EXCLUSIVE: ThriftBooks automates operations with proprietary AI

ThriftBooks is using its own artificial intelligence (AI) platform to streamline CRM and inventory management activities.

The country’s largest independent online retailer of used books has been able to scale its operations over the last 20 years with an in-house-developed AI solution called KeepBook. Chain Store Age recently spoke with Barbara Hagen, VP of marketing and sales at ThriftBooks, to learn more about the retailer’s development and utilization of AI-based automation technology. 

What business issues was ThriftBooks facing?

We needed a way to easily automate the regularly increasing volume of books ThriftBooks receives daily. So, we decided to develop our own unique learning algorithm, KeepBook, which enabled us to move away from manual sorting, which is tedious and extremely time consuming. 

With our proprietary technology, ThriftBooks can keep up with global demand, create better jobs, process more than 200 million pounds of incoming books each year, recycle what we can’t sell, and keep all that material out of landfill. 

What made you decide to develop an AI system in-house?

As far as we know, there is no off-the-shelf tool that can do anything like this at the scale we operate at ThriftBooks, offering more than 19 million new and used books. It is a lot for a human to fully process all the possibilities. 

ThriftBooks marries customer insights, including zero- and first-party party data, with generative AI to find unique and specific combinations and recommendations for our book lovers. It is a surprise and delight experience when our customers discover their next new favorite book or author.  That satisfaction helps drive customer retention. 

Using generative AI, ThriftBooks can entice a browsing reader with something unexpected to discover, creating a new journey of book recommendations and suggestions. Two things book lovers love most are finding an unexpected new book and doing so at a great low price.

We are also employing large language models to enhance our onsite product data, such as summarized versions of website content, including product descriptions, and author biographies on ThriftBooks.com. 

What are the specific capabilities of KeepBook?

KeepBook is a system for predicting supply and demand at a huge scale. It analyzes millions of inventory and market inputs and makes millions of inventory and pricing decisions in near real-time. It is highly adaptive to market changes and can react immediately to both internal and external signals.

KeepBook plays a significant role in the automation-driven approach of ThriftBooks, supporting our robust inventory management and customer service efforts. KeepBook looks at 20 years of company data and continually improves our efficiency both in the breadth and depth of our catalog.

Thanks to KeepBook, ThriftBooks is seamlessly able to manage, house, update, and replenish millions of books across our five processing centers in the U.S. in Phoenix, Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas, and Baltimore.

What results has ThriftBooks received so far from KeepBook?

Our holiday sales continued their year-over-year growth in 2023, rising more than 20%, especially notable as it was achieved without the aid of any seasonal discounting.  

ThriftBooks has sold close to 300 million books and saved one billion books from landfill. With the help of automation, we have saved an estimated nine million trees and reduced global carbon dixoxide by an estimated 400 million pounds in the last six years. 

Are there any future plans for KeepBook and generative AI?

Like most retailers, ThriftBooks is testing and learning with generative AI and will continue to do so as the technology evolves. We have some exciting plans coming in 2024 which we will share details on later this year.