Half-Price Books

[Flambeaux]

No HPBs here in FL, likely none ever not in this economy.

They're making money hand-over-fist in this economy. At least some companies are.

[Deogolf]

We have three in the Milwaukee Metro area, all three appear to be doing quite well.

I've picked up a lot of decent items over the years, but it's getting tougher. Every once in a while they hire someone that knows just enough to get in the way.

Still, it's a great place to start the hunt!!

[Ragnorakk]

I've ended up with quite a few good finds from mine. My understanding is that they rotate their stock - if things do not sell from one store for long enough they will get bundled up and moved to another store. How often this happens, I do not know. Right now it's pretty dry here, but that is because I've picked everything out of it that I thought was worth it!

[Is_907]

I've ended up with quite a few good finds from mine. My understanding is that they rotate their stock - if things do not sell from one store for long enough they will get bundled up and moved to another store. How often this happens, I do not know. Right now it's pretty dry here, but that is because I've picked everything out of it that I thought was worth it!

That is correct--stuff that doesn't get sold gets pushed to other stores. Also, stores buy stuff... just the employees get first dibs

[Badmike]

Apparently there are no locations in Missouri. (Kansas City doesn't really count.)
I've heard some big 'fishing' yarns from gamers about their catches at such stores. The accounts get more incredible by the day.

Having personally caught some of those fish and witnessed the catching of others, I can attest to the truth of at least some of the tales.

Flam has probably heard my tall tales. I've been shopping HPB since the late 70s, and found some insane stuff over the years. Here are two RPG tales:

I once found a OD&D white box in the Dallas flagship store in Mint shape (still have it) for $25. When I examined it I noticed it also contained all the supplements inside, also in mint. Still have the set!

The local gamestore I patronize had a deal with me that if anyone came in selling game stuff they would notify me. So one day the guy calls and says a guy just came in and wanted to sell a big pile of gaming stuff. The gamestore owner offered $1 an item, the guy wanted more, so they couldn't agree on a price (BTW, gamestore owner was a dunce). He did however say he got the guy's phone number, which he gave me. Called the guy. Sorry, the guy says, I just dropped it all off a the local HPB, they gave me close to my price. What did you have? Over 100 modules, he says, that belonged to my brother who was a collecter, he passed away. All in original shrink.

I'm excited now, so I speed over to the HPB. They are in the process of pricing all the items. The collection is everything ever published by TSR for D&D...EVERYTHING...in the original shrink. R series, RPGA series, A series, B series, H series, supermodules, etc etc. Everything including all boxed sets. They have everything priced at about $5 each, boxed sets half price. I end up spending $1000, and using a 20 % off coupon at the counter to knock it down to $800. Best haul ever, I ended up selling all of it (what do I need with SW modules????). Think I got $800 on the R-series alone!

Tons of other stuff. I once found a H2 signed by Gary Gygax, which is funny because he had nothing to do with the module! Probably some guy at a con who had nothing else handy for Gary to sign.

Some good comic deals also, once got a Amazing Spiderman #13 (1st appearance Mysterio) for about 10 bucks in very nice shape. All I can think is that the guy pricing it didn't know squat about comics. Still have that one also.

You'll rarely find any sort of deal in a HPB nowadays. They are much better at looking stuff up on ABE books or Amazon, if anything stuff is usually ridiculously overpriced My favorite was a Return to Tomb of Horrors in a local store that sat there for about two years at $75....it was missing stuff, but they never brought down the price even though this was pointed out to them many times.

Mike B.

[Clangador]

Apparently there are no locations in Missouri. (Kansas City doesn't really count.)
I've heard some big 'fishing' yarns from gamers about their catches at such stores. The accounts get more incredible by the day.

Having personally caught some of those fish and witnessed the catching of others, I can attest to the truth of at least some of the tales.

That's great! It's fun to hear those tales, no matter how outlandish they may seem.
As far as I know there are no bookstores in this entire county. I sense a conspiracy afoot!

None! Where are you?

[Philotomy Jurament]

I've found a few things a HPB, over the years. Lately, though, the well seems to have gone dry. On the other hand, I don't stop by there near as often as I used to.

[EOTB]

I've found a few things a HPB, over the years. Lately, though, the well seems to have gone dry. On the other hand, I don't stop by there near as often as I used to.

I suspect that a lot of the gamers who used to supply half price books with their gaming inventory now go to ebay instead and sell it there.

Wish we had one in Portland; we have Powells, which is nirvana for books, but gaming stuff is priced too high - the last time I was looking through their inventory was for a volume of the wizards spell compendium I was missing; they had it, for $55.

[Clangador]

I've found a few things a HPB, over the years. Lately, though, the well seems to have gone dry. On the other hand, I don't stop by there near as often as I used to.

I suspect that a lot of the gamers who used to supply half price books with their gaming inventory now go to ebay instead and sell it there.

Wish we had one in Portland; we have Powells, which is nirvana for books, but gaming stuff is priced too high - the last time I was looking through their inventory was for a volume of the wizards spell compendium I was missing; they had it, for $55.

Damn it! I have always wanted to go to Powell's. I even have a shirt of theirs the wife got me while she was in Portland for a training.

[Aplus]

I got all my AD&D books at HPB, but I'd crap my pants if I ever found a set of LBBs there.

Overall, I'd say I like doing business with them. Last weekend I dropped off 5 boxes of sci-fi books off there, and they gave me $90. I was cool with that. Just trying to clear out some space and no way I'm gong to go through the trouble to unload them on eBay. They called me back the next day saying they made a mistake and they want to give me another $300. They didn't realize a lot of the books were signed. I figured they just didn't care since they were all personalized signatures. Anyways, I thought it was pretty cool that they went through the trouble to call me saying they wanted to give me more money, so bonus points for them.

[Is_907]

I got all my AD&D books at HPB, but I'd crap my pants if I ever found a set of LBBs there.

Overall, I'd say I like doing business with them. Last weekend I dropped off 5 boxes of sci-fi books off there, and they gave me $90. I was cool with that. Just trying to clear out some space and no way I'm gong to go through the trouble to unload them on eBay. They called me back the next day saying they made a mistake and they want to give me another $300. They didn't realize a lot of the books were signed. I figured they just didn't care since they were all personalized signatures. Anyways, I thought it was pretty cool that they went through the trouble to call me saying they wanted to give me more money, so bonus points for them.

I knew your avatar looked familiar... saw this post and remembered that story on G+ from the other day.

I'm jealous of your stellar luck! HPB gave me $19 for a box of crap and I said "Thank you, ma'am" then proceeded to buy chinese food with that money this week.

[Philotomy Jurament]

Man, I took a dozen boxes of hardcover and trade paperbacks to HPB and only got $120 from them. It was mostly history and theology books. (Was doing the same as you -- just making space, so I was okay with that. I didn't haggle.)

[Aplus]

These were 100% hardcovers, very nice condition with those film cover protector thingies on most of them, many signed, mostly first printings. Some of them were from the 70s, so I'm sure they're worth a good bit to a collector. My father-in-law was a hardcore sci-fi book nerd, and he took good care of his stuff.

I probably got rid of some stuff that I'd kick myself for if I ever found out it's real value. We kept stuff that we liked or thought we might read some day. I kept all the Frank Herbert stuff because I figured I'd eventually read them. My wife kept the set of Andre Norton Witch World books (full set of hardcovers, all signed) because she read them when she was a kid and loved them. But yeah, space is at a premium these days and we have another kid incoming, so they had to go.

[bbarsh]

Whenever I travel out of state for work, i hit as many HPBs as possible. Usually nothing special, but every once in awhile something slips by them.

We don't have any in Michigan. Every state around us has them, but none here. Must be those friendly business taxes and labor laws we are so lucky to have...

HPB must have a pretty good business model as I don't recall seeing one go under. Sounds a franchise opportunity if you have the cash.

[Clangador]

I think all the HPBs are corporate owned. During Xmas there were running ads touting real books over Kindle/Nook. I think that is their main concern right now.

I had thought about working for them, but their pay-rate was rather crappy. Like nine bucks an hour. And they pay so little for stuff they buy and then jack up the price so high when selling it. Inmost cases, Half-Price Books in an inaccurate name to say the least.