The campus bookstore has made big changes this year, with the students’ benefit in mind, in response to a shift in the book industry as a whole.

Jennifer Martin, campus bookstore manager, said the store is fully online with an e-campus store instead of physical books on shelves inside the physical store.

“For 10 years we were with an outside vendor. That vendor was a book provider and course material provider, and also the campus store [for] things like merch and clothing and things like that,” Martin said.

University officials decided that it wanted to continue its campus store independently, and there were a couple different ways they could offer  course materials.

“The primary decision making in this regard was done considering what’s going to help the students the most,” Martin said.

Maryon said officials wanted students to have benefits such as the ability to use financial aid vouchers and receive free shipping.

“We interviewed a lot of course material providers, a lot of booksellers and tried to decide what to do and ultimately decided to go with e-campus,” Martin said.

E-campus offers students the choice of physical books and e-books, which was important to the decision.

“A lot of people, myself included, need an actual physical book in their hands. We wanted the students to still have choices,” Martin said.

The marketplace was also a contributing factor in the choice of partnering with a different vendor. For certain materials, there is a marketplace option, which searches the internet to find better prices on textbooks.

“It will go to used textbook websites [and] Amazon sellers. It’s going to be offered through independent sellers not from their warehouse,” Martin said.

This is a significant transition in the way students purchase course materials, Martine said. However, however, the goal is to make purchases a little easier for them.

“While I know there are always frustrations with anything new, it’s a transition. It takes time,” Martin said.

Cassie Kern, a sophomore marketing major, experienced some frustrations this semester with accessing an online information systems textbook.

“The only one I had a problem with was my information systems book because the wrong book was listed and it was kind of just a pain to get fixed,” Kern said.

Kern tried to figure out a solution on her own but ultimately had to contact her professor and Pearson, the publisher.

“I had to go to the Pearson sales representative, and she helped us get the book and she had to make a whole new code because they were trying to figure out what was wrong with it. It took like over a week to fix,” Kern said.

Even though she had some trouble, Kern enjoys the option of selecting an e-book or paperback for her learning experience.

“I’m one of those people who like to read off physical books rather than, you know, electronic, but the electronic books are a lot cheaper, so there are pros,” Kern said.

There have also been instances of book shipments arriving but missing students’ names on them.

“If you order from Amazon, sometimes you know your label gets ripped off once in a while. A marketplace order maybe will have a slight issue like that, but we’re right next door to the post office and we work really closely with them,” Martin said.

Martin thinks the biggest hurdle may be adjusting to the time books will take to ship to campus.

“I think it’s just a matter of shifting our mindset and knowing it’s going to take a few days to get here,” Martin said.

Misericordia is not the only college evolving to a purely online store. Competitor schools like Wilkes University, Kings College and Marywood University are also making the switch.

“During that transition time in our research time, we visited many universities, especially in the area. It’s pretty much happening everywhere,” Matin said.

The University’s transition team also traveled to schools like Lehigh Valley, and they found that Lehigh Valley’s store going in the same direction as the evolution of the industry.

“This new model of how things are is kind of cool,” Martin said. “The universities took the store part over. It lets you personalize the store a little bit more [and] make things more about what the students want.”

The campus stores changes  will ultimately be a better result for students and the University, Martin believes.

“It’s worth it for the students to not have to pay shipping and have us here to be able to help,” Martin said.