It’s no secret that the Associated Students Wildcat Store is, well, no longer the A.S. Wildcat Store.

After being purchased by Follett over the summer, the bookstore went through numerous changes to become the Follett Wildcat Store.

But what does this Wildcat think of this new store? Well, here are a few pros and cons about the merger with Follett.

What’s Awesome

• Not just Apple anymore: The new Wildcat store sells accessories for products other than Apple. Finally!
• Better quality apparel: The shirts and sweatshirts look and feel nicer than what was offered before. Though the price? Well, look at the list below.

What’s Not-so-Awesome

• More expensive Wildcat gear: Although the clothes are better quality, we’re definitely paying for it. $52 for a sweatshirt that would have only cost around $45 before? No thanks.
• No more loyalty point system: I was saving up my points for some of that new Wildcat gear, and now the store has discontinued the program because it was too reminiscent of the old A.S. Wildcat Store. Sure, the store will redeem my points onto a gift card, but they round down to the closest available amount from when the point system was still in effect, so I’m not even getting all of the points I earned. Such a rip-off.
• The new textbook website: Before, one click would bring up a list off all of the required textbooks for each of my classes while also listing comparable prices for the same books from different online retailers. The new website made me look up every class individually, and there’s also no list of comparable prices anymore. Sure, that’s what made the A.S. Wildcat Store fail in the first place, but why couldn’t they have just removed the comparable prices but kept the general sort of setup?

Some of the changes that Follett made to the Wildcat Store are great. I love the new apparel and the fact that I now can shop for products for my Samsung tablet when before I was ostracized to Amazon.

That being said, unfortunately, the cons outweigh the pros in this Wildcat’s eyes. More money for apparel and the cancellation of the reward points system is really disappointing.

But what really kills this merger for me is the new textbook website. Not only was it a painstakingly long task to look up my books, but I had more problems ordering books this year than my entire time here at Chico State.

Not only did my textbooks travel across the country due to a messed up zip code, but they were the wrong books to begin with.

Follett, you may have bought the Wildcat Store, but you haven’t sold me yet.

Megan Mann can be reached at [email protected] and @meganisthemann on Twitter.