Christina Salerno

State Hornet

Summer is over and the back-to-school rituals have begun &-paying fees, registering for classes, buying new clothes andsupplies and, of course, buying textbooks. In an attempt to lessenthe pain of book-buying, some students are looking for new ways toaccess books, such as online bargains and library reserves.

The Hornet Bookstore, by far the most frustrating and expensiveoption, had a total of $385.50 for eight average required books&- let’s be honest, no one buys the”recommended” books &- including three usedbooks.

In comparison, Amazon.com had all of the same books, four ofthem used, for $346.15. With the added shipping and handling costsof $20.92, the total was $367.07, a savings of almost $20.

If a little extra time is worth the money, the CSUS librarykeeps many textbooks on reserve. Students can plan their studyingwithin the hours of the library, which is open until 11 p.m.Monday-Sunday.

Another online bookseller, www.bigwords.com, uses a comparisonsearch engine &- referred to on the Web site as the”Uber-Bot,” which compares the prices for all of thetextbooks and provides a detailed list of the best prices on theInternet for the books. The Uber-Bot searches numerous Web sites,such as Amazon, Barnes and Noble and other third party sellers.Using bigwords.com, the total cost for the books and shipping was$345.99, a $40 savings compared to the Hornet Bookstore and lowerthan Amazon.com, mainly because of the free shipping promotionbigwords.com offered for the order.

Other online Web sites specializing in the sale of collegetextbooks include www.barnesandnoble.com, www.ecampus.com,www.BIGnerd.com and www.abebooks.com. Each site offers a variety ofbooks from different classes, and by checking more than one optionstudents can find the best deals.

To a cash-strapped student, savings of $20-40 may be significantenough to warrant buying books via an online book site rather thanat the bookstore.

Convenience is also a factor in considering where to buy books.With online sellers, the books are shipped to your door generallywithin a week or so. At the Hornet Bookstore, the best and easiesttime to buy books is before school starts when there are virtuallyno lines. However, during the first few weeks of school the line topay for books often snakes around the entire bottom level of thestore, with students waiting as long as two hours in line.

The Hornet Bookstore also has its own Web site to order bookswith the same shipping conveniences as other online book sites, butnot the same prices. The books are shipped within 24-48 hours, andthe shipping costs are $5.50 for the first item, and $0.50 for eachadditional item. Doris Gorin, the Hornet Bookstore textbookmanager, said the Web site is updated daily and students have theoption to buy used books through the site when available.

At the Hornet Bookstore Web site, one can make a list of allyour required textbooks and prices without buying them, which onecould then use to compare prices at various online book sites.While prices and availability of books will vary, the time spentresearching and comparing prices online and on campus couldpotentially pay off in savings.