Book Chat - Online Retailers or brick-and-mortar book sellers?

The Book Chat is a Feature hosted by Misty over at The Book Rat.

I buy a lot of books, and the main reason for actually buying the books, so far as I’m concerned is so that I own it.  Whilst I love my Kindle (and it makes things more reasonably priced) there’s something satisfying about actually holding a book in your hands, whether it’s a paperback or a hardback.  I also enjoy being able to lend a physical copy of a book to friends, and whilst this sounds kind of crazy – I enjoy the idea of having shelves and shelves of books (though I kind of already have this!   

The thing is, that a book buying habit can get pretty damn expensive pretty damn quickly. 

Whilst I’d love to say I support places like Waterstones and WH Smiths, or my local bookstores, by buying books there, the truth is that the majority of my books get bought from Amazon. 

Obviously, when I’m buying Kindle books, it’s much easier if they do come to Amazon, because they then get loaded on the device automatically.  But even with actual books, it’s just a lot cheaper.

The other reason I buy a lot more online is because sometimes books become available online a lot sooner than they do in shops – especially when I’m living at home from Uni, the choice in shops is pretty limited because I live in the middle of nowhere.  So not only is it cheaper than buying them in a proper store, it means I don’t have to drive anywhere to get it which saves me even more.  Also, because of the stock issue I mentioned, it’d often faster, because the store would have to order the book I want in, and usually it takes longer to do that than Amazon’s 3-4 day delivery time. 

I’ll only really buy books from stores if it’s a last minute purchase – for instance, I find out I have a long train journey coming up or whatever (though normally in that case, I’ll load a couple of books to my Kindle) or if they have a really good offer on – and sometimes that’s the case. 

But for the most part, it’s definitely cheaper online, and with my University student budget, that’s definitely important.  I have a £10 monthly book budget and that’s what I have to stick to – anything I read outside of that has to be borrowed from housemates, or one of the Kindle freebies or won from somewhere - whichever. 

In terms of shopping at commercial stores or indie stores, I’d like to say I support the indie stores more, but the truth is I don’t.  I like to wander around my local book store, but the thing is that they generally always sell at full retail price, and that’s because they have to make any sort of profit.  That, and they tend to sell a lot of books about the local area, which frankly don’t interest me, I’m sorry to say. It generally tends to be Waterstones I buy from, if not an occasional trip to W H Smith. 

So that’s how I buy my books – how about you guys?