[HN Gopher] Do Charity Bookshops Drive Out Other Second-Hand Boo...
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Do Charity Bookshops Drive Out Other Second-Hand Bookshops?
Author : fogus
Score : 34 points
Date : 2025-04-09 20:51 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (wormwoodiana.blogspot.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (wormwoodiana.blogspot.com)
| AStonesThrow wrote:
| Aren't brick-and-mortar bookshops, generally speaking, as viable
| as Apatosaurus today?
|
| Lately if I really must put hands on dead trees, the shelves of
| library sales, churches, and ordinary thrift stores are
| overflowing.
|
| Also -- secondhand books are generally outdated, undesirable,
| and/or damaged -- do collectors still find diamonds in the rough?
|
| No reason to waste real estate on any sort of dedicated seller.
| Goodness gracious.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| > Aren't brick-and-mortar bookshops, generally speaking, as
| viable as Apatosaurus today?
|
| Not really. Plenty of people still read, and they still read
| hard copies of books. I don't think you will get argument that
| business isn't as good as it used to be, but that's a long way
| away from not being viable at all.
|
| > Also -- secondhand books are generally outdated, undesirable,
| and/or damaged -- do collectors still find diamonds in the
| rough?
|
| You haven't spent much time around secondhand book stores, I'm
| guessing? Yes, there are absolutely diamonds out there. And
| even outside of that, there are lots of perfectly good used
| books. Books don't go bad over time, so unless they're damaged
| (which isn't most of them) they are still perfectly saleable.
| voxadam wrote:
| Powell's here in Portland seems to be doing pretty well with
| 68,000 square feet (6,300 square metres) sales floor space and
| millions of customers a year.
|
| https://powells.com
| jacobgkau wrote:
| > secondhand books are generally outdated, undesirable, and/or
| damaged
|
| Fiction books don't really become "outdated" to the point of
| being useless. That's only an argument for
| encyclopedias/technical manuals/etc.
|
| > the shelves of library sales, churches, and ordinary thrift
| stores are overflowing.
|
| I'm sure the same could be said about furniture, but I'd expect
| more luck finding interesting/quality second-hand furniture at
| a used furniture store than I would from a general dumping
| ground of miscellaneous used items.
|
| For that matter, since you're asking about _all_ brick-and-
| mortar book shops, I 'd also expect better _new_ furniture from
| a brick-and-mortar furniture shop than from a thrift shop. And
| while books may not require seeing them in person as much to
| know what they are, the act of discovering them for fun based
| on what happens to be there is (possibly) easier to understand
| than discovering a particular piece of furniture.
| karaterobot wrote:
| I don't want to just downvote and move on without an
| explanation. You're basically offering some of the arguments
| this article brings up and then dismisses, with evidence, so it
| seems like you didn't read the article and are offering your
| personal opinion as an argument.
| Henchman21 wrote:
| > secondhand books are generally outdated, undesirable, and/or
| damaged
|
| This is an odd take, to me.
|
| When I was still in school, I'd seek out texts with as many
| handwritten notes in them as I could find! That was an added
| value for sure and one only available second-hand.
|
| Now that eBooks are a thing I use them almost exclusively for
| schlock-type books: mass market paperbacks for well known SciFi
| franchises, for example, are all eBooks now. I wouldn't buy
| these any other way now, but when I did buy paperbacks they
| went right to secondhand. The value for those was that they
| were cheaper.
|
| But for any other type of book, if I am buying it, its a
| _classic book_. Maybe it won some awards, maybe it is even out
| of print!
|
| None of this feels like a waste to me in any way, and I will
| admit I do not read _a lot_ by the standards of folks here.
| rendx wrote:
| > secondhand books are generally outdated, undesirable, and/or
| damaged -- do collectors
|
| I buy up to 10 (mostly non-fiction) books on paper a month,
| always secondhand if available, via bookfinder. You typically
| get a very accurate description of their state beforehand; I
| don't mind most levels of use, I actually like it when they
| have history to them. Markings, notes of previous owners, etc,
| are all fine for me. Even if one prefers "clean" books there
| are usually plenty of copies available. I like how it is both
| much cheaper than new, and even more the reuse aspect.
| csdvrx wrote:
| > Also -- secondhand books are generally outdated, undesirable,
| and/or damaged -- do collectors still find diamonds in the
| rough?
|
| Secondhand stores offer in general "better" products because of
| the double curation:
|
| - someone found the good interesting enough to buy it in the
| first place (1st curation)
|
| - the store found it good enough to buy it again from the first
| owner (2nd curation)
|
| > Aren't brick-and-mortar bookshops, generally speaking, as
| viable as Apatosaurus today?
|
| No, it's even better because of the limited space they have to
| display the goods they want to sell: while online stores can
| show their full inventory, brick-and-mortar need to select
| what's most likely to sell.
|
| This adds yet another level of curation: the store found the
| good valuable enough to be exposed to buyers, instead of
| keeping it in the back (3rd curation)
|
| I find great music by randomly buying second-hand CDs from
| brick-and-mortar secondhand stores, thanks to this triple-
| curation,
| SpaceManNabs wrote:
| > someone found the good interesting enough to buy it in the
| first place (1st curation)
|
| I wonder how this is offset by someone finding an item not
| worth enough to keep. But maybe I underestimate the
| generosity (or need for income) of the typical person
| visiting secondhand stores to offload their stuff.
| SpaceManNabs wrote:
| > Also -- secondhand books are generally outdated, undesirable,
| and/or damaged -- do collectors still find diamonds in the
| rough?
|
| Growing up poor, second hand book stores were how I found some
| of the best math books that I wouldn't have been able to
| afford. And they were often quite good or better (at least in
| offering diverse perspectives and angles) than the books I
| could have bought at the time.
|
| I often liked the notes people left.
| fidotron wrote:
| There's a subtext to this post that may not be obvious to non
| British people: UK High Streets (Main Streets) have in the last
| 20 years experienced an incredible explosion of charity shops
| (thrift stores) including many locations specific to books.
|
| Quite why this has occurred is a subject of occasional argument,
| but I've never heard a definitive theory on it, and it partly
| overlaps with the general decline motivated by ecommerce. They do
| compete on some level with existing businesses, as debated here,
| but the more curious impact is they completely alter the
| character of an area.
|
| Ten years ago they used to be fantastic for obscure finds because
| it seemed people had not caught on, but these days they tend to
| be subpar, which is probably a major edge the non charitable
| enterprises have exploited.
| NoboruWataya wrote:
| I think a lot of people get the causal relationship the wrong
| way around when it comes to charity shops and the decline of
| the high street. It's not (IMO) that charity shops move into
| otherwise thriving areas and lead to a decline in local
| business by competing, but rather that they move into spaces
| that would otherwise lie empty, and therefore are more likely
| to be found on high streets that were already dying. Where I
| live we have a few charity shops but it's mainly chicken shops,
| vape shops and the occasional barber that are cannibalising the
| local high street.
| jdietrich wrote:
| It's a symptom of the decline of high street retail and high
| long-term vacancy rates for many retail properties.
|
| For commercial landlords, a charity shop paying little or no
| rent is usually better than no tenant at all - the property is
| less likely to be smashed up by vandals, burned down by
| arsonists or occupied by squatters if it's occupied. The
| landlord would be liable for business rates after three months
| of vacancy, but not if there's a tenant.
|
| Charity shops get an 80% relief on business rates, pay nothing
| for their stock and get some or all of their staff for free;
| obviously this allows them to operate profitably in
| circumstances where no normal business could.
|
| As I understand it, the landlords are holding on mostly in the
| hope that their properties will either be compulsorily
| purchased as part of a regeneration scheme, or granted planning
| permission for redevelopment as housing.
| neilv wrote:
| > _But bricks-and-mortar booksellers can sell via the internet
| too, and booksellers can migrate to lower rent areas. Indeed,
| there is some evidence of this: there are fewer city centre
| bookshops and more in smaller, less expensive towns._
|
| There was a hip university neighborhood used bookstore here, and
| even 20+ years ago they were also selling online.
|
| Their online inventory included a large amount of stock in a
| warehouse nearby that wasn't accessible to brick&mortar shoppers.
|
| Software automated the online listings and price adjusting.
|
| > _[...] contemporary book trade and book-collecting directories
| [...] there were 523 second-hand bookshops in the UK in 1955
| [...] and 1,140 in 2014. There are 1,282 now, in April 2025._
|
| Anyone know whether these all have a walk-in retail presence,
| appointment-only (like for rare books), or are a lot of those
| online-only sellers?
| stevage wrote:
| Interesting. I'm in Australia where I would also say that the
| number of second hand bookshops has greatly decreased in the last
| 20 years. New bookshops too for that matter. But I'm curious
| whether I'd also be wrong.
|
| We don't, afaik, have charity run bookshops, though. Lots of op
| shops, and they all sell books, but not exclusively.
| 9283409232 wrote:
| Sounds like the problem with book shops in Australia is just
| Amazon.
| amiga386 wrote:
| My experience has been that the second-hand bookshops have had
| thin times but nonetheless survive _because_ of the internet.
| They tend to have a better selection compared to charity shops,
| i.e. not just cast-offs of holiday novels and celeb bios. Shout
| out to https://www.tillsbookshop.co.uk/ and
| https://www.armchairbooks.co.uk/
|
| There has also been a growth in first-hand bookshops, especially
| specialists/curators (e.g. only selling sci-fi, only selling
| books by women, etc.) to distinguish themselves from the
| Waterstones and Blackwells of this world.
| colechristensen wrote:
| I've noticed a few book stores which intermingle new and used
| stock and they're great. (it's obvious when something isn't new
| stock but it's all pretty good condition regardless)
| whartung wrote:
| > only selling sci-fi
|
| Ah, memories of the late "A Change of Hobbit" in LA. A
| dedicated sci-fi/fantasy bookshop.
|
| I distinctly recall getting a towel signed by Douglas Adams
| during one of his signings, I may have met Ellison there once.
|
| Been a long time.
| shadowgovt wrote:
| Possibly, but gosh would it be hard for me to care.
|
| In unrelated news, access to a pure, unfiltered spring drives out
| local bottled-water sellers.
|
| We are in an era where even manufacturing physical copies of
| books is incredibly cheap. I'm not going to stress about charity
| bookshops disrupting scarcity in that ecosystem any more than I'm
| going to worry about libraries or the Internet doing so.
| kayo_20211030 wrote:
| What's the fundamental difference? They're stores with old books;
| someone makes a few cents. I honestly don't understand the
| question.
| shermantanktop wrote:
| If you're in the uk, I think you'd understand the question.
|
| Charity shops have sprung up all over on high streets, even
| while businesses around them fall. It's not hard to imagine
| that the economics are different and that non-charity shops
| can't compete due to lack of special tax treatment.
| charlie-83 wrote:
| Interesting analysis. I'm somewhat confused by why anyone would
| think charity bookshops replacing secondhand bookshops would be a
| bad thing (if that were to actually be happening as the article
| suggests there isn't much evidence of this). Surely, to the
| shopper, they are exactly the same except one helps a charitable
| cause as a bonus.
| SpaceManNabs wrote:
| I have found that second hand shops tend to have a more diverse
| and rich selection and charity shops can have very rare gems.
|
| Support both, and I wouldn't want to give up one for the other.
|
| Also a bit of an aside, but charity shops are also more often
| part of national or international orgs so a lot of the "gain"
| isn't localized as the article discusses. Good or bad on a case
| by case basis. Not sure how it edges out.
| DadBase wrote:
| They shelve by author; we shelve by likelihood the book causes
| deja vu.
| detourdog wrote:
| My experience is that if one collects books they want as many
| stores as possible as close together as possible.
|
| NYC in the 1990's used to have a few neighborhoods full of
| bookstores. My favorite was just around 16th street in between
| 6th and Broadway.
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