Tag Archives: Book Sale

Better World Books and library book sales

Instead of holding book sales to get rid of unwanted books, we’re now sending withdrawn books to Better World Books, a company that turns them into money for the good of humanity.

In recent years, the quality of our local book sales has been declining because we are receiving fewer large gifts of books than in the past. When we accepted large gifts in the past, we often sorted through them and added appropriate books, which was sometimes a small percentage of the total gift, and put the rest of the books into the book sale. Our book sales had interesting duplicate copies and fun books that wouldn’t be appropriate for an academic library. Without that influx of gift books, the local books sales just consist of withdrawn academic books that relatively few people are interested in purchasing. After all, the reason those books are being withdrawn from the library collection is because nobody is using them, so it’s not surprising that hundreds of those books were left over at the end of the last sale. (We couldn’t even give them away for free.)

Rather than sending them directly to recycling, we found the Better World Books library program. We ship our withdrawn books to them at no cost to us, they market them to a world-wide audience, and when they sell them, a percentage of the profit comes to us and a percentage goes to the BWB Literacy Partners. It’s a very efficient way to dispose of our withdrawn books while benefiting both Middlebury and the world beyond.

If we ever have a quantity of books that we think will be of interest to our local community, we’ll probably put them in a sale, but for now, no book sales are scheduled for the foreseeable future.

Book Sale Receipts Donated to Public Library Disaster Relief Fund

We’re pleased to report that the recent Davis Family Library book sale brought in $2,732 and that amount has been donated to the Vermont Public Library Foundation’s Disaster Relief Fund to help libraries that were impacted by the floods following Tropical Storm Irene.  The funds will be used for repairs, mold abatement, clean-up and replacement of books, furniture and computers. Thanks to Jess Isler and Carrie Macfarlane for suggesting that we use the proceeds from the sale to support the fund.  Thanks also to our College Cashier and the folks in Accounting for helping us coordinate the donation.

Library Book Sale

Tuesday, November 15th  – Sunday, November 20th ,  

Davis Family Library, 110 Storrs Ave., open at 9:00 AM on first day, continuing during regular library open hours thereafter.

The Davis Family Library will offer withdrawn and duplicate copies of books, music scores, and other media for sale at great prices.   Choose from a wide variety of items for scholarly work or recreational reading, listening, and viewing.  Proceeds from this year’s sale will be donated to the Vermont Public Library Foundation’s Emergency Relief Fund, assisting libraries that were impacted by the recent floods.

(Because the low price asked for materials is in part a service to the college community, anyone purchasing items on the first day of the sale will be required to show a Middlebury College ID.  Book dealers are not welcome to purchase items for resale on Tuesday, Nov. 15th).

FMI, contact Joseph Watson 443-5487 jwatson@middlebury.edu

AND!!!  Look for a small preview sale of antique/collectable/like new/especially nice items in the Atrium starting on Wed. the 9th.

Library Book Sale


Tuesday, November 17th – Sunday, November 22nd , Main Library

Open at 9:00 AM on first day, continuing during regular library open hours thereafter.

LIBRARY BOOK SALE–  The Middlebury College Main Library will offer withdrawn and duplicate copies of books, VHS tapes, and other media for sale at great prices.    Choose from a wide variety of items for scholarly work or recreational reading and viewing.  All proceeds from the sale will be added to the library’s materials replacement fund. (Because the low price asked for materials is in part a service to the college community, anyone purchasing items on the first day of the sale will be required to show a Middlebury College ID.  Book dealers are not welcome to purchase items for resale on Tuesday, Nov. 17th). FMI, contact Joseph Watson 443-5487 jwatson@middlebury.edu

BOOK SALE

Submitted by Joseph Watson

BOOK SALE

Many thanks go out to the folks at the Main Lib Circulation Desk for helping with the book sale last week! We made just over $1,500. We sold about 75% of the items that had accumulated to be discarded. About another 15% went for free at the end of the sale and about 10% remained to be recycled.

Every now and then we consider other ways to get rid of our discarded materials.  There are some services that accept discarded books and forward them to charities.  There are some web sites that will accept books, sell them for you and give you a percentage of the profit.  But in order to use these services we would have to sort the books, pack them, and in some cases pay for the shipping.  To get ready for a book sale here all we do is set the items aside as they’re discarded and when we have enough, we put them out for people to take them away, sometimes in exchange for money.  It’s quick and and easy and requires much less staff time to manage than the other options we’ve explored.   Plus people in the College community seem to enjoy buying the items!

BOOKS FOR SALE

Submitted by Joseph Watson

LIBRARY BOOK SALE:Tuesday, November 11th – Sunday, November 16th , Main Library, open at 9:00 AM on first day, continuing during regular library open hours thereafter.

We offer withdrawn and duplicate copies of books, VHS tapes, and other media for sale at great prices. Choose from a wide variety of items for scholarly work or recreational reading and viewing. All proceeds from the sale will be added to the library’s materials replacement fund. Because the low price asked for materials is in part a service to the college community, anyone purchasing items on the first day of the sale will be required to show a Middlebury College ID. FMI, contact Joseph Watson 443-5487 jwatson@middlebury.edu