Will Goodwill take old encyclopedias?

Goodwill of New Mexico generally does not accept encyclopedia sets at the intake door. Encyclopedias have near-zero retail demand and take up significant shelf space relative to revenue, so most local Goodwill stores either decline them at intake or accept them and immediately route them to the Goodwill Outlet (the bins) for sale by the pound — and from there typically to a paper pulper or commodity wholesaler.

The same applies to most other thrift channels in the metro: Savers, Friends of the Albuquerque Public Library, Habitat ReStore, and Better World Books all generally reject encyclopedia donations.

The honest path for an encyclopedia set in Albuquerque:

• Donate to NMLP (free pickup, any condition). Unsalvageable copies go to a regional pulper for paper recycling, not landfill.
• Recycle through a commercial paper pulper. Friedman Recycling or similar regional facility accepts book quantities for direct pulping.
• Don't put hardcover encyclopedias in your residential blue bin. Hardcover bindings contaminate the paper-recycling stream — the City of Albuquerque Solid Waste Department's accepted-materials list excludes them.

For the deeper sourced analysis of what happens to donated books at each Albuquerque option, see The Lifecycle of a Donated Book in Albuquerque.

The sets worth a second look

A small slice of encyclopedia sets deserves better than the pulper, and it is worth thirty seconds to check before you load the car. Early leather-bound editions — the 1900s through 1930s era, including the famous Britannica Eleventh — still carry collector and decorator value. Mid-century World Book and Funk & Wagnalls sets get rehomed through teacher networks for classroom art and craft projects rather than recycled. And matched gold-stamped spines have a quiet decor market: people genuinely buy them by the shelf-foot for the look. Partial sets are fine in every case — A through F is still a donation. If what you have is pre-war or leather-bound, text a photo to 702-496-4214 before hauling anything and I will tell you honestly which pile it belongs in.

What recycling actually involves here

The honest version: most encyclopedia sets will not be resold by anyone, including me — supply is enormous and demand is near zero. What I add is the handling. At the warehouse the glue bindings get stripped by hand, which keeps the paper stream clean enough for the regional pulper, and none of it routes to landfill. Full Britannica sets are remarkably heavy, which is exactly what the free pickup exists for — a full set does not need to ride in your trunk twice. NMLP is a for-profit operation, so there is no tax receipt; the trade is that nothing gets condition-rejected at the door. The longer treatment is in the old encyclopedias guide.