He had no interest in books. He was rude to me and said Welcome to (my city)"
I said welcome to English because he was not looking inside any of the books he was hoarding. He was loitering there for hours in a pandemic trying to put his paws on every book, and being rude about it.
Selling dear is for the benefit of ebay and bezos. And not any reader, or consumer, except for the asshole who monopolizes the store in a pandemic while you wait for them to finish, so you can shop (in a mask btw) like a normal book buyer.
Good point. Me too. But still. It’s not just about me.
Towards a good idea. They are looking out for actual readers.
It is a burden to have them in a pandemic. I have already explained it. They touch everything and hang out too long.
This whole thread is about thrift stores and churches both of which are based on donations. I am not talking about bookstores.
The books end up on the internet where we all know there are not only very aggressive prices, and competitive auctions, but also, prices that are outrageous (1000s of % over) and designed to take advantage of glitches, oversights and market anomalies.
This benefits Jeff Bezos space rides and the basic sucking upwards of all wealth.
That’s a fair point. At least these folks are offering something of value. If they discover a rare book in Cincinnati and post it online then it’s accessible to someone from Arkansas. I wouldn’t mind paying a few extra bucks for the book if it saved me time by not having to search for it myself.
I’ll contrast this with scalpers who offer nothing of value. Remember when Popeye’s chicken sandwiches were all the rage? There were scalpers who went into the restaurants buying as many sandwiches as they could to resell them at exorbitant prices. Not only did these people offer nothing of value, they made it more difficult for the rest of us to get our hands on a chicken sandwich if that’s what we wanted.
I’m really talking about used books donated to thrift shops. And people arbitraging it in an obnoxious exploitative way.
There is no need for someone to scoop a book out from a thrift store and put in on the net so I pay $20 instead of $2. I was in the store too, waiting for that jerk to finish putting his grubby illiterate exploitative paws all over the books, during a pandemic.
OMG- The ‘Estate Sale Thugs’!
Each ‘group’ has a specific specialty, whether it’s colored Depression glass or sports memorabilia or autographed celebrity memorabilia or what have you. At the start time, as soon as the person running the sale opens the door, they will have the biggest ape who can hold a thought, barrel through the door, knock anyone out of his way, and grab anything that looks remotely like their specialty, and then run it to a corner of one room. There, the person with actual knowledge waits and appraises what is worth buying vs what is not.
The first ape will literally grab things out of your hands to get the next full arm load to the appraiser in the corner ( until they say “That’s enough, Igor. Down, Igor! Down!”). Sometimes a second ape guards the appraiser (who may have as many as 30+ things in front of him/her, none of which have been bought yet) from others who may want to look at and buy some of them… or even just 1-2 of those things.
Once the appraiser has gone through the grouping, they’ll cherry-pick what they are buying and just leave the rest in a piled on top of each other in the corner. Then it’s off the the car with their purchases.
“Come, Igor-1…! Come Igor-2…! There is another estate sale on Main Street…!”
(Before I just stopped going I used to wish that Estate Sales had Bouncers.)
I just lost an auction for a 1970 book Sold for $20, plus 5 shipping.
Not for readers of books found in thrifts and churches though.
Your post is so speculative about motivations, and applies to bookstores which is a while other thing. They have buyers and expertise. I don’t go there to find things that are donated by estates, by accident, or folks who are just tired of stuff. That is where you find some bit of treasure in the world. And it is becoming rarer. That’s my hobby.
There’s nothing wrong here. Resellers actually help authors by elevating the market price for their works.
A thrift store (one that isn’t a charity) exists to make money by selling used goods. It’s not a lottery system, there’s no rule stating it’s supposed to be like a big CrackerJack box with a guaranteed prize inside each one.
Why do you feel so entitled to screw authors out of their hard-earned royalties, Mr. Ethical Literary Consumer? If you want to do something virtuous, go to a mom-and-pop store and have them order the title. Or have your library system reserve it for you. Then maybe the authors and publishers can get a little something for their trouble, instead of getting lowballed because lazy thrift store owners won’t pony up for a $90 bluetooth gizmo to help price their shit correctly.
This is the lamest pitting ever. My brother does this as a side hustle and as a hobby. The thrift stores, most of whom benefit charities, love these kinds of buyers.
This is the only part of it that bothers me. If I’ve got my hands on the book first, that’s too bad for the re-seller. He wants it, he’s got to hustle and get there first.
Physically assaulting people to get the book is already illegal, anyways. They should be tossed out of the store for this alone.
Even if they weren’t making a profit, they should be tossed for this behavior.
Can you explain this? It makes no sense to me.
The thrift stores I go to and define as such are charity stores.
Good to know you are objective.
For me, during a pandemic anyway, there is an argument for tossing them out of the store.
There have been a lot of pandemic rules in all stores, especially thrift stores.
To be frank, the OP scans as a whiny bitch with an enormous chip on his shoulder, so I suspect the details of the altercation are exaggerated (and likely instigated by him).
So then the resellers are helping the thrift store by buying their stuff at the listed price. And further helping them by demonstrating that the advertised price could be even higher if they’d bother to buy the bluetooth gizmo.
You’re the guy screwing the thrift store by hoping to find items they didn’t price correctly. Honestly this pitting is all about your sense of entitlement toward getting something for nothing (or less than it should be).
I still don’t get this.