After moving to Alamance county from Long Island 30 years ago, Debbie Gunyan was quick to notice the differences between the public libraries. Long Island has over 200 public libraries across the Brooklyn, Queens, Nassau and Suffolk county systems. Alamance County has four public libraries — one in Graham, one in Mebane and two in Burlington.
Shortly after moving to the area, Gunyan became a board member with Friends of the Alamance County Public Libraries, a nonprofit that funds the library system’s programming and has made over a million dollars in profit over their close to 40 years of operation.
Books that haven’t been checked out over a certain period of time at Alamance public libraries often end up at book sales to make room for new books. These sales are run by Friends of the Alamance County Public Libraries.
Friends of the Libraries next book sale will run from Sept. 6 to 15 at the May Memorial Library in Burlington.
Beyond books, Gunyan said the sales also feature DVDs and CDs.
“The library has mostly been getting rid of a lot of their DVDs because people are not doing DVDs or books on CDs,” Gunyan said. “We have tons and tons of those to sell.”
Hardcover books will be sold for $3 with paperback books being $2, and children’s books being $1. Friends of Libraries has raised over a million dollars total for the Alamance County Public Libraries, according to Gunyan.
“We purposely keep them low,” Gunyan said. “We could make more money off of children’s books, but we really want them in children’s hands.”
Gunyan said CDs and DVDs will also be sold for $2 each.
The first day of the sale, Sept. 6, will be for members only — but memberships can be purchased at the door for a $10 donation.
The sale will also have “bag sale” days on Sept. 15 and 16. During this time, attendees can pay $15 to buy and fill a bag, rather than purchasing books individually.
“As long as you can put them in the bag and carry them out with your hands,” Gunyan said. “A lot of people can pick up 50 books in that bag.”
Beyond the sale, Gunyan said a way to support the Alamance County Public Libraries is by volunteering at any of the locations and they are specifically looking for more Elon students to join. To volunteer, call 336-229-3588.