Ethical Shopping for Books: Why & How to Do It
We need to talk about how we buy our books.
Almost all of the time, I find myself buying or downloading from Barnes & Noble, Amazon, or other large chains — because what else is a poor college student to do? I can find the books I need for cheap, especially compared to the hundreds of dollars that a textbook can be.
But what about the books I read for pleasure? The ones that find a special place in my library (and my heart) or that have me obsessively turning pages for weeks on end?
The ones that I could buy for a few dollars more if I had a reason to?
As college students, I know we’re price-conscious and busy. However, I encourage you to make your next for-pleasure book purchase from a more ethical place. Below, I’ll explain the most ethical way to buy books, and why you should care about this.
Table of Contents
When you buy from a local retailer instead of a giant chain, you won’t be needing the book shipped to you from far away, so you’ll cut down on packaging and transportation waste.
It’s always important to think about how our actions affect others, and that’s still true when we talk about our spending habits. No one expects us to buy local all the time, but it matters that we’re aware of how we could change to make the world a better place.
When you buy local, your money stays in your town, supporting you and the people you care about in a way that buying from Barnes & Noble or other stores doesn’t. Your careful spending can keep businesses in your area afloat.
There are very few experiences as great as randomly stumbling across a book that you never would have read otherwise but fell in love with anyway—and that’s not an experience you get from buying a book off of Amazon’s Recommended For You list. Additionally, in-person bookshops provide opportunities for a laugh, intellectual growth, and fun outings, and that’s something to be protected. 3 Ways to Shop Ethically For Your Books:
Options For Book Lovers in the UK:
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