.”
False! Every website out there says “we have the cheapest textbooks, we’re cheaper than the bookstore”, but sadly there is no black and white answer to this question. It always depends on the book. Yes, the bookstore can be expensive, but sometimes ordering at the bookstore actually makes a lot of sense. People buy from the bookstore for a lot of legitimate reasons: it’s easy, it’s convenient, and on occasion they have the best price. Based on the numbers we’ve crunched, the campus bookstore is most often the lowest cost option for small, cheap paperbacks used in liberal arts classes - for these books, the prices online just aren’t that much cheaper, plus you have the occasional shipping cost to add onto online orders. Bottom line: anytime you are paying more than $20 for any book, it’s a good idea to check online; for books less than $20, the bookstore is probably your best bet.
MYTH: “I can’t order online because shipping will take too long!”
There are precautions you can take to make sure shipping isn’t an issue. First, ordering as early as possible is always a great tip. If you need your book really fast, order from a big rental site like Chegg or BookRenter – both of these companies are growing aggressively and they are maniacally focused on satisfying college students - they will do everything in their power not to disappoint! Online marketplaces like Amazon and Half are also very quick these days – the seller’s location is always a part of the listing information, so if you pick a seller located closer to you, you’ll have your book sooner! Another trick - check out sites that offer eBooks (Amazon Kindle, CourseSmart) – they usually provide an online version of the first chapter for free, so you can start reading your book immediately for free!
With everything going on at the beginning of your college experience, saving on textbooks may seem like a lot of work - but with a little effort, the savings really start to add up! Everyone ends up figuring out their personal favorite savings strategies, but the advice in this article should lay out a nice framework for monster savings.
