Ideas, information and industry news for collegiate retailers

With students not on campus this term, many stores are looking at out-of-the-box ways to buy back books from students for subsequent terms. Some stores are offering a drive-up buyback. However, convincing students to make the trip to campus could be difficult. Utilizing inSite Buyback Alerts gives your store a way to let students know the buyback value of their books from the start.

Now more than ever, it is important for campus stores to simplify and streamline buyback events. The College of the Holy Cross Bookstore has made its buyback a success by ensuring that its student body always has a consistent experience. Students can count on always getting the same great buyback service each term from the same familiar faces staffing the event. The store’s consistency ensures that students always know what to expect and where to get the best return on their textbooks.

Buyback is just around the corner, but it isn’t too late to encourage students to sell their textbooks back to your college store. Follow this easy-to-use checklist to make sure you maximize your buyback marketing efforts.

Drawing students to your store for buyback is step one. Step two can be even trickier: Ensuring customers leave feeling happy with the cash they get for their books.

It’s no secret students aren’t thrilled with the amount they receive back on textbooks in comparison to what they spend at the beginning of the semester. More services pop up online that promise better buyback rates every year. With increasing competition, make sure your store doesn’t fall behind on promoting this spring’s buyback with these six ideas on how to increase student traffic.

Buyback will be here before you know it. Do you have plan? How will you get the word out to students about where and when they can sell back their books? Do you have an incentive for them to choose your store rather than the competition? If these questions have filled you with anxiety, have no fear. We have gathered some easily-implemented ideas your store can use to ensure your buyback is a success.

The end of the semester is a busy time for college stores. Finding time to promote buyback and balance the rest of your responsibilities is a challenge. There are only so many hours in a day and so many directions you can be pulled. That’s why it is important to find easy-to-use solutions that save time, inform students and streamline your diverse duties. MBS Systems inSite offers an easy way for students to receive a personalized, automated buyback reminder that tells them the value of their book.

When Googling “the rising cost of education,” more than 63 million articles are available for our reading pleasure. We don’t have the time to comb through articles and whitepapers trying to determine the socio-economic and political root causes. Regardless, the rising costs of education can be attributed to two factors:

1. The rising cost of tuition
2. The rising costs of course materials

Your campus buyback also isn't your students' only option anymore. Peer-to-peer sales have become increasingly more common through Amazon, Craigslist or even among one another on campus. To ensure you're getting the traffic you need to have the lower-cost, used options students seek first, you need to make sure your buys are as successful as possible. Here's how stores are doing it nationwide:

On average, there's not a lot of churn among college retail administrators. If you're subscribed to Foreword and reading this blog, odds are you've been in your position for a few years — and each buyback isn't exactly your first rodeo. But whether you've done two or two dozen, it pays to get a fresh perspective. Having started in June, MBS Supply Chain Analyst Stephanie Webber is fairly new to the textbook industry in general — and she got to work her first buyback ever just a few weeks later, when she volunteered to work the University of Missouri-Columbia's summer session buy. Keep reading after the jump to see what she learned about the process, and how it relates to what she does for MBS and its partner institutions every day.