College students rent textbooks to save money - washingtonpost.com: ... Chegg.com has rented more than 2 million books to students at more than 6,400 schools since it was launched nationally in 2007. Students can rent books by the semester, quarter or summer at rates that vary depending on the popularity of the title and when the semester starts. But the books are usually at least half off retail. Students hang on to the orange boxes and mail the rented books back at the end of the semester for free.
The site has gained popularity by infiltrating Twitter and Facebook, using student ambassadors who are paid $5 for every customer they recruit (one student has made more than $17,000) and promising to plant a tree for every book rented. It has also agreed to donate money to Haiti earthquake relief efforts for each order. "Students are very green, but they are also very socially aware," said Tina Couch, a spokeswoman for the company.
Students are also thrifty, especially with prices of textbooks steadily increasing and, in some cases, spiking because publishing companies have packaged the thick volumes with computer programs, workbooks or access codes to content-related Web sites. Estimates for a typical student's spending on textbooks range from $700 to $1,000 annually.
