Speaking Volumes Books — Attraction in Burlington

EDIT: To respond to the completely incorrect information provided in the owner's response to my review:

Owner - "Additionally, in your review, you state we sell all of our paperbacks for $6 and all of our hardcovers for $12. That is simply not true by any means. As our customers know, we have a variety of prices on our books based on the individual item. These can vary from being cheaper to being more expensive."

In my unedited review below, available for anyone to read including the owner should he choose to retract the falsehood he wrote, I stated that all of the used books WE LOOKED AT were $6 and $12, respectively. At no point did I state, as the owner accuses, that this store sells ALL of their used paperbacks for $6 and ALL of their used hardcovers for $12.

Additionally, yes, I did tell my son that he could choose three paperbacks he was looking at to purchase because it would approximate the amount I had just spent on a purchase for his sister. Normally I would not have purchased any of these used books for him at the price they were marked here given what I found when I price compared them to the same new titles at Target as I previously noted. However, I felt it was fair to give my son the same amount of money that I gave my daughter in the same time frame at the same vacation stop so that he could, as I mentioned before, have the immediacy of enjoying the purchase.

AT ABSOLUTELY NO POINT did I state that amount was "all of the money I wanted to spend on my trip" as the owner states. It would not even have been possible to spend so little in one trip given its length (multiple days, multiple states). In fact, our next stop approximately an hour later was a used book store in Montpelier where the Star Wars books were priced less than at this store and I purchased two more books there.

It seems that the owner here simply wasn't able to accept that his bookstore is not going to be for everyone and that's perfectly okay. There was nothing false in my review and cost analysis. Some people prioritize shopping local over total cost, so I'm sure my facts regarding prices wouldn't have and won't matter to that customer base. He could have simply left his comments at the fact that he was sorry their prices didn't meet my expectations and he appreciated me complimenting their selection. Instead, he felt the need to misquote both what I wrote in my review and what I said in his store in addition to casting doubt on my book purchasing habits... to what end, I'm still not exactly sure. It's frankly bizarre.

Original Post:

Stopped in on a recommendation from an employee at another local used book store after that store had no Star Wars books at all and she said we'd have better luck here. I certainly give them credit for selection as they had almost two full shelves of Star Wars books; we stop in a LOT of used bookstores while traveling and rarely do we find anywhere near that amount for my son's collection.

However, perhaps part of the reason they have a larger selection is because their books are simply priced too high. All the used paperbacks we looked at regardless of condition were $6 across the board and all the used hardcovers were $12. Several of those paperbacks are currently in my Target cart online where they are $7.99 ea for the same books in brand new condition in addition to being part of a Buy 2 Get 1 free sale. So I could buy three used paperbacks here for $18 or buy the same books in new condition at Target for $15.98.

Apples to apples comparison, the same paperback titles in used condition were $4-$5 on Ebay and/or Amazon with shipping included.

We did end up getting a few titles for the immediacy of him having something to read in the car as we continued our drive, but had the prices been more reasonable we would've purchased at...

The bookshop owner chose to go out of his way to speak so unnecessarily rude to us when we walked in the store to shop. There was no signage outside of the store or even near the front of the store stating no drinks (we entered the store with our coffees) or-else we would have happily obliged by not bringing them in. Instead of asking nicely to set our drinks down, the owner chose to accuse us of not knowing how to read and said that his no food or drink sign was for “people like you” (whatever that meant). When I willingly and apologetically placed my drink down he then made up a rule that I wasn’t allowed to be on my phone sending a text message. It was at that point I realized he clearly was unwell and was going out of his way to be rude.

I love supporting local shops but not when someone chooses to go out of their way to treat genuinely friendly customers like this.

A note for the owner (assuming he won’t read this): I recommend he rethinks keeping the “no food or drink” sign covered in a pile of papers on the cash register table that is more than halfway inside the store. Expecting patrons to see this upon walking in is like looking for a needle...

I have a 1986 Pioneer A-88X (one of the best amps Pioneer ever made) that was sounding pretty bad....channels would cut out randomly, static response from the controls, and unequal levels between left and right channels. After a few days with these folks, my amp came home sounding like it was supposed to, and better than it had been in recent memory. It sounds amazing...with a clarity and brilliance I had forgotten it had. The charges were very reasonable, and the work is topnotch. It only needed a good cleaning...he did not take advantage and say it was more than that...my respect. Highly...