Posted by So I went to my neighborhood thrift store the other day and I tried my darnedest to find something worth buying–maybe a nice bit of antique silver plate or Waterford crystal or a cool piece of outsider art. All things I have found there before. But I went around and around finding nothing, which honestly is not all that unusual.
But before I left I took a quick peruse of the book shelves. They always have a ton of cookbooks and I do sell vintage cookbooks, but I’m not buying as many as I used to. But I did spot this intriguing book on the Navajo code talkers in WWII.
My 95-year-old father is particularly found of WWII history so over the years I’ve bought him dozens of WWII books and I thought he might be interested in this one. But then I discovered this 2002 reissue had been signed by some of the original code talkers who served during the war! Wow!
Found a couple online similar to mine with the code-talker autographs so it looks promising.
So my pops isn’t getting this particular book and I’ve added it to my Etsy store. I think for the right person it will be a treasure.
Truth be told books are not a huge category in my Etsy store (I sell just 4 to 6 a month), but I plan on growing it. As a bibliophile this is a natural area for me to build and where I live I can find a wide variety of books at low cost. (I notice when I am thrifting in other parts of the country this doesn’t hold true.)
Do Books Still Sell?
Yes, even in this era of e-readers, physical books sell and some folks make a full-time living reselling secondhand books.
Mel from Australia has been selling used books for at least five years now on Ebay. She has a huge warehouse and sells gobs, but just the other day announced her decision to close her Ebay store for a while. She’s going to use this time to reorganize inventory, rethink her business and likely move to live sales events. Look forward to seeing her progress.
I’m a fan of Shaun Bythell who owns the largest secondhand book shop in Scotland (over 100,000 books!) and also has written a number of books about his experience as a book buyer and seller that are strangely intriguing and hilarious.
While I cherrypick my few books, Mel and Shaun buy in bulk. Shaun is often contacted by folks who need to clear out a deceased loved one’s book collection and he may end up buying hundreds in one fell swoop. Which seems both wonderful and frightening to me. The most I’ve ever purchased at one time is 40 and these were hand selected out of a large home library.
All this to say it encourages me to know that people are still interested in physical books and still buying them and hopefully reading them. Here are a few that are in my store…
Wishing you happy hunting,
Karen
