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Collegiate Retail Alliance Partners with CourseSmart LLC
College Store Business Coalition Teams with Leading Digital Delivery Company to Offer Member Stores New eTextbook Capabilities
Plymouth Meeting, PA, April 13, 2009--The Collegiate Retail Alliance (CRA), a coalition of independent college stores that shares and deploys the industry’s best business practices, and CourseSmart LLC, the nation’s largest digital course materials supplier, announced today that they are partnering to help users of CRA’s VisualRATEX™ system meet the growing demand for electronic versions of textbooks and other course materials.
CourseSmart’s products and services have been integrated with VisualRATEX™, the store management system developed by RATEX Business Solutions, which is wholly owned by CRA member stores. The VisualRATEX inventory management and point-of-sale system now accommodates the purchase of eTextbooks, a feature also incorporated in the new eRATEX web store being rolled out later this year.
Through CourseSmart, VisualRATEX users now can offer students digital versions of nearly 6,000 textbooks from 12 different publishers, representing over one-third of all titles in demand in North America. CourseSmart eTextbooks can be downloaded to a student’s laptop or accessed online from any computer connected to the Internet.
“CRA is committed to staying at the forefront of collegiate retailing through innovation, technology, and strategic partnerships,” stated Richard W. McDaniel, CRA President and Chairman. “As course materials shift to new platforms, the ability to offer students texts in electronic as well as print formats is essential. We are pleased to partner with CourseSmart to give our members access to CourseSmart’s comprehensive array of digital content.”
“CRA members are among the most innovative college stores in the industry and we welcome the opportunity to help them meet the growing needs of today’s students for easy access to digital content,” stated Sean Devine, CourseSmart CEO. “Students rate CourseSmart eTextbooks highly for their cost advantages, search capabilities, and the convenience of accessing their assigned textbook anytime and anywhere. We look forward to offering eTextbooks to the hundreds of thousands of students served by CRA member stores.”
The San Diego State University Bookstore was one of five CRA member stores that piloted the CourseSmart program. Todd Summer, SDSU’s Campus Stores Director and CRA Digital Delivery Chair, reports that in the first year, his store sold about 3,000 CourseSmart eTextbooks. “We were pleased to be able to offer our students choice and keep them as customers,” Summer observed. “The strength of CRA member stores in partnership with the great team at CourseSmart helps position both our organizations for the future.”
About the Collegiate Retail Alliance
Founded ten years ago by five of the nation’s largest independent college stores, the Collegiate Retail Alliance (CRA) is a business coalition dedicated to helping members stores deliver more value to the institutions they serve by sharing and deploying the industry’s best business practices. More than 50 stores are CRA members; their combined annual revenue is nearly $1 billion. The organization’s wholly owned software company, RATEX Business Solutions, produces VisualRATEX™, the most comprehensive inventory management and point-of-sale system and the only one owned by collegiate retailers. In addition to CourseSmart, CRA partners with other leading suppliers such as Follett Higher Education Group, NACSCORP, and Ingram Book Company.
CRA recently was awarded the 2009 Leveraging Excellence Award from the National Consortium for Continuous Improvement in Higher Education (NCCI) for its development of VisualRATEX.
For more information, visit the Collegiate Retail Alliance website at www.collegiateretailalliance.com/.
About CourseSmart LLC
CourseSmart LLC is the world’s largest marketplace for digital course materials and the best tool for students who want to save money buying their assigned textbooks as eTextbooks. The company offers thousands of textbooks across hundreds of courses in a common eTextbook platform. Students can purchase CourseSmart eTextbooks directly or through hundreds of participating college stores and retail partners.
For more information, visit www.coursesmart.com or read the company blog at blog.coursesmart.com.