A library is much more than a place to hold and organize printed books. Our print book expenditure makes up only 22% of the total library budget. With all the new methods of storing and distributing information, the question arises why use a print books? When you have to understand a process, procedure, operations, history, or one person’s opinion, a book might be the answer. This blog answers how a book gets into this library.
There are three main ways a book is added to the library:
1) a decision is made by a librarian to acquire the book by reading reviews, suggestions from faculty, etc.;
2) it comes in under an approval plan;
3) it is given to the library as a gift.
Using fiscal year 2009 (July-June) as an example, you can see in the chart that most of the books are added as a result of a decision from a bibliographer. Bibliographers are librarians who work through the Collection Development Department, with has specialized education or experience in a subject we teach here at Georgetown. Bibliographers work on the reference desk so they know the research needs of students, they are invited by faculty to teach library resources in classes so they are in close contact with curricula on campus, and they are the personal contact between the library and academic departments, so they know the faculty. Bibliographers read book reviews from magazines like Choice and Booklist, read publisher catalogs, take suggestions from faculty and students, and pore over approval slips (see below) on what titles to add. At the beginning of every year a defined amount of money is given to each bibliographer to spend on a specific subject. When that money is gone, no new books are bought by the bibliographer for that subject. However, books are still coming in through the approval plan.
Approval plans are agreements with wholesalers and distributors of books, traditionally called “book jobbers.” Jobbers like Yankee Book Peddler have contracts with publishers to act as a distributer. Sometimes jobbers are able to offer discounts to the library, but their main benefit to libraries is the ability to direct the right book to fit the library’s need. Each jobber has a templet with more info about a book than you can imagine. Along with normal data such as the author, price, call number, the data collected also reflects whether the book is a textbook, best for undergraduates or graduates, in Spanish, or publishing in the Netherlands. Subjects are assigned to the book which go beyond those of the traditional Library of Congress subject headings. Each bibliographer knows the options of this templet and has selected what they want through the library’s profile. The subject profile filters the books so the right ones automatically come to the library. These filters can be set at a price, type of book, or any other criteria so books which are close to the profile don’t get sent, but slips are sent for review. This is why bibliographers are constantly reviewing approval slips in paper or virtually. With their many years of experience, a jobber can estimate how much money an approval plan will cost the library a year.
The other way books are added to our collections is through gifts. These gifts may be the result of students dumping their books after their school years, faculty members who are book reviewers donating, or established researchers moving or retiring who wish to find their books a “good home.” Just because the book made it into the building it does not mean the book will stay here. Last year a large percentage of the donations were sold at book sales or passed on to other institutions.
If you are an author and want to get your book into an academic library here are things to remember. Being published by an established publisher will put your book into the marketing machine, getting it into the hands of reviewers and jobbers. Sending a book to a library will not guarantee that it is added to the collection.
