Purchase On Demand In The ULMS

Well, that does take a little of the fun out of it. I was thinking we could respond directly. I also put out a few ideas via email that might be valuable topics to get some opinions on. I won’t recreate the email here, but one of my favorites is Purchase on Demand. I know several of you are already doing some sort of purchase on demand in your library. Chances are it is not as free- wheeling as I’d like to see in the future. Along with Alma I believe we could incorporate ILL budgets and standards so we would be able to make the decision on the spot whether it should be purchased or borrowed. The new collection may have only one or two copies of each title, so if it is new and there are zero copies, that will be pretty easy to spot. The subjects can be determined ahead of time with your collection development people depending on what topics are trending on campus at the time. Price limits should probably be kept within reason, say $150 limit, so if we make a real bone head decision it’s not too terrible. 

This would move Resource Sharing closer to the Collection Development side of the libraries. I believe that would also keep our skill level growing, making us more valuable, and hopefully, making more money. This is not something new. Other libraries have been doing this very successfully for years. As a matter of fact, statistically speaking, books purchased on demand have a higher check-out rate over their lifetime than those books chosen by bibliographers. We are on the front line of seeing what patrons are wanting 

-Darlene Nowak 

Resource Sharing Unit Head 

San Diego State University(CDS)