Below are some burning questions people didn’t even know they had about Better World Books as an organization. Feel free to email us for any additional information or click here for specific questions regarding book orders.

1. What is Better World Books?
2. What is a social venture, anyway?
3. What is your relationship to your non-profit partners?
4. What social and environmental impact has Better World Books made?
5. How do you collect books?
6. What do you do with the collected books?
7. Do you throw any books away?
8. What percentage of each sale supports literacy?
9. Are you profiting off of other people’s charity and donations?
10. What makes you different from all the other businesses that give part of their profits to good causes?
11. Can I help promote literacy by purchasing books?

What is Better World Books?

Better World Books is a self-sustaining, for-profit social venture whose mission is to capitalize on the value of the book to fund literacy initiatives locally, nationally and around the world. We partner with nearly 3,100 libraries and over 1800 college campuses across the U.S. and Canada, collecting unwanted textbooks and library discards in support of non-profit literacy programs.

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What is a social venture, anyway?

Social ventures operate under a for-profit business model in which success is measured by the positive impact a company makes in addressing a specific social issue. In the case of Better World Books, that issue is literacy. The primary purpose of a for-profit social venture is to generate a “social profit” by harnessing the power of commerce.

By operating as a social venture, Better World Books provides its non-profit partners with a consistent and stable source of unrestricted funding. This, in turn, allows the organizations to focus on implementing effective programs in literacy and education -- instead of spending an inordinate amount of time raising funds. The nature of our business model allows Better World Books to react swiftly to market opportunities, thereby leveraging the maximum social profit through the wonders of capitalism.

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What is your relationship to your non-profit partners?

We run book drives to benefit four major non-profit literacy-based organizations, as well as 80+ other literacy-based non-profits. The books we collect are passed on to our partners or sold to create a sustainable stream of funding that enables these organizations to further their mission.

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What social and environmental impact has Better World Books made?

Since the spring of 2003, Better World Books has raised more than $13 million for over 80 literacy and education non-profit organizations, sending over a million books to our partner programs & saving over 63,000 tons of books from landfills. Please visit our Impact page for more details.

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How do you collect books?

Books collected by Better World Books come from two primary sources: the over 1,800 college and university campuses on which we run textbook drives and over 3,100 libraries and thrift stores that send us discarded and donated books.

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What do you do with the collected books?

Better World Books finds the best possible use for each book collected in support of our mission to promote literacy. Books are either sold to raise money for non-profit literacy programs, sent to one of our non-profit partners for use in their programs, or recycled if unsuitable for sale or partner use.

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Do you throw any books away?

Never! We pride ourselves on our ability to derive the maximum value from every book collected. Any book that cannot be sold or used directly by our literacy programs is recycled. To date, we have diverted 63,000 tons of books from landfills.

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What percentage of each sale is used to support literacy?

The specific terms of most Better World Books partnership agreements are confidential. In the college textbook market, the company’s "social profit" margin currently averages 7 to 8% of net revenue from each used book sold. Library books are transferred to Better World Books under consignment and sold with a fixed percentage of the net revenue paid to both the library and a non-profit literacy partner. Typical arrangements are 15% of the net sale price to a library and 5% to their chosen literacy partner.

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Are you profiting off of other people’s charity and donations?

As a for profit social enterprise we do make money on the books we collect and sell. And we are OK with that fact, because we believe there is value in the service we provide. Not only do we find new homes for millions of used books that might otherwise end up in landfills, we also donate a significant portion of our profits to support the work of our literacy partners, and dozens of other nonprofit organizations around the globe. Our model proves that it is possible to do good and do well at the same time. To date, every dollar of profit the company has ever made has been re-invested in the company. There has never been an economic distribution/dividend of any kind to any of the owners or employees of Better World Books.

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What makes you different from all the other businesses that give part of their profits to good causes?

We love books. And we believe deeply in the power of the written word to change lives and transform our world. What makes Better World Books unique is the way in which the social costs are built into our business model. We pay our literacy partners their committed share of our revenues regardless of whether an economic profit is actually earned for a specific time period being measured.

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Can I help promote literacy by purchasing books?

Definitely! All books sold on BetterWorldBooks.com help fund high impact literacy projects on four continents. BetterWorldBooks.com has over 8 million books, free shipping worldwide, and every order shipped from Mishawaka is carbon balanced with Green-e Climate certified offsets from 3Degrees a leading green power and carbon balancing services provider.