Subject: Deferred binding of paperbacks
A useful reference on the subject may be "The Life expectancy of Paperback Books in Academic libraries: a follow-up study" by Roger Presley and Christina Landram, (from Georgia State U) in Technical Services Quarterly v 7 n 4 1990. The authors monitored a sample of books over four years, and concluded "that the blanket policy of binding paperbacks for this academic library is still not valid and is a waste of library resources". We were forced to end our bind-all-paperbacks policy this year due to budget cuts, and now only bind after circulation (which is also an indicator of future use), or some pre-selected types (glossy art books, scores etc). Its too early to know how the unbound books are surviving (if not used, then probably fairly well !), but we will monitor a sample over a few years. Ross Coleman Collection Management Librarian University of Sydney Library University of Sydney. NSW. 2006. AUSTRALIA +61 2 692 3352 Fax: +61 2 692 2890 *** Conservation DistList Instance 7:41 Distributed: Thursday, November 25, 1993 Message Id: cdl-7-41-003 ***Received on Thursday, 18 November, 1993