Buying Books in Bulk: Too Risky?

Posted by Adam on June 22nd, 2010

Tags

Category selling-more-books

Where to find books to purchase is the #1 hot topic for online booksellers and rightly so.  There is a saying that goes something like “you make money when you buy not when you sell”.  If you’re making money when you’re buying books we all want to buy as much inventory as possible!  Common methods that are taught and used are Friends of the Library sales, thrift stores and yard sales just to name a few.  There are hundreds of different places where you can find books to resell.  In fact, Frank Florence has a product called Creative Inventory Sourcing that talks about where to find books for resell and that’s it’s only topic!  The places covered in his booklet aren’t rocket science and are actually pretty common sense if you think about it but I’ve found that you just need someone to point you in the right direction.

When I’ve got my index finger out pointing in a direction to a beginner, I’m usually pointing to the ol’ faithful sources that I used to use such as the aforementioned FOL sales, thrift stores and yard sales.  They were profitable and still are.  To this day, I can go into a Goodwill, spend $5 and easily come out with $50 worth of books.  It’s an easy $45 profit and I’m happy with that but the question I always asked myself afterwards was “Am I satisfied?” and the answer every time was a resounding NO every time.  Don’t think that I didn’t appreciate the profit.  This kind of buying just didn’t fit my goal of creating a large, self sustaining business.

My goal within 2 months of starting this adventure was to create a business than could support myself and my family.  That means a consistent, steady stream of income that could pay the bills, debt, mortgage or anything else our lifestyle may bring.  In making this goal, that means than a one-off $45 profit isn’t going to do much for me besides pay for a month of cell phone service.  I’m going to have to replicate that $45 hundreds of times over in order to reach my goal.  This is when I stopped looking at one-off profits and started thinking in bulk.

There are a lot of different ways you can buy books in large quantities for dirt cheap prices.  One of my main streams of income is buying leftovers from Friends of the Library sales.  As I quote in the revised edition of my popular eBook Used Books: Big Business “Taking the leftovers allows you to forgo all of the hassle and frenzy of the sale itself, get thousands of books for next to nothing and allows you all the time in the world to properly determine value of the books.”

Buying leftovers from FOL sales is only one way to buy books in bulk for next to nothing.  However, in order to buy these books you’ll typically have to shoot the owner an offer and see if it sticks or not.  This is where a lot of people get hung up on.  How much should you offer on these huge lots?  My answer to most answers is…it depends.  It depends on the quality of the books, where they came from, what they were used for previously, etc.

For example, if you’re at a library sale looking at 1,000 ex-library books that are in good condition chances are the Friends are going to just want to simply get rid of the books.  You’re going to get all ex-library books that can only be classified as good condition but at the same time they will sell.  Offer $50 and see what they say.  I bet you they’d take it.  However, if you’re at a used bookstore going out of business these are typically higher quality books.  Depending on if these books were ever tried to sell online I’d offer $0 if they’ve ever been scanned for value from Amazon or up to $400 if I notice that they aren’t newer, mass produced books and most are non-fiction.

Here are some examples of my bulk purchases so you can get an idea on what to offer at your next opportunity:

1. 10,000 most ex-library for $40.

2. 25,000 60% pre-1970 books, 20% donated and 10% ex-library for $400.

3. 250 already all looked up, like new religion books for $400.

I hope that this gives you a good idea on buying in bulk and some examples of real world pricing.  I don’t recommend buying in bulk if you’re a beginner but if you’ve been at it for awhile and have the gumption and storage space take a gamble and take action now!

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  • Wayne

    Thanks for the great info Adam. Your book has helped me to get started and it is going great! I also saw, early on, that buying bulk was the way to go. Also, not much competition when buying that many at once.

    When you buy in bulk, what percentage of books do you expect to be able to sell? I have been using 50% as my guide. I have only been buying 200 – 1000 at one time but I also want to ramp it up. I know that it depends on the mix of books (as referenced in your post) and you are pricing it accordingly.

    Just curious what you think in your head when there is a decent mix of non-fiction/fiction, etc.

    Thanks for all the info!

    Wayne

  • adbertram

    I've counted on only 30% but I'm usually able to sell the rest for 5-10
    cents/piece to people that sell at flea markets and used bookstores. I
    mostly check condition and if they are ex-lib or not and if there are a lot
    of novels, I'll pay considerably less.

  • Sales

    Great post, Adam. Only about two weeks too late for my latest large purchase. Judging by your examples I paid a little too much for the 10,000 books I acquired. However, my situation was a little unique. These were from a antique/estate mart whose owner's were retiring. They were in their 80's and neither were capable of doing any online marketing. Their inventory was acquired mostly in large lot purchases from estate sales and estates that went to auction.

    I'm in a medium size town and there seem to be few, if any serious book scouts around here. Translated: little competition. So I made a $550 bid on the entire lot (along with about 12 bookcases) and she accepted.

    I've just scratched the surface in my sorting, but I've found that only about 30% are bound for the thrift shop or yard sale. About 5% meet my personal FBA requirements (VG or better, light weight & 500k rank or less). The rest have been what I call 'listable'; meaning I can list them and reasonable expect to sell them and clear at least $1 after fees & shipping.

    After sorting about 500 books, I've found 5 books that should bring $40+ and about 30 that should bring $10+. At a cost of 5.5 cents per book, I think I'm liking the trend here.

    Like you, my wife and I are trying to replace her part-time income with the book business. I'm fortunate in that she is fully bought in and is participating fully in the business. Oddly enough, she'll ultimately invest more time in the business than me. But, I look at that as an opportunity to grow it bigger that I we originally thought we could.

    At any rate, I can't thank you enough for the inspiration you're providing everyone that follows your post. You rock!

  • adbertram

    Thanks for the comment! It's great to hear others' stories and good luck on
    that lot.

  • Rezolutionz

    I have completely ignored the fact of whether or not a book is ex-library when qualitizing and listing. In 3 years with a total sales volume of +36,000 sales I have yet to have one complaint. I list (and sell) them as VG all day long. Just thought some people might like to know that. I find when conditioning books, rigid rules never work out in the end. Instead you need to think about what the potential customer of THAT item would think when they open the package and look at the book. What would you think if you bought it? As long as its really nice looking, everybody wins. Textbooks with minimal marks or highlights; VERY GOOD, why? because a student wont care as much about that textbook than someone who wants to read the alcoholics anonymous 7 steps book. Get it? As long as your customer gets what they want, its all good.

  • rekinom

    Interesting stuff. So out of curiosity, how do you dispose of books that you will not able to sell?

  • adbertram

    I have always been able to sell my discards. The ones that are nasty I
    take to the recyclers.

  • adbertram

    I have always been able to sell my discards. The ones that are nasty I
    take to the recyclers.

  • Elariabooks

    Hi Adam – I've been in the business for just over a week, so please forgive any stupid questions! I was wondering, though, how do you know if a book's value has already been looked up by someone else?

  • adbertram

    If it's already in one of the few stacks we put them in. :)

  • Garywrites

    Enjoyable post, Adam. My wife and I have been in business for almost two weeks. I've had great luck with our area thrift stores and some luck at yard sales. Our FOL sale was in April so I have to wait another year to take advantage of it.I put an ad on Craigslist two days ago that is similar to the one you suggested in your book and have already gotten three inquiries about selling lots. One guy wants to sell me a lot of 1750 “mostly non-fiction” books. He said he is closing down his online bookstore and will sell them to me for $550. After reading your post I feel this is way too much for me to spend…especially since he lives 180 miles away.

    Is there a target price-per-book that you like to get when buying in bulk? Any other suggestions?

    By the way, I've found your book very useful in helping me get started in selling online through Amazon.

  • adbertram

    Since he's an online bookseller wanting to get out of the business get a
    list from him with ISBNs and go to work looking them all up. That is one of
    the good things with those kinds of buys. They can get an electronic list
    very easily. $550 may not be too much if he knows he's got some very
    valuable books in there.

  • Garywrites

    That was a good suggestion Adam. I contacted the seller and requested the ISBNs as you suggested, but he refused to supply them. Perhaps my suspicions were correct.

  • adbertram

    He has them and can get them but if he won't give them to you he's not
    wanting you to see they're all penny books.

  • Garywrites

    That was a good suggestion Adam. I contacted the seller and requested the ISBNs as you suggested, but he refused to supply them. Perhaps my suspicions were correct.

  • adbertram

    He has them and can get them but if he won't give them to you he's not
    wanting you to see they're all penny books.

  • Anonymous

    I typically get them from leftovers at Friends of the Library sales. I’ve got a few more sources but I discuss all of them in my eBook How to Source Used Books at howtosourceusedbooks.com. :)