First off, Let's start with a little history of Chegg shall we?
The first business model didn't work; in 2003, the founders modeled the company as a quasi Craigslist but for college campuses where "students would buy and sell everything from used mattresses to textbooks."[1] The plan was to make money from advertising[1] but their biggest seller was used textbooks.[1] The problem faced by most college students is that textbooks are expensive, often priced higher than $100 per book; students usually didn't need the heavy books after each semester, but there was no good way to sell them. One estimate was the college students spent, on average, $667 annually on books in 2009.[3] A second estimate was $1000 per year,[4] with signs that the prices of books were increasing faster than inflation.[4] Some college bookstores would offer to buy back the used books for a fraction of their original price.[1] The founders noticed how people were becoming accustomed to renting things online because of services like Netflix.[5]
In 2007, Rashid and Phumbhra repositioned the company along the lines of Netflix as a way to rent textbooks to students.[1][6] But there was little money initially. When an order came in, Rashid would buy the book using a credit card and have it shipped to the student; automation came later.[7] At one point, with a huge volume of traffic on his credit card, his credit card firm suspected fraud, but Rashid was able to persuade the credit supplier to extend credit using multiple numbers of cards.[7] Books normally rent around half the retail price; for example, a macroeconomics textbook priced at $122 at a college bookstore would rent for $65 at Chegg.[8] But savings varied from book to book. Round-trip shipping costs, paid by Chegg, average about $4 per book.[8] The simplicity of the model helped the marketing; investor Ted Schlein said "when you describe this idea to someone, they immediately get it."[9]
Stories in campus newspapers helped spread the idea. One senior at Arizona State University calculated he would spend about half as much renting books than buying them for one semester.[2] The idea clicked. In 2008, the firm hired the former chief executive of Match.com Jim Safka to run the firm.[10] In 2008, revenues were about $10 million; in 2009, revenues in January alone were $10 million, according to Safka.[10] The firm has raised additional capital from venture capitalists.[11] In January 2009, USA Today reporter Julie Schmit described Chegg as a "leader" in the "burgeoning arena of college textbook rentals."[12] The firm had 55 customer service reps at that point.[13] The firm employs software engineers to improve its website.[13] The four-story office building in Santa Clara "hums with the sounds of clicking computer keys, ringing phones and snippets of conversations" and has "trash bins burst with soft-drink cans, paper plates and discarded snacks."[13] It has a cat named "Mongo."[13]
The name Chegg is a contraction of the words chicken and egg, based on the founders' experience after graduating from college: they couldn't land a job without experience, but couldn't get experience without a job, or a chicken and egg type quandary.[
I only rented from Chegg because when it come to just purchasing and then reselling the text book it just wasn't cost effective. If you want to be good with your money never go off to Chegg right off the bat. Do a little research and see if you could actually rent or purchase your copy instead.
Check out my post on ways you can save on college textbooks.:
http://collegesurvivalplease.blogspot.com/2010/07/college-surivival-vol2-how-i-saved.html
Chegg is a pretty basic you register put in the title, author, or ISBN # of your text book. You can choose to rent the text book for a 90 to 120 days. You pay via credit card and Chegg notifies that your order has been received and the text book will be shipped out on such and such a date.
It also notifies you that by renting a textbook that a tree has been planted in your honor. Chegg has a deal with American Forests. Even though I doubt a tree is planted for each text book the gesture is still nice.
I'm feeling all warm and fuzzy inside.
The shipment was relatively fast and was around 4 dollars. It took about three days to get the textbooks. The textbook also came with a nifty little pen. ( I loose pens all the time so a free pen is pretty nice.) There was a tiny rip in the textbook, but besides that the book was in pretty good condition.
It turns out I didn't need the textbook as much as I thought, which is great news because I get to review their 21-day return refund guarantee. This will happen at least once in everyone's college career. A teacher tells you to purchase a book. You purchase the book just like the teacher told you an it turns out that you really didn't need the darn thing as much as you thought you did. This is where Chegg's return policy comes in handy. To return the book log into your Chegg account and look at your purchases. Click the book you wish to return and there should be a return option that lets you print out a return slip. Put the book back in the box Chegg orinially sent the book in and insert the return slip. Tape the return shipping address ontop of the box and drop it off at your nearest UPS.
I was glad to see that Chegg had given me my refund after their book arrived at its proper destination.
In all honesty if anyone asked me about Chegg I'd actually reccomend it. They seem to be pretty reliable and most of the rentals are at a fair price. Their process is actually quite simple and makes life a little bit less stressful for college students.
I never get tired of promoting this site, but if you're renting from Chegg check out RetailMeNot.com. Chegg almost always has a promotional deal going on that can save you a bit of money.
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