It’s that wonderful time of the year, when families are gathering and memories are being made. We love this season! We wanted to give our members a present – something totally new, a fun feature to celebrate the holiday – one that includes the surprise factor of gifting, with a “chosen just for you” flair.
And so…we introduce Member Appreciation Books (MABs)! This is the perfect combination of the PBS Market (where we offer NEW books at steep discount) and our book swapping club (where you swap used books for Book Credits) – now you can get NEW books for 1 Book Credit + the cost of shipping!
MABs are unpredictable – you may be offered a MAB at any time; the system will do this randomly (as long as you have chosen favorite genres in your Account Settings or from your homepage). So you may not be offered a MAB for weeks, or you may be offered MABs every day for a while. MAB offers will appear in the Message of the Day box at the top of your Homepage (click Home when logged in to see if you have a MAB). If you do, you can order that book for 1 Book Credit + shipping! You can sometimes order more than one MAB at a time (click the “More Free Books” link on the MAB offer on your homepage to see the list of MABs currently available to you), or you may be allowed only one that day. To keep things fair, you can’t order multiple copies of any specific MAB. MABs can be fleeting – they can expire quickly (usually because of supplier limitations) so if you see a MAB you want, put it into your Cart. Don’t wait too long to check out though, because if the MAB expires for that book, the 1 credit + shipping price will no longer apply. MABs are specific – they are chosen for you based on your favorite genres (so you do need to select these to participate in the MAB program). You can choose your favorite genres in two places: (1) on your Homepage and (2) in your Account Settings .
How much does a MAB cost? For each MAB, you pay 1 Book Credit + shipping. The shipping cost is the same as always for Market books – $3.45 for the first book in a shipment, and $0.99 for each additional book in the shipment. In our Market, shipments can come from two different sources: Overstock or Super Seller. So, if you order two MABs and both are Super Sellers, you will get them for 2 Book Credits + $3.45 shipping for the first book and $0.99 shipping for the second. If you order two MABs and one is from Overstock and the other is a Super Seller, you will be charged 2 Book Credits + $3.45 x 2 (shipping for each “first” book in the two different shipments). Yes, you can order regular Market books (non MABs) at the same time and have them shipped with the MABs!
The MAB program launches December 11, 2012. You can read more about MABs in the Help Center.
Don’t forget to go to your Homepage to check it out, and see what MABs may be waiting there for you!
Merry Christmas and Happy Chanukah to all,
Richard and
The PaperBackSwap Team
Tags: Book Recommendations, Book Suggestions, PBS Market
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2012 at 5:06 pm and is filed under Announcements, New Features & Improvements.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
SWEET!!! Got MAB’d and am now 4 books richer!!!
I got MAB’d today and I still don’t understand how the program works even after searching the PBS website and reading this blog post. I have this little image under my name but it’s not a clickable link that would direct me to a page explaining it (big opportunity missed there). If I hover my mouse of the image it tells me to go to the Message of the Day to claim my free book, but after sliding through the “Messages” twice the “free book” I am supposed to receive isn’t popping up.
Ah, now it finally has appeared. That took a few tries to find it. But I’m not sure how this is a free book, mathwise. I would expect with a free book I wouldn’t have to pay any credits or money (except maybe shipping). But to get this book (a random one I’d never heard of before) I’d have to give up 1 credit (a $3.95 value) plus $3.45 in shipping – a total cost of $7.40 for me. I went to an online bookseller’s website to see what the value of the book being offered, and found that I could buy it outright for $1.67 + $3.99 – a cost of $5.66. So I save myself $1.74 by not accepting this “gift.” Sigh.
It’s clear that this isn’t a deal for me, because I’d still have to give up one of my hard-earned credits to get a “free” book that I’m not even sure I want to read. Sorry, but this program isn’t worth it and isn’t very well set up to boot.
Absolutely wonderful program ! Thank you so much.
Gee, LadyDanio, you are one tough lady to please. You don’t have to take the book offered. I didn’t. There are currently almost 7,700 books being offered to me through MAB.
While I agree the books are completely “free”, they are a heck of a lot “free”er than they were before MAB. I just got a book on my WL without waiting for the same credit it was gonna cost me. Sure I paid for postage, but I also get the thrill of being the first person to actually crack open that cover! And, since I decided to do a little additional shopping while I was there, I picked up 3 more MAB books at only $0.99 for postage. So, I got 4 brand new/never been read books for only $6.43. I can’t do THAT good even at Big Lots!
But, then again, I do tend to look on the bright side of life. There’s an old story about a group of psychologists who put a kid in a room full of brand new toys and another kid in a room full of horse manure. They gave neither kids any instructions…just stuck them in the room. 3 hours later the psychologists were surprized to find the kid in the room of toys mad as a poked badger (no badgers were injured in the telling of this story). He was bored because he had played with all the toys, broken a few, and wanted something new to play with. Considering how mad the “toy” kid was they were afraid to open the door to the other room. But, as they approached the door, they were amazed to hear laughter (the “cry down you leg” kind of laughter) coming from the room. They opened the door to find the kid covered in manure and digging in the pile like crazy. When they asked him what he was doing, he replied “Why with all this poop, there’s got to a pony in here some where!”
Guess we know which kid you and I are.
Tink – 🙂
LadyDanio, if you don’t understand something, it’s typically a good idea to ask questions. All I saw were complaints in your post. Very puzzling.
I love the MAB idea! My MAB link, which is currently on my home page, is a clickable link, taking me to a list of thousands of books that are available to me for 1 credit plus postage. (My credits aren’t hard earned; I just post and mail books I no longer want; very easy). I find it very clear to understand. And if you think about the Market books, which are a price plus a credit plus postage, then these are free, right?
Oh well, not every Grinch can steal Christmas! ;D Thanks PBS!!
Tink👍
Get out of debt today. Bankruptcy is a dirty scary word.
But once you leatn the ins and outs oof bankruptcy it is not so scary anymore.
In fact, you may conclude it is your best chance at starting a
new future.