The beginning of each semester is filled with the hustle and bustle of students moving into new housing, reuniting with friends after a long break and starting new classes. With new classes comes new books, and with new books comes empty wallets.
During my first semester, I was surprised at the amount of money I had to spend on books. $600 was gone within one transaction and access codes I would only use for one, maybe two, semesters.
Being a naïve freshman, I bought all of my books at the LSU Bookstore.
I was clueless. I didn’t have anyone older than me to borrow or buy old books from, I didn’t explore online options like Chegg or Amazon and I had no clue about off-campus bookstores.
The LSU Bookstore was my first option because it was brand new, had a convenient location and was spoken so highly of at freshman orientation.
Shopping at the LSU Bookstore for anything is the worst idea anyone can ever make. Everything in the bookstore is horribly overpriced, from textbooks to school supplies to clothes.
A flimsy, 1-inch binder, with no pockets on the outside, that has LSU and a tiger printed on it costs around $8. A more durable binder at Walmart costs half this price.
A pack of four AAA batteries is around $9. You could get a decent brand of batteries at Walmart for almost a third of that. So, when my calculator died the day of a stats test, I had to take that lick.
A towel is around $17. I’m not sure why anyone would buy bathroom accessories at the bookstore, but for $17, I can buy a Walmart brand, six-piece bath towel set or groceries to last me two weeks.
With all the people who shop at the LSU Bookstore on a daily basis, is it really necessary to jack up prices that much? It should be illegal.
Not to mention, the people who work there are poorly trained. Of the three workers I overheard helping customers the other day, not one of them seemed to know what they were doing. No one could answer simple questions about books. If you asked them about a book you couldn’t find, instead of looking into it and checking to see if they actually had it, they just said, “Oh, it’s probably out of stock or we don’t have it.”
Well, could you go look first? How can you tell me you don’t have a book when you didn’t even move to go check? And shouldn’t the bookstore supply books for every class anyway? That would only make sense.
The LSU Bookstore ain’t loyal.
Before you sell your soul to the bookstore, exhaust all other options first. Odds are, you’ll find better deals elsewhere. My favorite places to shop for books include Amazon, Chegg, Valore Books and the official Facebook groups for each graduating class. Amazon also has a discount on Prime for students that includes the first six months free and free, two-day shipping.
Taylor Simien is a 20-year-old mass communication junior from Lafayette, Louisiana. You can reach her on Twitter @TSimien_TDR.