The line looked like it never ended.
It snaked from the doors of the book-filled warehouse down North Main Street, and more literary enthusiasts kept coming to join it.
A crowd of UF students, Gainesville residents and booklovers from across the country stood chatting in the cool morning air Saturday, waiting for the doors of the Friends of the Library book sale to open.
About 700 people came out Saturday for the first 30 minutes of Alachua County Friends of the Library’s biannual book sale, said Peter G. Roode, organization president.
Sarah Harrison, Friends of the Library publicity chair, said the sale raised about $80,000 on the first day.
Roode said he couldn’t estimate how many people showed up over the weekend for the book sale at 430-B N. Main St., but he said it was easily thousands.
The warehouse, which is slightly bigger than a quarter of a football field, was less crowded than usual. Harrison said the Florida-Georgia game drew droves of students out of town, which cut down the crowd.
Since the crowd was tamer, patrons had room to walk down most of the aisles of books, rather than squeezing through like in previous years.
The sale, which lasts through Wednesday, holds about 500,000 items such as books, videotapes and posters.
After the doors opened Saturday, a man with a baby slung on his back sifted through books as people around him filled cardboard boxes and grocery bags with items.
Blaine Beck, a UF environmental engineering sophomore, waited in line Saturday morning with his friends. He felt the fistful of coins in his pocket: $3.80 exactly.
“I have a little coin jar, and I raided it,” the 19-year-old said.
Books can be as little as 25 cents at the sale, and cheap prices attract students looking for good books.
Janeen Badillo, a UF nursing junior, spotted an old nursing textbook that only cost a few dollars.
“You see this Perry and Potter?” the 20-year-old asked. “I paid like $100 for that.”
Badillo held on to the textbook, since she’s taking a pharmacology class next semester.
Harrison said the sale’s prices are cheaper than used bookstores and Amazon.
“You can buy, like, 100 books for way, way less than retail,” she said.
All profits from the sale go to the Alachua County Library District, said Betty Roode, a sale volunteer.
Harrison said the book sale is a staple Gainesville experience.
“It’s the biggest sale in the Southeast,” she said. “We’ve been able to create this kind of very big thing in this very small town.”
“I wish I had a million books,” said Lily Mills, 7, before she sat with her brother Hayden, 5, at the Friends of the Library book sale. The sale, which started Saturday and ends Wednesday, raises money for the Alachua County Library District.
