Southern New Hampshire University Saves Students $2 Million Since Launching Bookstore Initiative Last Year
(PRWEB) March 13, 2014 -- Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU), a private, non-profit institution committed to making higher education more accessible and affordable, has announced $2M in savings for its student at the end of its first year of implementing cost saving and customer service enhancements in partnership with its bookstore. The effort, intended to lower the cost of course materials while improving the overall customer experience, has been a big success—and there’s more to come.
In response to student concerns about the cost of required course materials, SNHU began rolling out a series of efforts in March 2013 to reduce pricing of textbooks for both online and on-campus students. Through a new bookstore vendor relationship with MBS Direct, SNHU launched a new online bookstore, decreased the cost of course materials, increased e-book offerings for many courses, and implemented a free shipping policy for all College of Continuing Education (COCE) course materials purchased from the new MBS Direct online bookstore.
“All of these improvements add up to bigger savings, better service and more success for our students,” said Matt Thornton, COCE senior director of Student Success. “We have seen tremendous results over the last year, but our work is far from done. At SNHU, we understand that the cost of textbooks is simply too high for many students, and we’re always looking for new ways to bring prices down. We’ll continue using more digital resources wherever we can, and working with publishers to make books more affordable for our students while also enhancing the customer experience.”
The university’s mission is to make high-quality higher education not only attainable, but also affordable, and this initiative has held true to that promise. The bulk of the $2M in savings is the result of renegotiating prices with publishers and SNHU’s decision to forego the commission that many colleges and universities receive on bookstore sales.
Students now pay an average of 30 percent less for course materials over last year and receive free ground shipping. They also receive 24/7 support to help them get the course materials they need in time for term starts. Interactive learning tools have also been added to more than 200 classes.
Learn more about Southern New Hampshire University’s initiatives to provide affordable and accessible higher education at http://www.snhu.edu.
About Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU)
Southern New Hampshire University is a not-for-profit, regionally accredited university with an 80-year history of educating successful professionals. SNHU has a total enrollment of 36,000+ students in more than 180 undergraduate and graduate degree and certificate programs, available online, at our main campus in Manchester, NH, and at our regional centers in New Hampshire and Maine.
Southern New Hampshire University has been recognized with “Best of Business” awards for best online degree programs and was ranked 12th on Fast Company’s 2012 list of The World’s 50 Most Innovative Companies. SNHU was the only university to earn this distinction.
Pamme Boutselis, Southern New Hampshire University, http://www.snhu.edu, +1 603-851-5399, [email protected]
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