Anyone noticed quality difference in books purchased online from Amazon etc. and those bought from local vendors? I am talking about the novels and self-help kind of books.
Any quality difference for books purchased online and from local vendors?
by by
Book Publishing is a very big business. You get excellent quality paper and printing with UV designed cover pages. You also get the same thing in Newsprint Paper with low quaity printing. If you are looking for low priced books, you may come across few choices. Publishers may have only two choices, one is very high quality and another one is quality. For they wish to maintain their brand.
Only the other local publishers, take license and keep printing in low priced paper and covers. Hence it all depends on your choice of price.
My take would be, the road side vendors sell the same books, at a very low cost. Can be considered, if you do not want to follow ethics on buying books.
Agree on the paper, and print quality differences. But I don’t think that is the case between online stores and physical shops. They are essentially selling the same book, the same quality. And this assumes we are talking about original books.
Visible price difference arises when the format of the book is different: e.g. A paperback book vs. a hard-cover book.
Road-side vendors is an entirely different game. If you notice drastically different quality of paper and ink, then these books are most probably counterfeit. Almost all roadside vendors were selling the same counterfeit books whenever I got a chance to stop by and examine. The qualities were so bad, you can not miss to notice. Bad(almost blackish) paper, bleeding ink, badly aligned text on a page, etc. are tell tale signs.
I think this is what people need to understand. Even the quality changes due to the publication house and the issue. Sometimes second or third edition have extremely different quality to than the books of first edition. It’s pretty normal I guess. And yes, most street vendors sell counterfeit but we need to remember that we can bargain too with them because of that. Their quality is definitely the worst of them all. So it’s definitely not about online or offline, it’s about the publication time and editions.
In my experience, when you purchase books online, you can enjoy some great discounts, and the convenience of having the book delivered right to your doorstep. On the other hand, when you buy from a physical store, discounts are usually not good. Additionally, if you’re looking for the latest editions, online stores often have them available sooner than local stores. Online markets even provide expected arrival dates for upcoming titles. So, in my opinion, it’s more advantageous to make your purchase online. here are some best online book stores:
1. Crossword
2. Kitabay
3. Bookish Santa
4. Used Books Factory
Why not Amazon, or Flipkart? They offer much greater discounts than Crossword IMO. Crossword stores never gave discounts as far as I remember.
Yeah, Amazon and Flipkart are already well know. I just suggested the stores that only sell book and nothing else. These stores have limited editions and some early launch stuff as well.
I have definitely noticed a difference in the quality of books that are purchased online from sites like Amazon compared to those bought from local vendors.
Buying from local vendors let you inspect the book before buying. Even for books purchased online i have received books with damaged covers or pages. Depends on your preference. For general readers any source is fine I think.
Yes, sad that some sellers try to pass on damaged items via online route.