Students going to buy text books at their local campus bookstore may have encountered sticker shock. Perhaps a better term is ‘oversticker shock’.

The prices of text books are exorbitantly high. Many campus bookstores are adding to that price with overstickers. This is a tag that covers the original book cost on the cover and increases the sales price. It seems that the range of the increase is between ten and twenty per cent.

The rationale for the increase is that shipping / fuel costs have increased. However, most of these text books were ordered many months ago, prior to the present fuel prices. Apparently the book publishers, the shipping companies and the campus bookstores are not absorbing these shipping charges and reducing their profits. Instead, the cost of doing business is passed along to the students, who have to have the books.

Students are in the unenviable position of being forced to buy the product. And, unfortunately, the campus bookstores count on that.

Catherine Forsythe