In the Used-Book Market, Textbooks Rule
October 10, 2005
By ALEX MINDLIN
Textbooks dominate the offline used-book market, according to a study just released by the Book Industry Study Group, a trade association. The study found that educational books made up 93 percent of all used-book sales in brick-and-mortar bookstores in 2004. (They represented a smaller percentage of online sales, for which only incomplete data were available.)
Textbooks are more expensive than other used books, said Jeff Hayes, director of market research for InfoTrends, the consulting firm that carried out the study. Used educational books sell for, on average, $45.63 a copy in bookstores, compared with $6.12 for other used books, according to the study.
Besides being more expensive, used textbooks also sell in volume; they are about 70 percent more common on bookstore shelves than other used books. "Many of them try to give the student as good a price as they can," Mr. Hayes said. "They're not trying to maximize their profit."
ALEX MINDLIN
nytimes.com |
