A used book or secondhand book is a book which has been owned before by an owner other than the publisher or retailer, usually by an individual or library. [1]
A used book or secondhand book is a book which has been owned before by an owner other than the publisher or retailer, usually by an individual or library. [1]
Used books typically become available on the market when they are sold or given to a second-hand shop, church used book sale or used bookstore; they are usually sold for about half or three-quarters the price of what they would cost new, though rare books and others still in demand or hard to obtain might sell for more than this. [2]
Book sales in general decreased with the advent of online shopping. However, there are dedicated online retailers for used books that allow individuals to sell directly to them. [3] Some retailers also allow used books to be sold through a third-party marketplace. [2]
Some new book shops also carry used books, and some used book shops also sell new books. Though the original authors or publishers will not benefit financially from the sale of a used book, it helps to keep old books in circulation. Sometimes very old, rare, first edition, antique, or simply out of print books can be found as used books in used book shops.
College textbooks are often bought secondhand. [4] Students will buy secondhand or resell books they bought at full-price to save costs. These copies will be sold through secondhand markets or the school itself. [5]
A reading copy of a book may be well-used, may include highlighting, marginalia, dedications, [6] and is suitable for reading, but is not collectible. This is a term used in the used book business, to indicate the lack of collectible value, while claiming that the book is in sufficiently good condition for a purchaser whose interest is primarily in actually reading the book. A reading copy is typically less expensive than a collectible copy.
A number of small towns have become centres for used book sellers, most notably Hay-on-Wye in South Wales. [7] They act as a magnet for buyers, and are located in country areas of great scenic beauty. [8]
The New York Times Best Seller list is widely considered the preeminent list of best-selling books in the United States. The New York Times Book Review has published the list weekly since October 12, 1931. In the 21st century, it has evolved into multiple lists, grouped by genre and format, including fiction and nonfiction, hardcover, paperback and electronic.
Hay-on-Wye, or simply Hay, is a market town and community in Powys, Wales, in the historic county of Brecknockshire. With over twenty bookshops, it is often described as a "town of books"; it is both the National Book Town of Wales and the site of the annual Hay Festival. The community had a population of 1,675 at the 2021 census.
Barnes & Noble Booksellers is an American bookseller with the largest number of retail outlets in the United States. The company operates approximately 600 retail stores across all 50 U.S. states.
A textbook is a book containing a comprehensive compilation of content in a branch of study with the intention of explaining it. Textbooks are produced to meet the needs of educators, usually at educational institutions. Schoolbooks are textbooks and other books used in schools. Today, many textbooks are published in both print and digital formats.
Waterstones Booksellers Limited, trading as Waterstones, is a British book retailer that operates 311 shops, mainly in the United Kingdom and also other nearby countries. As of February 2014, it employs around 3,500 staff in the UK and Europe. An average-sized Waterstones shop sells a range of approximately 30,000 individual books, as well as stationery and other related products.
The American Booksellers Association (ABA) is a non-profit trade association founded in 1900 that promotes independent bookstores in the United States. ABA's core members are key participants in their communities' local economy and culture, and to assist them ABA creates relevant programs; provides education, information, business products, and services; and engages in public policy and industry advocacy. The Association actively supports and defends free speech and the First Amendment rights of all Americans, without contradiction of equity and inclusion, through the American Booksellers for Free Expression. A volunteer board of 13 booksellers governs the Association. Previously headquartered in White Plains, New York, ABA became a fully remote organization in 2024.
Coles is a Canadian bookstore chain owned by Indigo Books and Music. Coles is Indigo's brand for small-scale bookstores in locations such as shopping malls. Some locations are operated as SmithBooks, and the company has recently begun to open selected small-format locations as "IndigoSpirit".
A book town is a town or village with many used book or antiquarian bookstores. These stores, as well as literary festivals, attract bibliophile tourists. Some book towns are members of the International Organisation of Book Towns.
The Early Learning Centre (ELC) is a British retailer that sells toys aimed at younger children. It is part of The Entertainer. It was a subsidiary of Mothercare until 2019.
Bookstore tourism is a type of cultural tourism that promotes independent bookstores as a group travel destination. It started as a grassroots effort to support locally owned and operated bookshops, many of which have struggled to compete with large bookstore chains and online retailers.
Pearson Education, known since 2011 as simply Pearson, is the educational publishing and services subsidiary of the international corporation Pearson plc. The subsidiary was formed in 1998, when Pearson plc acquired Simon & Schuster's educational business and combined it with Pearson's existing education company Addison-Wesley Longman. Pearson Education was restyled as simply Pearson in 2011. In 2016, the diversified parent corporation Pearson plc rebranded to focus entirely on education publishing and services, and as of 2023 Pearson Education is Pearson plc's main subsidiary.
The Hay Festival of Literature & Arts, better known as the Hay Festival, is an annual literature festival held in Hay-on-Wye, Powys, Wales, for 10 days from May to June. Devised by Norman, Rhoda and Peter Florence in 1988, the festival was described by Bill Clinton in 2001 as "The Woodstock of the mind". Tony Benn said: "In my mind it's replaced Christmas".
Follett Corporation is an American technology company headquartered in Westchester, Illinois. Follett is a provider of educational services and products to colleges, schools, and libraries.
Richard George William Pitt Booth was a British bookseller, bibliophile and micronationalist known for his contribution to the success of Hay-on-Wye as a centre for second-hand bookselling and founder of The Kingdom of Hay-on-Wye, a micronation that claims the town as an independent kingdom.
Rakuten Kobo Inc., or simply Kobo, is a Canadian company that sells ebooks, audiobooks, e-readers and formerly tablet computers. It is headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and is a subsidiary of the Japanese e-commerce conglomerate Rakuten. The name Kobo is an anagram of book.
World of Books Group Limited is an online second-hand book retailer, trading under the names Wob, Ziffit, and Shopiago. reported to be the United Kingdom's largest. The company buys unsold inventory of used books mostly from UK charity shops. The books are resold either to consumers through Wob's website and various online sites, or wholesale to recyclers, with about 80% of the books going to recycling. It was certified as a B Corporation in 2019.
Google Play Books, formerly Google eBooks, is an ebook digital distribution service operated by Google, part of its Google Play product line. Users can purchase and download ebooks and audiobooks from Google Play, which offers over five million titles, with Google claiming it to be the "largest ebooks collection in the world". Books can be read on a dedicated Books section on the Google Play website, through the use of a mobile app available for Android and iOS, through the use of select e-readers that offer support for Adobe Digital Editions, through a web browser and reading via Google Home. Users may also upload up to 2,000 ebooks in the PDF or EPUB file formats. Google Play Books is available in 75 countries.
Sefer ve Sefel is an English-language secondhand bookshop in downtown Jerusalem, Israel. It was established in 1981 as the first combination bookshop/coffee shop in the country. Though the café was closed in 2002, the shop continues to carry a large selection of used books, with an estimated 26,000 titles in stock. It is frequently cited by guidebooks and travel sites as the best secondhand English bookshop in Jerusalem and the Middle East.
Jimbōchō Book Town and also known as Kanda Book Town, is a book town located in the district of Kanda-Jinbōchō in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. The area is known for its high volume and concentration of used bookstores. It additionally houses the headquarters for multiple major Japanese publishing companies, as well as campuses for several universities.
Baedari Secondhand Bookstore Alley (Korean: 인천배다리헌책방거리) is a historical and cultural space in Dongu-gu, Incheon, South Korea. The Baedari Alley was once home to about fifty bookstores specializing in secondhand books, but only a handful remain today. The name Baedari comes from the name of the village Baedari meaning where boats and ships dock, and it currently covers the Geumchang-dong and Songhyeon-dong of Dong-gu, Incheon. This place was a gateway to import culture from Jemulpo port since it was open to foreign trade. After liberation, those who lost their homes around the port came to Baedari for food, to find a job, and to live. It is an area where various modern experiments were made as the modern culture brought in from the West and the traditional culture of the Joseon Dynasty formed a cultural interface. The film school, the cradle of modern education for Koreans, the Incheon Public Ordinary School, and the private school Uiseong Sasuk nurtured Korean talent in Baedari. It is an area with significance in the history of modern Christianity in Korea. Presently, Baedari is full of old bookstores, stationery stores, photo studios, restaurants, murals, craft shops, photo galleries, Baedari Space Beam.
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