ACQNET: Selling unwanted library books on the Internet

Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 11:20:08 -0500
From: Helen P. Mack (Lehigh U.) <hpm0_at_lehigh.edu>
Subject: Selling unwanted library books on the Internet

There was to be a session at ALA Midwinter focussed on libraries selling
their unwanted books on the Internet.  If anyone has notes from that
meeting, I'd appreciate a copy.

Here's where we are in this process: I have received permission from my
University's Purchasing Director and our Internal Auditor to sell such
books.  My proviso was that all proceeds would eventually find their way
into the library's materials budget.  If they would go only to some
general University fund, then I would not do all the work.  After all,
we're not talking about huge amounts of money here.  They agreed,
providing, of course, that I maintain a paper trail of each
transaction.  

Since I already use Amazon Marketplace and half.com to sell my unwanted
personal books, I need to set up a separate account at each site so my
personal sales don't get mixed up with library sales.  To do so, I need
a second email address.  Our campus email guru has agreed to set up a
departmental email account to serve this purpose.  That's it so far. 
When this second account is set up, I will try to create second user
accounts at these two Internet sites.  I suspect that I will need to go
back to the Purchasing Director to get bank account info for the direct
deposit of the proceeds, at least for Amazon Marketplace.  I think
half.com can write checks.  Given a choice, I would prefer to get a
check, so I would have control over where it got credited.

Does anyone have similar or related experience to share?   
-- 
Helen P. Mack, Acquisitions Librarian
Lehigh University Information Resources  
Linderman Library, 30 Library Drive
Bethlehem, PA 18015-3067  USA

Phone 610 758-3035 * Fax 610 758-5605
E-mail hpm0_at_lehigh.edu