Who We Are
MonsterTrade was founded in June of 2004, by current CEO and former UCSB Business-Economics major Farbod Javaherchi, as a means for empowering college students to bypass the middlemen and get the most bang for their buck. The idea was to help students save money amidst an ever rising cost of textbooks and other school expenses. While policy makers and universities have clearly failed in recent years to deal with this issue, bookstores have added fuel to the flame by charging outrageous amounts for used textbooks and paying spare change in their buy-back programs (as if they were doing everyone a favor). Over the years, our Site has expanded beyond textbooks, and our members currently trade pretty much anything as long as it’s legal and acceptable.
The idea came to Farbod in a research paper concerning the pricing of textbooks. While the paper itself could not achieve a better grade than a D, we estimate that in 2 years since launching this Website, we have saved the UCSB student body over $100,000 on textbooks alone.
How we did it?
Our idea spread rapidly through an aggressive 2 year off-line marketing campaign consisting mostly of individual campus reps, Greek letter organizations, and word of mouth. The Website was originally developed by CSU Fullerton graduate computer science majors, with a bit of help from the programmers at Aplus.net. Our Site is currently maintained by InfactSolutions.
What sets us apart?
At MonsterTrade, we value our ability to create savings for students, whilst also allowing students to make a few dollars by selling their items. Our company was created by students whose objective was to help other students; and that’s what sets us apart. While many Websites on the Internet claim to help users save the most on their textbooks, the MonsterTrade model should mathematically save both buyer and the seller the most amount of money. Most of these other Websites are simply online bookstores, or at best, referrers to other online bookstores. You save a few bucks on your item, but when you add the shipping costs and the waiting, you’re probably better off finding a local store. Plus, think about it this way, when you buy something off of MonsterTrade, not only will you save money yourself, but you will also help another student sell something. So the money always stays in the students’ pocket; and that is the MonsterTrade mission.
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