6A • THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
NEWS
THURSDAY, JANUARY 16, 2003
Students buy books online save money while at home
A student without a textbook can feel like a navigator without a map, an archeologist without his tools, President Bush without his speech writer — which makes it frustrating for a student to find an empty shelf at the bookstore where the Anthropology 160 book should be.
More have been ordered, but how many quizzes will the student have to endure before they arrive? Besides, who has time to ping-pong from bookstore to bookstore searching for the elusive text? For students fed up with the book buying experience, shopping for texts online may be a solution.
The Student Senate Book Exchange, has been operating since May 2002, and Scott Roberts, Student Senate Webmaster, said student response had been positive. The site boasts 711 books currently for sale, and 101 books have been sold. The site can be accessed through the University of Kansas' Web site www.ku.edu.
Roberts said the goal of the Web site was for students to be able to cut out the extra costs bookstores include in their prices.
Sellers set their prices somewhere between the buy-back price a bookstore would pay and the used book price a bookstore would charge.
"That way we save money for both the buyer and the seller," Roberts said.
The site seems like a ripe place for people to sell outdated editions to naive, bewildered students, but Roberts said this hadn't been a problem. The site includes links to the Kansas Union Bookstore,
COMMON CENTS
Nicole Roche
mroche@kansan.com
Who has time to pingpong from bookstore to bookstore searching for the elusive text? For students fed up with the book buying experience shopping for texts online may be a solution.
where students can check buyback rates and used-book prices. Students are ultimately responsible for making informed purchases, the site's disclaimer reads.
If a student gets really desperate, he can always visit Amazon.com or the Barnes & Noble Web site, although these online merchants charge a $11.99 next-day delivery plus an additional $2.99 per item, and Varsity-Books.com charges a $10.95 next-day delivery plus 10 percent of the order cost. These sites are good for rare books or if one is bedridden, but otherwise it might be better to suck it up and head to a local bookstore.
The Kansas Union Bookstore, www.jayhawks.com,and University Book Shop,
kansan.com
See how local bookstores compare on kansan.com
www.kubbooks.com, allow students to purchase books online at the same price as the bookstore, which might be the best choice for students who are worried about buying the wrong edition of a book. A menu asks students which department the class is in and which course and then the books for the course are listed.
The student can choose to pick up the texts at the bookstore to avoid shipping costs.
Bill Getz, textbook manager at the Kansas Union Bookstore, said the store has offered texts online for the past two years, but last year an improved system was implemented. He said the problem with Amazon.com and other online bookstores was that they often don't have the capability to serve all students.
"They wouldn't be able to piecemeal together 900 orders," Getz said.
He said nontraditional students and commuters were most likely the biggest online customers. He said parents are other customers who want to buy books for their children but don't want them to have their credit card numbers.
Ultimately, it depends on how much an aversion one has to campus bookstores.
If students are sick of the long lines and narrow book shelves, they can log on to the Student Senate Book Exchange or local bookstore Web sites. If anyone is still looking for Soul Rebels for your Anthropology class, the Student Senate Book Exchange has it for $6.
Roché is a Wichita senior in journalism.
Books
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1A
some stores will sell it for the recommended price.
Discrepancies between stores occur because stores can decide whether to price the book at the high or low end of that margin, Doddma said. Used books are priced at 75 percent of the new book cost, he said.
Courtney Kuhlen/Kansan
Sara Echison, Holyrood junior, writes a check for her book purchase at the Kansas Union Bookstore as recent KU alumna Kara VandenBerg waits on her. Students have spent the past few days comparing prices among bookstores.
Publishers' prices serve as the benchmark, Bill Getz, textbook manager at the Kansas Union Bookstore, said.
Bill Muggy, owner of Jayhawk Bookstore, said Getz was basically correct, but being the
"Our prices don't increase. We just follow the publisher's price structure," he said. "But we make sure we don't have the highest prices in town."
"We're more likely to have all the books for a course," he said.
The Burge Union Bookstore, 1601 Irving Hill Road, located just east of Daisy Hill, sells its books at Kansas Union Bookstore prices and serves as its satellite location.
As the University of Kansas' official, or "institutional" bookstore, the Kansas Union Bookstore cannot refuse complicated or costly orders. Getz said.
institutional bookstore didn't guarantee the Union had or could get every book.
"The University makes a point of showing new students the 'official' bookstores on campus as if there were an unofficial bookstore," he said.
Muggy said that since opening the Jayhawk Bookstore on the edge of campus 25 years ago, he often dealt with competitors.
Preordering became a way for him to distinguish his business from nearby stores, Muggy said. Fifteen years ago he began a preordering system that other book-stores nationwide have mirrored.
He said he looked at the fast food industry and tried to incorporate some of its concepts.
"I asked myself, 'How can individuals get information quickly?' You can call in for a pizza — now you can come in and preorder textbooks," he said. "But I haven't taken it to the extent of doing home deliveries."
Doddema said the relationship between bookstores at the University was refreshing because the stores would work with one another to secure books for students.
—Edited by Julie Jantzer
Theft CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1A
Muggy, owner of the Jayhawk Bookstore, 1420 Crescent Road, has not hired guards to patrol his store.
"I think that their appearance can sometimes be an advantage, but I question their actual effectiveness," Muggy said.
The Kansas Union Booksore has several security cameras, alarm systems and security guards patrolling the entrances exits and store aisles.
Peter Doddema, textbook manager at the University Book Shop, 1116 W.23rd St., said he had dealt with two types of thieves; those who noticed that nobody was watching and took a few books without paying and those who stole as a means of steady income — "career thieves."
Even with increased security measures, sneaky students continue to take risks and steal, Doddema said.
Lawrence businesses often work together to minimize crime in the area. Security cameras and
other technology make it easier for businesses to network and crack down on crime.
"If we suspect a theft has taken place at the bookstore, the chances are pretty good that that same person has stolen from another business nearby," Doddema said. "For instance, we can call Target and compare our security tapes with theirs."
Kansas Union Bookstore plans to continue its heightened security measures.
Edited by Melissa Hermreck and Michelle Burhenn
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