BOOKOFF Costa Mesa — Local services in Costa Mesa

Admittedly their selection of CDs and books is extensive, however whoever priced their inventory must have been out of their minds. Seriously? CDs for $30? Not even like a deluxe edition or anything, just a digipack CD for $29.99? That's straight up laughable. They seriously wanted $70 for the Century Media release of Mayhem's "De Mysteriis Dom Satanas", which can be purchased on discogs for under 10 bucks. And it's not even like it's super popular bands. I'm talking about bands like Electric Wizard, Mayhem, and EHG. Sure, these bands are super popular in their respective scenes but to the general public? Your average person on the street has probably not heard of them. Not to mention you can get all of these CDs off discogs or even the band's website for half of what Book-off sells them for. The same can be said for the video games (seriously, PlayStation 1, 2, and 3 games for close to original retail price) DVDs, (again close to retail price for a format that most people give away or sell at garage sales for a dollar a pop. I have purchased many a DVD and Blu-ray at Goodwill and other thrift stores for a few bucks, when book-off tries to sell the same thing for north of $20) comic books, and action figures. Naturally there will be some comics and figures that are deserving of a higher price, but not most of their inventory. It's a shame, because the store has a great selection of everything from comics and cards to action figures and video games to CDs and DVDs. I just wish the vast majority of it wasn't priced so astronomically high. Also, and this might be the worst thing about this place, is if you take them CDs to sell they'll offer you 10 cents for a CD. And then Mark it up to $25, $35, sometimes even higher. THAT IS UPWARDS OF A 3000% INCREASE.

This place is an absolute joke. Take your money to Independent retailers who actually charge...

I wish I could rate the level of service at more than five stars because the people that helped me out during my visit definitely deserve 10 stars at the very least. Zach, Hector, and Thalia are literally the nicest most helpful people I have come across in a very long time at a store. They are super knowledgeable about the products that they have, and even educated me on so much stuff that I didn’t know about before that I was very interested in now. I also want to add that this store has an amazing collection of all sorts of books at a very reasonable price. Being an interior designer, I’m constantly looking for a coffee table books and specifically art ones. These books can go up to hundreds of dollars and at bookoff, I was able to find brand new ones that were still in the wrapping for about 10 to 20$. They also buy books that are in good condition as well as an assortment of action figures and comic books and all sorts of really awesome things. The pricing they will offer you for your items is very fair and ultimately I think that what this store is trying to do is make things that may not be affordable to most people affordable and they are doing an amazing job at it. Nothing in the store was lacking quality and most importantly looked pretty much new. I really love this Store and the people who Work here are so amazing I really recommend this place to not only collectors, but also to designers, artists, or...

If you are the type of girl who prides herself on finding treasures in a thrift store, or the type guy who prides himself on his ability to spot a bargain, especially if you are a Japanophile, then BookOff used to be totally be for you! Every location used to be THE spot to hit for deals on manga, anime, comics, books, toys – all at really low prices. It was all good, rare stuff, too.

And then they changed their business model.

In the beginning their merchandise was predominately Japanese-language. Over the years, tho’, their English area has expanded from one cubby to over half of the store. To fill all of that extra space they began to focus less on “all the GOOD stuff” and more on “ALL the stuff”. Couple shelves laden with undesirable goods along with hugely inflated prices and one finds oneself wondering why they still come in here.

For me, this is a habitual stop-off before I go into Tokyo Central. I haven’t bought anything here in years. Whenever I get lucky and find a good Pop or action figure, they are always priced higher than online.

The customer-base has changed, too. It is less Japanophile/nerd and more err.. something different. Of course, it is always fun to check the rogues gallery photos they hang behind the registers to see if anybody I know has been caught stealing lately.

They have opened more locations and seem to be doing well, but I miss the good ol' nerd...