College books have ALWAYS been expensive...

I never bought any books until I attended the first day of class..the professor would pretty much tell you if you needed the book for class..if tests are going to be from lectures or no homework assigned questions book, no sense in getting it.  I never bought a textbook for any of my English Lit classes as I could get all of the individual books from the public library.

A couple other options that I did that weren't mentioned here---

Barter--I traded out my American History book to a guy who worked on my car....traded out a Criminal Justice book to a young lady who could type much faster than I could to type up a term paper for me.  Traded out an Art Appreciation book to a young man who put together an awesome PowerPoint presentation for my Senior Project.

Study libraries--in my university the Math and Engineering Dept had "study areas"--rooms where students of those departments could go and work on assignments.  They were most always stocked with current textbooks, sample tests, Senior Projects, and term papers, periodicals, etc.  Especially helpful for students where English was not their native language.  And there was usually always someone in there you could ask for help if you got stuck on something..

I was a professor of English at a community college; certainly some book sellers are pushy--but--we were never "wined and dined"...maybe our enrollment numbers weren't high enough to encourage that?

The sales reps would come in, bring muffins and coffee, and show us a power point...not exactly the most compelling sell...and certainly not something that made us "best buddies" with the reps...it was dull and a waste of our time, to put it nicely...and we still had to go find some quick food after wards to get our lunches in before the next class.

We hated trading out books every two years as much as students; we get used to a book, its content and organization and make it work for us, only to have it replaced...and then we have to deal with the complaints of students trying to sell their books back when a new edition is coming out...and the difficulties of all students having copies of the new book when a used version isn't available for them to purchase at a more affordable rate...this means we are stuck making copies for a week or two until they can afford it...yet more work for us.

So stating we're "best buddies" is the exaggeration of the century.

Those are mostly good tips, except for the "sell back when you're done." It's great in theory, but my old college bookstore would offer about $15 for an originally $100 brand-new hard-cover with no markings or damage. Then they could sell it with a "used" sticker for $70...the hapless students never questioned how much they were losing out by doing this.

When I was finished with my textbooks, I would sell them through an online dealer like Amazon or directly to my fellow students. I would charge $50 for that $100 book, get a lot more of my money back, and cut the other student $20 from what they'd pay at the store. Win-win.

As Tamara pointed out, selling books back online takes more work but it can get students more money than the campus bookstores.  Also, when a college course is switching to a new textbook edition sometimes the bookstore won't buyback the old edition anymore, but you can still sell it online!   www.bookscouter.com shows the buy-back prices offered from many different online vendors and shows some reliability ratings for those vendors.

The best trick I ever used in college is this: when you get your schedule for Class X at the end of the sememster, go to one of the final sessions of Class X before your semester starts.  As class is getting out, stick your head in and say, "If anyone is interested in selling your book, I have cash and will buy it".  The beauty of this is you have 20 students who are done with the class, at least 10 of whom are ready to get rid of the book and would love some cash.  The best part is a bidding (down) war usually erupts, because if someone there is willing to sell it for $40, another classmate will happily take $30.  It takes a little planning, but it works like a charm every time...

As an engineering professor I can tell you we are not wined and dined.  I let my students use the 4th, 5th , or 6th edition of the textbooks (which are actually books they had for two other prereq classes already).  There have been almost NO changes during that time - even the HW problems are the same.

Publishers pressure writers for a new edition every two years because their competitors do it - kind of a detente with books rather than nuclear missles - they have a new edition, so we need one too.  Also, publishers don't make any money from used books.  The students are the victims.

Buybacks at the college bookstore are a joke.  I wonder what they do with all that money anyway?  They charge the same as the private textbook stores and don't have to turn a profit - why can't they be cheaper?

My daughter and myself are both students and have been really frustrated wit the high price of text books.  I am taking one class at a time because I work and for my current class my books ran $250 bucks, hers for the semester ran $600.  She also found that if she had ordered them online about a month ahead of time they would have cost $400 but the online dealers jacked their prices near the beginning of the semester.

I agree with EngrProf in that buyback programs at the schools are a joke, a $50 text book my daughter used brought $1 at the end of the semester.  She took extra cautions to take care of her books so that she could sell them back, so the book was in great shape.  Unbelievable that the same book that she would get a dollar for would sell at the book store for $40.

So we decided to create  CC Book Exchange.  This operates like a Craig's list for used text books.  It is completely free to use, we offer it as doing our part to combat the high price of text books.

http://ccbookexchange.com