I haven't had one of these interactions in a while, and this gal was more than usually persistent, so here you go.
Gal wanders in, sees our big display of Franklin Mint/Easton Press/Folio Society books across from the counter. She picks one up and asks "How much do you pay for these?"
"It depends on the book."
"Well, I have a bunch of books just like these, and they're brand new."
"I'd need to see the books."
"But...they're just like this."
"If you want a number, I need to see the books."
"Well, they're all in Santa Barbara and the bookstores down there are just swamped."
"Yes, so are we. You see we have five shelves of Franklin & Easton books. Two years ago we might have had one four or five Easton books total- now we deal in shelves. It's a buyers market."
"I just want to know, would it be $5 a book, $10 a book?"
"I need to see the books. Some of them can be quite valuable, and for those we would pay more. Some are quite common and those we wouldn't be interested in at all. So I need to see the books- there is no one price that applies."
She grumbled off and I thought I was in the clear, but back she came with a different book.
"So," she began, opening it up. "This one is $35. How much would you pay for it? Half of that? A quarter?"
"It would depend on the context of the buy. We may have paid two dollars for that book. Someone may have just given it to us for free- we're getting a lot of donations these days. But if I'm going to make a bid on a book I need to see it. I'd suggest if the books are in Santa Barbara, try selling them to a shop there."
"Yes, well, they're all swamped.
"And so are we. It's a buyers market right now, sorry."
She eventually quit asking me unanswerable questions and after looking around complimented our buyers and spent $7.00 on a couple of little gift books.
Patience rewarded!
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