Students crowded Wheelock Books this weekend as the Dartmouth Bookstore scaled back the number of books it carried and announced it would end Dartmouth textbook sales next term instead of in the summer as it had previously planned.
The Dartmouth Bookstore has already decreased the number of books it carried significantly in anticipation of dropping Dartmouth textbooks from its shelves, leading many students to go to Wheelock Books, sometimes for the first time, to find the missing texts.
The atmosphere was social in Wheelock Books as students took advantage of the lines to chat with friends back from winter break or a term off.
As lines lengthened at the store Sunday afternoon -- the longest will probably come on the first day of classes today, according to one employee -- students had different reactions to the switch from having two major Hanover area bookstores to one and a half.
They also carried a set of loyalties to one bookstore or the other that ranged in intensity from vehement to indifferent.
Cindy Torres '04 always went to Dartmouth Bookstore for her textbooks because of their shorter lines and larger spaces.
She was disappointed by its decision to stop supplying Dartmouth textbooks (the store blamed Dartmouth's decision to allow professors not to release lists of required textbooks to all interested parties.)
"It's really small and it's so cramped and it's always crowded," Torres said of Wheelock Books. "It's just an inconvenience."
Rachel Abramowitz '05 was much less critical of the store. She always shopped at "rush hour," she said, and so did not notice much difference in how crowded the store was. Also, she felt Wheelock Books offered lower prices than the Dartmouth Bookstore.
Wheelock Books has expanded its floor space along with vastly increasing the number of books it carries, often on late orders from departments who had ordered from the Dartmouth Bookstore only to hear later that their orders would not be completely filled.
Kaitlin Chantry '01, the store's reader production coordinator, said she felt that Wheelock Books had sufficiently expanded its available space. She said that although the current crowding was by no means the worst she had seen at the store, future crowding would be alleviated further next term when Wheelock Books could get more of a "head start."
Many students were indifferent to the change, shopping at Wheelock books just because the store was the only one to carry some of their textbooks this term. Textbook shopping has traditionally been a chore for most students, if an unusually expensive one.
One student shopping in the Dartmouth Bookstore for textbooks for the last time -- Chris Mah '06 -- said he looked first there because it was less crowded and the Dartmouth Bookstore's member discount made the prices comparable, but had no preference between the two stores.
The crowds may seem to warrant the perfect opportunity for students to switch to shopping online, where prices can be lower and no lines exist.
Those students in the bookstores questioned by The Dartmouth, however, were skeptical of online stores' delivery times -- especially when booklists were usually only announced in the first day of classes -- and a buyer's abilities to return books if he or she switched from one class to another.
Ultimately, the decision on how much inconvenience is tolerable is up to individual students. Brian Zurhellen '05 gave the impression that he was willing to put up with the lines, especially considering the alternative -- waking up early enough to beat the crowd.
Dave Cioffi, the manager of the Dartmouth bookstore, said yesterday he would pull out of Dartmouth textbooks before Spring term instead of before Summer term as he had planned before.
Cioffi had said the Dartmouth administration's not taking action to force professors to distribute book lists to all interested parties was a major factor in his decision. The rising availability of online sales, rising shipping costs and the increasing price of returning unsold books also played a role, Cioffi said.
Ultimately, it was "clearly an economic decision."
Cioffi is exploring different options for how to use the large space that is currently his store's textbook annex.
Wheelock Books' owner, Whit Spaulding, declined to be interviewed for this article.
Speaking from the end of one of Wheelock Books' checkout lines, Ben Zabar '04 said he understood the Dartmouth Bookstore's choice to leave the textbook business and Dartmouth's decision to allow professors discretion in releasing their textbooks, but still wasn't convinced of either side's choices.
"I think Dartmouth's being a little silly, I think the bookstore's being a little silly and I think waiting in this line's a little silly," he said.
