by Emily Johnson
My brother Matt and I started the company in Denver (2014) and Chicago (2018) with the primary aim of rescuing the nearly million books being thrown out every day (and ultimately to start to figure out what to do with the rest). About 60 percent of our books go on to be donated after carefully sorting for selling (30 percent) or recycling (10 percent).
In my travels through my career with books I have worked on new titles at Penguin and on older titles and retail—currently at Uncharted Books with Tanner McSwain in Chicago, and formerly at Coyote Ridge Books with Matt, in Colorado. At Book Driver I work with books across the spectrum. It is by far the widest breadth of titles, and relative states of condition, I’ve ever seen.
Many books we get in crap condition got that way because they are on shelves in basements or garages for years. We consider these to be wasted resources, and try to get books moving and into the right hands. “We find good homes for books.”
To this end, and as COO, I’m starting to define other lines in our business. This year I will start assisting others in downsizing their collections. We have been branching out to seek partnerships with specialized buyers and institutions, in addition to the local bookstores and individual sellers we deal with weekly. Over the next few years we will continue to define our paper recycling practices, too.
For myself, I will start to ease off the book donation pickups I’ve been doing, so that I can spend more time with the rare titles I get. The research that goes into these titles is time prohibitive, so I’ve done what I could over time to learn. I often get books in the $20–$40 range, many early editions of diverse authors—on my bookshelf right now are Le Carré (Russia House and Secret Pilgrim), Greene (Human Factor), Steinbeck (Grapes of Wrath), and King (Christine and The Stand). I sell them on eBay or just hold them until I am able to establish their value.
Book Driver’s secondary motive is to create book jobs for book people and bring some elbow grease to the table as we start to grasp these unclaimed resources. To that end we employ a low infrastructure model that relies on a decentralized network of drivers and online booksellers. This way we avoid the costs of a fleet and factory, while giving the gig economy a big boost of books. Having our own retail space / office / warehouse is also on the horizon as business grows.
I just have a couple links for you if you are inclined to delve further. This is a recent interview I did with a local blog that outlines Book Driver pretty well. Here’s a YouTube video wherein I go through a typical donation. And here is Book Driver’s donation intake and landing page.
What I seek to gain from attending the rare book seminar are some tools for identifying editions quickly, and also networking for partnership opportunities, as well as some helpful advice as we grow the business.
My goals would be to come out of this also with a clear selling path for rare books, both locally and online, and a fair idea how to establish condition and edition.
In my time at Penguin I served as a bookseller at many academic conferences over the years. From literature, history, religion, social science, and science conferences over the years I have gained an appreciation for the best books in every academic field, defined by their longevity and resell ability. As another motive for this seminar I hope to extend this interest into bona fide rare titles to help me define a niche in the business.
Please contact us if you are interested in book selling.