Half Price Books — Local services in Saint Louis Park

Not recommended. I visited this Half Price Books to sell media after spending several hours sorting at home. My expectations were very low for what I would receive in payment, so, that's not what informed my rating. Sadly, I found the staff at the buy back counter to be rude, unprofessional, and passive aggressive. I was polite, quiet, and patient as I waited for my 63 items, mostly DVDs with some VHS and a couple of CDs, to be sorted and scanned so I could get a buy back offer. The staff were clearly annoyed that I did not go shop or sit down while they sorted through my items. This was evidenced by heavy sighs and scoffs when I politely declined their dismissal of me to go sit down. I was told it would take them awhile to scan the items in and to go walk around the store or sit down at the chairs in the front while I waited. I simply said, "no thank you, I'd prefer to stay here." Which was met by eye roll, heavy sighs, and scoffs of annoyance. One associate told me it made her nervous when people stood there and watched. Since the items still belong to the seller until the seller accepts the offer, I preferred to stay with my belongings to ensure all was accounted for. People make mistakes, especialy in tasks of repetition. And I was hoping to learn something in the process that I could pass to my disabled mother, whom I was doing this errand for. Indeed, I was given my offer with only half of my belongings scanned. I brought this to his attention politely and he corrected the error. Then he gave me another offer. I then politely pointed out that I believed he still had one more stack (of the 12 stacks he made) to scan, and he polity responded, "oops, sure do," and scanned the final missing items. There was no one else in line behind me the entire time I was there. but I was still talked to woth annoyance and as if I was a burden.

The staff would benefit from customer service and professionalism training.

I sold back 63 items for $10.45. I asked when I arrived if they bought back VHSs before I brought them in the store because the phone recording and the website just says "movies" which could mean different types of media. The associate rudely and sarcastically responded with "Well, we buy anything we sell in the store!....."

I had not been in a Half Price Books for over 20 years. if I ever return, it will not be to...

It's with sadness that I write this review. For years this has been one of my all time favorite stores. But, like many things in life-they've changed. It used to be that other than rare, old, or first editions the books were priced at, well, half price of the cover price. Now, many books have price tags and are well over said price. For example, a collected works of HP Lovecraft published en mass by Barnes & Noble from the late 80s was going for $24, even though the cover price was $20. Also, I've been selling my books here for some time. I used to bring in a bag or 2 and make twenty bucks or so. Recently I brought in 6 bags, and they gave me $30. I was pissed. Not so much as I needed or cared about the money, but it was an insult. Maybe I should have expected it, as when I brought the books in, the employee behind the counter who was just standing there with little to do didn't even try and hide the look of disdain on his face as I loaded them up on the counter, creating work for him to do. Again, I don't expect to make a bunch of cash here. I know how it works. I always looked at it as a nice system, and only hoped to make enough from selling 30 or so books to buy my next 2 to read. The books I brought in weren't mass market paperbacks. They weren't old, outdated titles. They were unique, current books ranging from science, current health trends, hardcovers...most bought new from Amazon. I literally picked 3 books out of the hundreds and selling just those 3 at half price, they would have made their 30. It's a shame. 5 or 10 years ago, this was a fantastic place. Don't know what happened. Greed, new management? Who...

I was a frequent shopper of Half Price Books many years ago. I lived in St Louis Park and would browse whenever I had time to kill. It has probably been over 5 years since I've returned and my experience last week will probably make it another 5 years before I return. The staff was pleasant enough, however, I had brought with a bag of books to sell and upon entry to the store, saw a sign stating that they would only be buying books from 1PM-5PM and selling books from 9AM-6PM or something along those lines. It was 11am. I thought surely I could spend 2 hours browsing and wait it out, but not after seeing the prices. The majority of the books were priced around $9, which is roughly half of the cost new, which would be great if Amazon didn't consistently beat that price by a few dollars. I'm all about supporting small businesses and left that day after purchasing 2 books, but if the store offered any discounts on say, buy 10 get 1 free, buy 5 get 15% off...anything! I know I would have bought more here and felt the whole experience was a win-win. 2 stars for the confusion of the hours for buying books vs selling books and the prices that have...