Content provided in partnership with
The evolution of approval services - Library Finance: New Needs, New Models
Library Trends, Wntr, 1994 by Martin Warzala
Abstract
This article illustrates the major developments in book approval plans and information dissemination and document distribution services based on approval-like concepts. A brief history of modern book approval plans and approval-like services and an analysis of market trends supports responsible speculations on their anticipated evolution.
- Most Popular Articles in Reference
- The importance of understanding organizational culture
- Credit card attitudes and behaviors of college students
- What factors attract foreign direct investment?
- Libraries Need Relationship Marketing - mutual interest marketing concept, ...
- How to set performance goals: employee reviews are more than annual critiques
- More »
Gathering plans to support efficient acquisition of current library materials have their roots in blanket order plans of the late 1940s. Individual arrangements were made by large domestic public and select academic libraries with publishers and book dealers. In general, blanket orders operate by a library requesting a publisher or dealer to supply one copy of every title of a publisher's output or one copy of all of a publisher's output in select subject areas as they are published. Titles distributed to clients are nonreturnable. A notable example is the Greenaway Plan. Named for Emerson Greenaway who, as director of the Free Public Library of Philadelphia in the 1950s, arranged for publishers to send all their trade books to a library in advance of their on-sale date (Strauss, 1983, p. 298). Blanket orders are used for single copy acquisition and as review copies to support decisions for multiple copy purchases. The service supports reduction of some verification and ordering processes in libraries. Suppliers are assured of standing order sales of a select amount and/or universe of current publications. They must address the associated costs of performing this type of service including marketing, selling, packaging, billing, and required customer service contact.
Book approval plans achieved their predominant character in the early 1960s. Richard Abel, and other vendors who followed, demonstrated that the book purchasing habits of academic libraries could be predicted once the subject areas of primary interest of each library were known. Modern approval plans operate with the following processes as their foundation - these remain relatively consistent through the life cycle of most approval and approval-like concepts. Elements analogous to a library's selection criteria are recorded by a supplier in a form known as a profile. Vendors compare pre- and postpublication data about books with these profiles. Books which corresponded to data which match profiles are supplied to client libraries for in-hand review and selection. Those deemed unsuitable for acquisition may be returned to the supplier at no penalty to the library. Other variations of approval service provide clients the option of receiving notification forms, which include descriptive and availability information about books instead of generating automatic shipments. These forms are used for review and pro-active order generation by clients.
Cargill and Alley's (1979) classic text, Practical Approval Plan Management, documented the rationale for use of the service in a library.
1. Comprehensiveness of coverage.
2. Timeliness (in arrival of materials).
3. Freedom to return without advance authorization.
4. Time- and labor-saving features in these areas: reading publisher catalogs and reviews, pre-order searching and verification, vendor selection, order preparation, filing, and invoice processing.
5. An organized approach to collection development which can result in a better balanced collection through the preparation of a profile.
6. Book selection is done with book in hand.
7. Useful generalized and specific statistical reports from vendor based on approval plan records for library.
8. Access to approval vendor's historical data base.
9. Interface of standing orders and approval plans.
10. Access to vendors' wider knowledge of publishing output. (p. 4)
From the early 1960s to the late 1970s, vast amounts of money were being pumped into academic libraries for book acquisitions. Academic library personnel budgets were not increasing at a corresponding rate, and book selection and ordering procedures that facilitated labor intensive. Simultaneously, relatively affordable computer technology emerged which supported data processing that facilitated performance of library collection development functions by library material suppliers. The combination of these factors - the proliferation of scholarship and associated publishing along with the previously noted user rationale - solidified the position of approval plans as legitimate tools to support acquisition and collection development for books in academic and research libraries.
Libraries which adopted the modern approval concepts abdicated certain technical service responsibilities - most significantly book selection - to library material suppliers. Suppliers developed and marketed approval plans in this time period to generate profit as a result of book sales attracted by the value-added collection-development services. Provision of these services increased the supplier operating costs for: computers and computer specialists to address data processing operations; librarians and book specialists who are required for traditional library technical processes and more demanding publisher contact functions.
Find Research Guides for:
Find Featured Titles for: Autos
Most Popular Articles in Reference
- The importance of understanding organizational culture
- Credit card attitudes and behaviors of college students
- What factors attract foreign direct investment?
- Libraries Need Relationship Marketing - mutual interest marketing concept, ...
- How to set performance goals: employee reviews are more than annual critiques
- More »