The Mule Market, an online marketplace that makes marked- down textbooks, furniture and electronics available to students on the Hill, is reaching its final stages of development and will officially launch this fall.

Site founder Clay McMickens ’12 was frustrated by the diminished return students receive on their textbooks from companies such as Bell Tower Books and inspired by the enterprise of those that sell their goods on the Digest of General Announcements. He created the Mule Market to end the disconnect between students on the Hill and the materials they need for school.

“For the students, by the students,” is the thinking behind McMickens’ project, he said. “Everybody here at Colby has their own product, and it’s about time we have a shot to dictate the market for the things we sell ourselves.”

Only students on the Hill can log into the Mule Market, at themulemarket.com, using their campus username and password. They can post anything they want to sell at whatever price they see fit. The standard selling price for every new and used book sold at the bookstore is also listed on the site as a point of reference. With the textbook marketplace already up and running, only the furniture and electronics features have yet to be completed.

“The more people use it, the more everyone benefits,” McMickens said. “I want to shift the mentality [of how students conventionally sell their goods on campus], have kids go the extra mile, make them some extra money and provide the Colby community with a tool that benefits everyone,” McMickens said.

For a small eight-percent fee, McMickens will deliver anything bought on the market to any location on campus. Students can also leave goods for sale in a storage center until they receive an offer from a buyer. “For students that want to make money, the option is out there,” McMickens said. “A new blank marketplace is up and running. Now it’s up to us as a community to dictate how we fill it.”