For many years students have criticized the Pirates’ Bookstore at Modesto Junior College for the high cost of textbooks. Increasingly they have turned away from the bookstore and found alternatives, purchasing their class books online, or at the Off-Campus Book Store on Tully Road or just sharing books with friends. As a result, Pirates’ Bookstore’s sales plummeted last semester.
In fall 2009, the bookstore estimated a loss of 15% of their sales—and it all started during the crisis of the budget cuts.
“As enrollment goes down, sales go down,” explained Rhonda Green, Auxillery Service Manager, describing the budget cut passed down from the state capitol. “We (MJC) had to cap enrollment. There is a high demand in classes, we could be growing, but we can’t. We just don’t have the budget to do so.” According to Green, the college is currently stable in the enrollment cap.
Green explains that if the college had the funds for growth of the campus, then MJC would have record numbers in enrollment. “The more classes are cut, the less books are needed,” said Green.
The Pirates’ Bookstore originated in 1942, 21 years after the campus was founded. Back then, there was no competition. The only way to purchase text books was through the bookstore. Seven decades later, the bookstore is finding new strategies to market the store and seeking better ways serve the students. Banners are posted through the east and west campuses claiming the store offers textbooks with the “lowest price guaranteed.”
Some students don’t see it that way.
“I buy my books online; it is easier than waiting in a long line for the first week of school,” said Tawnya Hanson, television and sociology major. “Plus it is way cheaper than going to the book store. There was a book being sold at the bookstore for $120; I got in on Amazon.com for only $20.”
Students not only have the choice in buying books online for the fraction of the cost, but now they have the choice to rent their textbooks. After reading the fine prints of some rented textbook companies, it may seem more worth it to just buy the book.
Hanson continues, “I only buy books from the bookstore if I can’t find it online.”
Pirates’ Bookstore competes with many companies such as Amazon, eBay, Cenguage Books, CheapBooks.com and the store located across the east campus, Off Campus Bookstore. According to Green, the new bookstore across from the campus has had little impact on their sales. The main issue the campus faces is that increasing numbers of students resort to online books.
Green explained that often students end up buying the textbooks at the Pirates Bookstore anyways because they carry almost all of the books required by the instructors.
“We (the Bookstore) carry and orders the books that the instructor requests us to order,” said Green. “The main cost is based on the publisher of the textbook—some are more, some are less.”
The store determines their final based price of the books based on a 25 percent profit. For instance, if a brand new textbook cost $50 the store would charge the students $62.50. If the book is used, then the store would sell it for 75 percent of the cost of the new book from the publisher.
Although Pirates’ Bookstore has foreseen a change in sales over the past few years, they will always remain to be in business. If sales continue to fall, then the bookstore would shrink the budget of the operation; the bookstore currently employees 12 workers.
Green explains, “Our mission is to serve the students and the faculty. If we need to evolve or shrink, that is what we will do. Our goal is to provide the books the instructors need to educate students.”
The Pirates' Log > Campus Spyglass
Pirates' Bookstore sailing away
Published: Friday, February 26, 2010
Updated: Monday, March 1, 2010
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