As students wait in line to purchase books this week, they are debating the convenience of buying books online versus the traditional way of taking them off the shelf.
For dietetics senior Karina Forberger, buying online was more about convenience than prices.
After buying a book online during the summer, Forberger said, it seemed like a more convenient way to shop at the time because she wasn’t on campus and “didn’t want to drive all the way up here for one book.”
But while standing in line for 15 minutes Tuesday at the MSU Bookstore in the International Center, she said she now prefers to buy her books on campus because it is easier to return books.
“Buying at local bookstores is really the most convenient,” she said. “I know that the bookstores actually have the right course lists.”
MSU Bookstore assistant store manager Shawn Bourdo said having the right class information makes the bookstore more attractive to students looking to make purchases.
“Instructors turn their orders in to us. You can’t go to Amazon.com and say ‘I’m taking ISS 210, section 3’ and expect them to give you your books,” he said.
“I saw these ads comparing online book prices with local bookstore prices,” said Rosa Morales, the director of the Minorities in Journalism and Hispanics in Journalism programs at MSU.
“Well, they might get a deal, but how do they really know?”
Morales said students could be taking a risk buying books online because they could have difficulties with returning items, shipping times and accurate course information.
“Students should obviously have text titles, author and ISBN numbers before shopping online,” she said.
“But students who buy their books based on the ads or early reading lists run the risk of their books not matching the final reading list.
”MSU Bookstore is owned by Follet Education Group Inc., the parent company of efollet.com, an online bookstore that competes with independent online bookstores.
“When students order from us they don’t have to worry about shipping and handling costs,” Bourdo said. “Because we have a brick and mortar store also, students can skip the lines and come right in and pick up their books.”
Despite the perceived disadvantages, StudentMarket.com president Oren Milgram thinks book shopping online is a growing trend and will continue to be successful.
“We started StudentMarket.com because we saw that students were posting notecards and fliers all over campus trying to sell or trade their books,” he said.
“We provided a national online trading service that allowed students around the country an opportunity to trade and sell.”
Milgram said he discovered that students were more interested in buying than selling so StudentMarket.com developed into a online bookstore comparison site. The site allows students to search for books and compare prices with nonvirtual competitors. The site, he says, “eliminates the time used by savvy shoppers comparing costs on several sites.”
Even though students have to wait for shipping when they order online, Milgram said the service “gives students the power to say, ‘Here’s what I want to buy, who wants to sell it to me at the lowest cost?’”
