This weekend marked the Monroe County Public Library’s annual Friends of the Library Bookstore Sale.
The sale began Friday with a diverse selection of books selling from 50 cents to $1. On Saturday, prices dropped further, ranging between 25 cents and 50 cents. On Sunday, shoppers could fill an entire bag for $2. By Monday, everything left was being given away for free.
“This sale has three main purposes,” Barbara Wilcox, one of the event’s organizers, said. “We are able to get rid of overstock books, we make money for Friends of the Library, and it provides an opportunity for members of Friends of the Library to volunteer.”
Friends of the Library is a nonprofit organization that supports the mission and values of the library.
Most of the books at the sale came from donations. They were the books that hadn’t been sold while available at the library’s book store or the ones of which the book store had too many copies.
Wilcox said the clearance sale is valuable because it helps spread awareness about the library’s permanent book store, which is open four days a week.
“I think a lot of people are genuinely surprised when they find it here,” said Mike Burns, the man who runs the store on the library’s first floor. “They didn’t realize that we have such a wide selection, and that everything is so cheap.”
All year long, people can buy the store’s hardback books for $2.50. Paperbacks are even less.
Sometimes the store receives donations of antique volumes. The oldest Burns has ever sold was published in 1707 and even that was priced at a mere $100.
The proceeds of the clearance sale go to benefit library programming. Burns said that as of Monday afternoon, it had been the most successful sale yet.
In the final minutes of the event, people were frantically sorting through the piles, hoping to find an overlooked treasure.
Two education students were stocking up for their future classrooms.
“People may not have the income to buy their own books or the time to regularly come to the library to check out and return books,” Mikaylah Hershberger, an IU junior, said. “This is definitely helping promote literacy and getting people excited about reading.”
