While many students are accustomed to griping about the blow their wallets take buying books at the beginning of every semester, officials at other campus bookstores say that prices may be driven up because Georgetown’s bookstore is not owned by the university.
Georgetown’s bookstore status — operated under contract with the university and owned by Follett Higher Education Group — allows the company to set prices in consultation with Georgetown.
University-owned bookstores, on the other hand, have the flexibility to adjust sale and buyback prices, according to several bookstore officials at universities nationwide.
Frank Henninger, director of the university-owned and operated Villanova University Shop, said there is a distinct advantage in university ownership.
“Employees are employees of the university, and there is a certain allegiance and a sense of community that comes with this,” he said. “Just as importantly, the university can exert much more control over pricing, store hours and policies, while contracted-managed stores set the policies for textbook pricing.”
Margie Whiteleather, strategic projects manager for The Cornell Store and Cornell Business Services, said that Cornell University’s bookstore is an “enterprise,” owned and operated by the university but generating its own revenue. However, Whiteleather said that leasing bookstores to contract-managing companies like Follett or Barnes and Noble does not necessarily translate into higher textbook prices for students.
“There is a perception that after going [to] lease, the contract managed stores raise prices, but that’s just a perception some people report. I don’t know if there’s truth to that across the board,” she said.
According to Elio Distaola, director of public and campus relations at Follett Higher Education Group, Follett negotiates textbook prices with publishers and the respective universities. He said that new textbooks with suggested prices set by the publishers or built-in pre-prices are sold at that price, but new textbooks without a set price are specifically negotiated between the university and Follett.
“In most [of our] on-campus bookstores, [these] books are priced so the gross profit margin does not exceed 25 percent,” he said.
Whiteleather said that, at Cornell, gross profit margins for books without a set publisher price compare to most other stores between 22 and 26 percent, while “trade” books that come with a price are contingent on this price, with a gross profit margin that falls between 20 and 40 percent. However, she admitted that the store’s position as a university-owned institution allows it to avoid meeting set profit margin goals.
“The selection of titles used at Cornell varies each semester, and faculty make the selections, so we’re not in a position to steer the product selection toward a certain margin goal, as a general retailer of general consumer products might,” she said.
According to Henninger, the Villanova University Shop keeps its gross profit margins in a set range.
“Our gross profit margin off selling prices for new books is 25 percent, while it is 33 percent for used books,” he said.
In addition, he said that used textbooks are discounted from the originally agreed upon price.
“Used textbooks are usually sold at a 25 percent discount from the selling price of the new book,” he said.
Whiteleather said that Cornell’s store also sells used books for 25 percent less than their current new book price.
Distaola characterized the book buyback program as an area in which Follett is particularly competitive. He said that Follett offers to pay 50 percent of the purchase price of textbooks that buyers want to sell back, as long as there is anticipated demand for the book by the bookstore in a future course. If the bookstore does not anticipate being able to resell the book, he said, it will buy back the book for a wholesale price, which is usually up to 30 percent of the original purchase price.
Henninger said the Villanova University Shop offers 50 percent of the current new price, not the purchased price, of the book for its buyback, if the book will be used in a course for the following semester. In addition, they partner with MBS Textbook Exchange to buy back books that are not slated to continue the following semester. Prices for these books are set on a case-by-case basis.
At Johns Hopkins University Bookstore, which is owned and operated by Barnes and Noble, the buyback program is structured similarly to Georgetown’s, offering 50 percent for continuing courses. However, store manager Rebecca LaFleur said the store offers one option that most bookstores do not: “We offer buyback every day of the year,” she said.
Henniger said that Villanova also offers book buyback year-round if the books will not be used the following semester, but not for texts that continue to be in demand for the following semester.
Whiteleather said that Cornell’s bookstore also has a buyback program at the beginning of each semester, offering 50 percent of the current book price to students, as long as it will be used the following semester, and wholesale prices for those that will not.
While some Georgetown students say that textbook prices are too high at the bookstore, Distaola said that the increased cost of producing textbooks must be taken into account.
“A textbook costs more than a general-reading book because creating and publishing a textbook is more complex than writing and publishing a novel,” Distaola said. “Textbooks can be expensive to produce because they typically include color pictures, graphs, charts, formulas and illustrations.”
The bookstore does not have a complete monopoly over textbook sales at Georgetown, though.
The Corp has operated a Book Co-op since 1972, through which students can buy and sell used books from fellow students.
“Students get to set their own price and we post it online. When the book sells we take 20 percent of the sale and the rest goes to the student,” said Joel Johnson (MSB ’10), director of the Co-op.
Financial records for the bookstore are held by the university. Margie Bryant, associate vice president for auxiliary services, could not be reached to provide financial information on the bookstore.