Income Generation and Pricing in Libraries
| Published date | 01 March 1994 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/01435129410772275 |
| Pages | 5-17 |
| Date | 01 March 1994 |
| Author | Yvette Tilson |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science |
This article originated in a thesis which examined
the trend in libraries towards charging users
directly for services.
Observations (and incentives) “from the top”,
from the British Government or from bodies
established by the Government aim to encourage
librarians and information workers in realizing the
income potential of their resources. The concept
of tradable information was considered in the
Information Technology Advisory Panel (ITAP)
report of 1983[1], which recommended, among
other things, that:
“Both private and public sectors in the United
Kingdom need to pay much more attention to
information as a commercial commodity, to be
concerned with the creation and maintenance of
its value”[1, p. 8, para. 5.1]. In order, therefore, to
offset the balance of payments deficit, the UK
should capitalize on its information assets.
The library literature has also become
concerned with the issue of commercialization:
what skills are needed[2], “what we are doing in
our library”[3], what the impact of this new
attitude to income generation might be[4,5].
Surveys which look at practices across all sectors
have been undertaken by Birks[6] and Redican[7].
The Survey
A pilot questionnaire was prepared, and this was
amended on the advice of six librarians and three
advisers with professional experience in
questionnaire design. Advising librarians were
chosen to represent public, academic and special
library perspectives with the objective of making
the questionnaire as relevant to all three sectors as
possible. As well as minor changes to vocabulary,
some preconceptions (e.g. in asking the
respondents to classify themselves according to
certain criteria) were removed. In order to reduce
complication, two questionnaires were designed:
questionnaire A was aimed at library and
information services which charge for services
and questionnaire B at those which make no
charges or only punitive charges.
Forty-seven questionnaires were sent out in
October 1992 to libraries of all types in a sample
selected from libraries in the London area. The
survey was limited to the Inner and Outer London
areas for practical considerations (time and
money) and for the more positive reason of there
being a great wealth of libraries in these areas.
Whether the demands placed on London libraries
are atypical (in terms of, for example, quantity of
usage, which can play a significant part in
influencing decisions to charge) is not certain, but
relevant examples, sometimes contradicting those
found in this survey, are included from libraries
from further afield.
In a bid to provide a balanced picture, the
sample of libraries was chosen with no regard to
known charging practices or political persuasions.
Questionnaires were sent to chief librarians in
one-third of public library services (i.e. 12) and
one-third of academic libraries (counting the
University of London colleges as individual
entities (i.e. 16) in the London area) as listed in
Harrold[8]. Special libraries were selected, using
Harrold and Task Force Pro Libra (TFPL)[9] to
represent various types of libraries including
Government libraries and those of industrial
organizations.
By early December 1992 and after issuing a
reminder letter, 38 usable questionnaires were
returned, representing an 81 per cent response
rate. The responses to the questionnaire, analysed
by type of library, are given in Table I.
The high level of response from librarians in all
types of library must reflect a broad and high
level of interest in this area. Indeed, unsolicited
comments included: “The subject of your
investigation is of timely interest” and, from a
respondent declining to be interviewed, “due to
time pressures/not lack of interest”.
VOLUME 15 NUMBER 2
1994
5
Income Generation and
Pricing in Libraries
Yvette Tilson
Library Management, Vol. 15 No. 2, 1994, pp. 5-17
© MCB University Press, 0143-5124
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