Libraries : Countywide : Check Out the Volume of Sales

Some folks don’t know it, but there are books to be bought as well as borrowed at local libraries.

“Friends of the Library” groups all over the county sell books periodically at book sales or at used bookstores inside or beside the libraries to raise money for equipment and programs.

Twenty-three of the county library system’s 27 branches feature used bookstores, said Cheryl Pruett, library spokeswoman.

In Tustin, the Friends of the Library group converted a former patio into a bookstore by covering it and installing shelves. The bookstore brings in $700 to $800 a month, branch manager Rae Beverage said.

“We have a very active friends group and a very profitable bookstore here,” Beverage said. “They are making a really big contribution. It’s a very positive thing.”

The Tustin group underwrites all children’s programming at the branch and has purchased two electric typewriters and other equipment for the public to use, Beverage said.

Books sold in Tustin and at the other bookstores are either donated by library patrons or discarded by the library.

“We get very good donations,” Beverage said. “Some of the other branches, like Laguna and Seal Beach, have nice bookstores and get lots of donations too.”

Helen Quiggin, president of Friends of the Laguna Beach Library, said books in the group’s store beneath the library sell for as little as a dime.

“When we have a silent auction, we have books that go for $250,” Quiggin said. “Basically, paperbacks are a quarter and hardbacks are 75 cents.”

The Laguna store brings in about $1,100 a month, Quiggin said. The group has pledged $25,000 to help with a library expansion program and also helps support children’s activities.

Some libraries, like Fullerton’s, occasionally have sales where books can be purchased for “a buck a bag.” Such events draw crowds of book lovers who comb the piles for treasures.

Used book sales and stores make it possible for libraries to pay for programs and equipment that city budgets don’t cover, librarians say.

Some of those programs are what attract people to the library. In Seal Beach, the Friends group donates money to pay for a professional entertainer to come to an after-school program once a month, boosting attendance from 15 to between 50 and 100, said Betty Katzmann, children’s librarian at the county’s Mary Wilson branch.