My office is practically covered in books. I especially love physical books and I buy a lot of them. But – where should I shop for them?
Amazon is the big, big player in this space. They’re expected to drive nearly 90% of US books, music, and video ecommerce sales in 2025 and they control roughly 75% of the ebook market and more than 80% of all online book sales.
We can fight back against their monopoly! There are a ton of great alternatives to Amazon, whether ebook, physical, or audio.
Review your subscribe and save items with Amazon. Often people will start to reduce dependence on Amazon for random items, but if you have multiple subscribe and save items it can take time to find alternatives.
Start with identifying what you have as subscriptions set up on Amazon. Look through and see if any of the items can be bought locally through your regular trips and if so, cancel them. If there are items that you know you can’t find locally (probably why you went to Amazon in the first place), then create a list and start going through those items week by week to find alternatives. Don’t try to get it done all at once if you’re not ready, give yourself time to wean yourself off of Amazon dependence to cause less disruptions. I’ve spent the last few weeks slowly going through my subscribe and save items, and I just cancelled my last one!
Understanding where you’re at with subscriptions and then setting a goal, whether it’s finding an alternative once per week or every couple weeks means you can keep working through your list over time and avoid getting overwhelmed. If you’re not depending on Amazon for regular deliveries, then it gets you closer to being able to cancel Amazon Prime.
Local, Direct, and Non-Shopping Choices: If you have a local bookstore, check ‘em out in person! I love the discovery of looking through titles and finding a random book that ends up being a favorite.
Direct: If you’re interested in a particular author or publisher, go to their website to see if they direct ordering options. If the book is a new release, sometimes they offer gifts or author-signed versions as well.
Free/No Purchase: Use your local library! Go in person or use the library’s app if they have one. I recently got a library card and it was amazing – I put a sci-fi trilogy on hold and got the books at my local branch within a few days. Looking for free ebooks, audiobooks, and digital magazines? Libby is an app that connects you with your local library and you can download the material directly to the app for viewing. If you don’t have a library card already, Libby will help you find where and how to apply for one. Some libraries even let you sign-up fully online!
Shopping Options: The good guys
Bookshop.org: Started in 2020 and privately owned, Bookshop.org partners with local bookstores to enable customers to shop them online and sells direct-to-consumer as well. You can select your local store, order your book for pickup or ship directly to you, and everybody wins! They recently launched a new eBook reader app enabling you to buy eBooks from local bookstores. Bookshop.org supports DEI and are a Certified B corporation. I use Bookshop.org to support my local bookstore all the time, especially to order the random titles I’m looking for that my bookstore doesn’t have already stocked.
Libro.fm: Similar to Bookshop.org, Libro enables you to shop from your local bookstore for audiobooks. They are 100% employee owned and have a dedicated DEI program which focuses on amplifying underserved voices and prioritizing accessibility. You can search bookshops by ownership attributes including API owned, disabled-owned, woman-owned, indigenous-owned, Black-owned, Latinx-owned, and LGBTQIA+ owned. If you prefer audiobooks, definitely shop here.
BetterWorldBooks: BetterWorldBooks sells both new and used books but does not partner with local bookstores. As of 2019 its owned by Better World Libraries, a not-for-profit company affiliated with The Internet Archive (aka the Wayback Machine site). Better World Books is still a for-profit company however and a certified B corporation. They donate books and funds to libraries and other organizations to support literacy efforts around the world, while also recycling used books when needed. I prefer Bookshop.org so I can support my local community, but when I’m looking for a rarer/older book this is a great alternative. I ordered from them recently with no issues.
The hedge fund and private equity crew:
Barnes & Noble: Privately held and owned since 2019 by Elliott Advisors Limited, a hedge fund. They did not spend any money on lobbying in 2023 or 2024. I can’t find anything on their corporate website about DEI or even diversity amongst their employees, which is troubling, but they also haven’t announced they’re removing or reducing DEI. Barnes & Noble is better than Amazon, but still owned by a hedge fund. If you want to have a bigger impact with your dollars locally, either shop at your bookstore or use Bookshop.org or Libro.fm.
Thriftbooks: They sell used books, usually donated to them from libraries or other organizations. Beyond their website, they also sell on Amazon, eBay, AbeBooks.com (owned by Amazon). Since 2011, Thriftbooks is owned by KCB, a private equity firm, and MMF, an investment firm. Despite my best efforts, I can’t find anything about DEI on their website or in news articles. I feel like this is an option if you can’t find a book anywhere else, but since they’re owned by private equity and don’t have a clear DEI program or support you can generally avoid this one.
World of Books: Similar to Thriftbooks, World of Books (WOB) sells used books from customers and charities that have excess stock. WOB also owns SecondSale.com and SellBackYourBooks.com, and sells on Amazon as “GlentheBookseller.” They are owned by UK private equity firm Livingbridge and are a certified B corporation. I don’t see anything on their site or in the news about supporting DEI, but they are a UK-headquartered company so may be less of a priority there. Similar to Thriftbooks, I’d stay away from this one since it’s private equity owned.
Abebooks.com: Owned by Amazon, stay away!
What I did: I’ve been using Bookshop.org, BetterWorld Books and my local library to quench my reading thirst. It’s been great so far with no issues.
Was this helpful for you? Let me know in the comments and what you’d like me to tackle next. Follow me on TikTok for recap videos, and subscribe to see more category deep dives with behavior exercises every Friday. Thanks for reading <3
