VALUE BOOKS: The Company I Want to Support That Reminded Me of the Joy of Reading
The Mad Sponsor, VALUE BOOKS
When I previously wrote a book review for a book called "The Story of an Unidentified Deceased Person" and posted it on note, the moment I saw the "Company I Want to Support" contest on the page after posting, one company immediately came to mind. It was VALUE BOOKS, a company that operates a business selling used books via the internet.
Hearing that, you might think, "Just another used bookstore?" And in fact, it is a used bookstore. The truth is, my first contact with VALUE BOOKS was when they happened to be the shipping company for a used book I bought on Amazon. I still remember my impression at the time: "It was cheap, but the condition is good, and it's packed so it won't get wet. It was raining today, so that helped." That is exactly the kind of impression one has of a "good used bookstore," and in my mind, it remained as a good used bookstore. I also liked the purchase coupon included in the package because it had an interesting design. So, for a while, whenever I bought used books on Amazon, I would check to see if VALUE BOOKS was the seller.
Meanwhile, I discovered a podcast. It is a program called "Yuru Gengogaku Radio" (Casual Linguistics Radio), with the catchphrase that you can learn about language loosely and enjoyably. This podcast is a "favorite" of mine, and one day, VALUE BOOKS appeared as a sponsor. Since my impression of them was "a used bookstore that sells good books cheaply and packs them carefully," it was a bit surprising to see them as a podcast sponsor, but the surprise lay in the nature of the sponsorship. They provide various forms of sponsorship, but the episode where a VALUE BOOKS representative tried to draw up a contract saying, "There's no particular return, but VALUE BOOKS will cover the cost of the books used as topics for the podcast," and got scolded by their legal department, is particularly memorable. That's not how a sponsor usually works, is it? Because they have episodes like this, they were called the "mad sponsor" by the personalities of Yuru Gengogaku Radio. But well, they had included interesting coupons in the past, so I thought they might be the type of company that acts just because something is interesting. However, it seems there is more to it than that.
One day, while browsing YouTube as usual, a channel called "Tsundoku Channel" caught my eye. It featured Mr. Horimoto, the personality of the aforementioned Yuru Gengogaku Radio, and someone who looked like a good-natured person (since I was meticulous enough to listen to Yuru Gengogaku Radio from episode 1, I hadn't yet realized that this good-natured person was an employee of that mad sponsor, VALUE BOOKS). I like Mr. Horimoto's way of speaking, so I started watching the Tsundoku Channel video, thinking he might be talking about something interesting.
Worlds I want to know, worlds I don't know, and worlds I remain ignorant of
I have posted several book reviews on note in the past. Before that, I wrote them on Booklog or on my blog. The fact that I write book reviews even though it's not a school assignment means that I found something compelling in the books I read.
What motivates people to read? Work, asset management, problem-solving, entertainment. There are various motives. I have come to read with the motivation of wanting to touch upon the worlds I want to know, or even the worlds I don't know, as much as possible. Saying "I have come to" also means that it wasn't like that before.
I was originally a reader, but other than reading novels for entertainment, I often read technical books and practical books. Unfortunately, since I started working, I have mostly been reading books related to programming. It is interesting to dig deeper into stories that are a continuation of the world I already know, but it is somewhat inorganic, and I cannot deny the feeling that I am reading them because it is my job.
It is interesting to know about unknown worlds, but this has a major problem. It is that I don't know them. Because I don't know, the path to reaching that world is always a process of trial and error. It is difficult to find books that I find interesting. Recently, Amazon's suggestions have become decent, and when I buy books on Amazon, they generally suggest books I might want. However, these tend to be the aforementioned books that are a continuation of what I already know. Surely, somewhere, there must be worlds I remain ignorant of.
I am a heavy Amazon user and have a shut-in temperament. However, I like so-called physical bookstores and often visit them. This is because they have the advantage of allowing random access to publications. If you want to know about an unknown world from a place that is not a continuation of your own, accessing a physical bookstore is an effective classical method. However, the efficiency is extremely poor. At that time, my encounter with Tsundoku Channel became a kind of turning point.
The videos on Tsundoku Channel are structured in a format where Mr. Iida and Mr. Horimoto present books they have each chosen. No matter how tough the publishing industry is said to be, the number of books published is enormous. From among them, one must choose books through some kind of filter. As that filter, Tsundoku Channel was excellent. Mr. Iida, who uses his high skills as a book selector to introduce books in a way that stirs our emotions, and Mr. Horimoto, who uses the skills he honed in launching Yuru Gengogaku Radio as an "interesting explanation guy" to give interesting explanations, both accurately reveal the interesting points while introducing books in a way that doesn't just make you "satisfied with watching the video."
In this way, VALUE BOOKS, a used bookstore, entered my life as a bridge that tells me about worlds I would have remained ignorant of, and turns worlds that were not a continuation of my own into ones that are. This was an unexpected development, and at the same time, it made me an even bigger fan of VALUE BOOKS.
When it comes to book-introducing YouTubers, I tend to think, "They're just talking about the content of the book, right?" But since the parent company of Tsundoku Channel is VALUE BOOKS, whose job is to sell books, they make me want to buy the books! I am not the only viewer who has been successfully made to add to their "tsundoku" (unread book pile).
VALUE BOOKS as a used bookstore
It was supposed to be about a company I want to support, but it turned into a story about a channel I want to support, Tsundoku Channel. I would like to touch a little more on VALUE BOOKS as a used bookstore. I mentioned the buying side earlier, but I would also like to talk about the selling side.
Buying at VALUE BOOKS is a system where you apply for a purchase, pack the books in a cardboard box, send them, and then just wait for the appraisal and transfer. I'm sure this is the general flow for most used bookstores that do online purchasing. They buy them for more than I expected, but I think that is a weak point for a company I want to support.
Have you ever had the experience of selling books to a used bookstore and having some books not be given a value? I have. What happens to those books...? Sometimes they aren't given a purchase price but are sold for 100 yen (I don't think this is bad; it costs money to display them as items for sale), and sometimes they might be thrown away. It is reassuring that VALUE BOOKS takes the stance of, "We couldn't put a price on this for now, but what would you like to do? Shall we send it back?" You can also make the judgment, "I sold it on a whim, but if it doesn't have a price, maybe I'll keep it a little longer?"
Once a book is read or becomes involved in your life, information beyond what is written is added by the owner. It's what you call attachment. I think they understand that well. Also, if you decide you don't need it after all, they properly send it for waste paper recycling. This might have some business advantages, but the fact that they make such flows public is one of the points I like about VALUE BOOKS.
The desire to improve the entire publishing industry
By the way, is there anything a used bookstore can do to contribute to book authors, and by extension, the publishing industry? While that is generally the nature of second-hand dealers, it is usually not the case. VALUE BOOKS inevitably operates within that framework as well. Since it is market-theoretically impossible for everyone to buy used books, there may not be any significant negative impact, but since royalties do not go to the authors, it is hard to say they are contributing.
However, many writers and avid readers must be buying used books. While there are cases like out-of-print books, avid readers buy books on a daily basis in quantities that people who are not readers cannot imagine. To put it bluntly, it is an abnormal amount. Since you cannot give what you do not have, they must have relied on used bookstores to some extent. Perhaps that is why society does not seem to be very harsh toward used bookstores.
However, even though VALUE BOOKS is a used bookstore, they want to give back to the publishing industry and are engaged in many initiatives.
First is the "VALUE BOOKS Ecosystem." In short, it is a system where the profits VALUE BOOKS earns from sales are returned to publishers. They leave the use of those funds to the publishers, and it seems there are cases where it is returned to the authors.
If you ask whether this initiative has any benefits for VALUE BOOKS, I think the advantages are quite thin. It is about as indirect a benefit as the "windfall profit" scenario—where someone who knows about this system chooses VALUE BOOKS because they have a system that returns profits to publishers, and they might get a small portion of those profits. It can only be called social contribution.
Next is "Book Gift." Some of you may have heard of Book Santa. In short, it is that. It is a system where they donate some of the books that VALUE BOOKS could not buy, but they are not just pushing off worthless items. Books that VALUE BOOKS judges they cannot buy are not necessarily bad books. In fact, books that have sold incredibly well are often the targets. This is because the market is saturated. However, because they sold a lot, they are naturally books that many people want to read. For organizations outside the market that need donations or are in a position to be grateful, it should certainly be seen as a social contribution.
The company called VALUE BOOKS
When you dig deep into these initiatives, you think, "Ah, what a good company." But Mr. Iida from the Tsundoku Channel also summarizes in his note that it is not necessarily just that.
On the other hand, their behavior as a sponsor of the Yuru Gengogaku Radio, and their movement to focus on a specific industry and try to revitalize the whole thing, rather than just paying money and feeling like they are doing something good for the environment, sometimes gives the impression that they are "crazy..."
Companies usually pursue some kind of profit efficiently. It is normal for the government to cover social contributions, or public interests. However, if that is all there is, the whole thing becomes profit-centric, and the industry may wither. A used bookstore could also make a profit by buying as cheaply as possible and selling as high as possible, turning their back on the publishing industry, but they do not do that. Of course, there is a practical aspect that if the publishing industry withers, it will have a negative impact on their own business. But I think the source of this social contribution is their experience of having been saved by books.
I, too, had become accustomed to inorganic reading, but I was once healed and lived by books. It is not once or twice that I have gained questions to ask of my own life from books. I am sure they were strongly motivated by such experiences. Otherwise, they could not do something this insane.
There are many other points I want to support them for, but this has become long. Please, through the Tsundoku Channel and the links I have posted, try to learn about the initiatives of VALUE BOOKS.
