8 Places to find cheap and discounted children’s books

Books are really important to your child’s development, but there are so many to choose from and they can be expensive, so I’ve put together details of where you can find cheap and discounted children’s books.

Choosing what books to buy your children

With so many books for children to choose from it can be difficult to know what to buy before you hand over your money.

Luckily, the Book Trust has a useful tool that gives you recommendations based on criteria that you select, such as age, when the book is going to be read and much more.

This doesn’t tell you where to get the recommended book at the cheapest price, which I think would be a useful addition.

Where to find Cheap and discounted books

1. Charity shops

Not only can you get a book quite cheaply from a charity shop, but your purchase is also doing some good so it’s a win-win for everyone involved.

The one thing that might put you off buying from a charity shop is the fact that it can be potluck as to what is available so you could go in one day and there would be nothing appropriate and the next day someone might have dropped a package off and have a collection of books to go out onto the shop floor.

2. Friends and family

Parents and grandparents will often have books lying around the house that might no longer be age appropriate or no longer hold a child’s interest.

If you know other parents, ask if they have any books that they are looking to get rid of, they might be happy to just get them out of the house and give you them for free, if not then they might expect a token payment. 

3. Online auctions website

There are thousands of books listed for sale on auction websites, but they must be approached with caution, that’s not because of the potential for scams, but more to do with the fact that the price that you see, no matter how little will also occasionally be subject to postage and packaging.

As you’re not able to see and touch the book it can be difficult to tell the condition as most of the time the picture only has the front cover, which tells you nothing about the condition of the book.

You can ask questions of the seller before placing a bid and you might think that it is a worthwhile risk with how little you are actually spending.

4. Local marketplace

I’m sure that there isn’t anyone that hasn’t bought and sold something on Facebook marketplace or another online marketplace.

Some sellers might be prepared to post the books to you, but you will know the seller’s preference beforehand as to whether the books are collect only and if you’re searching locally, a car drive or walk might not be too much hassle to save money on a children’s book.

5. Car boot sales

If you enjoy a haggle buying books from a car boot sale might be the way to go.

Like a charity shop, it is a potluck that might be available but if you do find that diamond in the rough, it will probably be marked cheaply or at the very least you can haggle to what you might be comfortable with paying or what you think the book is worth.

6. On the high street

Last time l looked, there are still some bookshops that feature on the high street and they will often have sales on their books or provide offers such as buy one get one free, or discounts on particular authors.l 

7. Book websites

If you know what you’re looking for sites like Books2Door give huge discounts on books for a range of ages.

These discounts might be on individual books or collections of books. As of writing this post, they were selling 10 bedtime stories that would have cost £69.90 for £11.99, a saving of 83%

8. Supermarkets

Who hasn’t gone down the middle aisle of Lidl or Aldi?

If you know when to look you can get some great bargains on certain books.

When we had our first child, Aldi had a number of That’s not my…… books for less than you would find elsewhere, so we bought a few and they are still in great condition and are being used by our little girl to this day.

If you haven’t got the Aldi app, this might be something worth downloading its notifications will alert you to middle isle offers and when they start and when the offers are available online.

More recently we were able to get our hands on There’s a Bear On My Chair which retails for £6.99 for around £3.

Create a book swap with local parents

If you’re still not able to find cheap or discounted books or you want to just create something more social, which not consider starting a book swap club with local parents.

You might already know people from our child’s nursery to get this off the ground, but if not why not set up a page on Facebook?

Make use of the library

Children sometimes have low attention spans and can get bored quickly with a book, so if you don’t want to spend money on books visit your library more often.

Libraries were once places that didn’t really scream out as being somewhere that you would necessarily want to take your children to, they were dark, lifeless buildings and were not welcoming and you could get only get a limited amount of books.

But that has changed, our local library is colourful and has a dedicated area for children where they can sit at a table with their parents and read a book.

They’ve also moved with the times and gone electronic, using digital library cards to check books in and out. They also let you take out several books at any one time.

Conclusion

With books being so expensive, the cheapest way of getting them would be to ask friends and family if they have any that they are looking to get rid of.

Failing that if you aren’t able to find cheap or discounted books from them then you have been provided with a list of places where you can include the middle aisle of your favourite German supermarket and charity shops to name two.

If after reading this post you can think of any other ways to find cheap and discounted books, let me know in the comments.