Quote:
Originally posted by decadence
Another thing I'm wondering about, bookstores on a US campus are a central part and don't sell just books. On a campus there might be a store for snacks, food and magazines, maybe a small greek store etc etc.
But school merchandise, t-shirts, sweatshirts of whatever always seem to be sold in the bookstore. WHY there and not the convenience store which sells snacks, frozen foods etc.  Clothing and stuff seems always sold in bookstores.
Oh and also are the bookstores ever external company branches (like a Barnes & Noble or Borders) or just RCU bookstore? (R for Random).
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At my US undergrad university, our bookstore is owned by the university. It's like a mega one-stop shopping place. We could get ALL of our textbooks (which, by the way, were shelved according to each class/module), stationary, uni clothing, uni merchandise, greek life merchandise, computers, software, books for fun reading, magazines, backpacks, gift items, photocopies and so on! The only thing they did not sell was food and drinks!
We did have a few convenience stores around campus which sold food, drinks, some stationary and supplies and the occasional uni clothing or gifts. Additionally, both our university
and the student union have food courts where students can grab hamburgers, mexican food, chinese food, salad bar, pizza, coffee, baked goods or whatever.
http://www.csulb.edu/aux/bookstore/index.html
Though, when I went to England for grad school, I was taken aback by the "lack" of a campus bookstore as I know it. My professors simply gave me a list of suggested books and texts and I had to traipse around town looking for them in "regular" bookshops. I do not believe that the University of Bristol has an official "campus bookstore". There is a Waterstones bookstore located inbetween our library and the sports complex. They probably have some kind of agreement with the uni. The same goes for the Blackwells bookstore which is next door to my department - that's where I got most of my books. Though, all they sell is texts, pleasure reading and the occasional stationary.
I guess the idea is that, though there's no campus bookstore, local area shops will do their best to stock books that students are likely to need. Need pens and pencils? Well you have to haul your behind to a stationary store....
On the other hand, the University of Bristol Student Union has a student shop in the union building itself. There are no books!
Just food, drinks, uni clothing, uni gifts, stationary, beer/wine, and sweets! If you want a university sweatshirt, then you can only get it from the union shop....
http://www.ubu.org.uk/main/services/shops
(I love the fact that the photo they use to depict the shop is a shot of the shelves of alcohol and not of the other merchandise...heh)
.....Kelly