Over the past few weeks, my good friend Shawn was moving his business into a new building he purchased. Shawn's business is selling books online, and he is very successful at what he does.
He purchases trailers of books from different suppliers and sells them one by one on popular sites like eBay and Amazon. Most books he purchases are large coffee table style books, but there are times he receives books he can't sell online, such as children's books. "A small 10 page Dora the Explorer book just won't sell online, and even if it did, the shipping costs would far exceed the cost of the book itself," Shawn explains.
As Shawn prepared for his move, we realized he had over 40 pallets of books he could not sell and he was going to have to send to a recycler. There was a great opportunity to do some good here!
With Shawn's blessing, we decided we could donate them to some worthy causes. First we picked some schools who were existing Costless Express customers and also BC Children's Hospital. Our staff really got behind the project and spent several days sorting product on their own donated time!
We found books on everything! How about a children's cooking book (with apron), a book on juggling - balls included, card tricks - cards included and tons of kids' books that were perfect for a school. I remember a paperback book about a grade four class of kids who adopt a creek, clean it up and save the fish. There were over 100 copies of the book, so I'm sure the school we give these books to could hand out a copy to the whole class for a few years to come. Hey, maybe this book will motivate the class to save a stream!
It was very rewarding to save some of the books from recycling. We did the best we could, but still there were lots of books that needed to be shipped off. Some of our staff had tears welling up as the recycling truck drove off. They really wanted to save more books, but 40 pallets was just too much in the time we had. The great news is Shawn does accumulate these books from time to time, and he said we could come back again. Thanks, big guy!!
A side note: I will do my best to keep up to date on my Calvin's Corner. Shawn is diligent in calling me when I have not posted. There you go Shawn! A recent post — and it is about YOU!
Cheers,
Calvin
