Saturday, April 14, 2007

Disgusting Book Hogs

I've run into this kind of thing on a smaller scale at the last two library book sales that I attended. I would probably have spoken up if I had not been so astounded at the level of rudeness demonstrated by the individuals involved. In both instances, I did complain to the folks in charge of the sale but they seemed to be so intimidated by the sociopaths in question that they did nothing but sadly shake their heads at the sight.



At least one out-of-town dealer hired more than a dozen local minions and gave them last-minute cuts at the front of the line, said Scott Landfield, owner of Eugene's Tsunami Books. They rushed in the doors and threw sheets over tables to claim their contents, he said.

Other dealers parked 50-gallon tubs at the end of tables, then used their arms to sweep hundreds of books into the containers, said Anita Danielson, a Eugene hair stylist who herself sells books online.

"It was over the top - it was savage," she said.

Within 15 minutes, Landfield estimated, such monopolizers had hauled "tens of thousands" of books to a stage at one end of the Lane County fairgrounds Performance Hall. There they used portable scanners, cell phones and laptops to identify high-value books, leaving their rejects in a jumble.
It's a shame that it's come to this but I think that book sales managers would be wise to spend a few dollars on security guards with the authority to toss these types out on their collective ear.

7 comments:

  1. The clipart looks like a mad Michael Caine. ;D

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  2. Whoah, those collector people need to be stopped.

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  3. With the rise of Ebay you find these kind of people wherever there is a big sale, no matter what is being sold. It's really unfortunate for those who actually want to buy something for themselves at a good price.

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  4. You guys are right...they need to be stopped and, since they don't seem to understand common courtesy, it will take someone with the courage to toss them out of the building to do it.

    This kind of thing is one of my pet peeves...along with all of those ticket agencies that recruit homeless people and others to stand in line at sports venues to buy up all the tickets so that the agencies can resell them at some ridiculous price. I can't imagine why that is still legal in most states, Texas being one of them.

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  5. Yes, these people ruin a sale. This happened on a much smaller scale at a library sale I was helping run a few years ago; fortunately our "cashier" was a man with a sharp tongue, and he ejected the selfish hog.

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  6. Glad to hear it, Melanie. I wish there were more like him working at library book sales.

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