Libraries Behaving Like Bookstores? Amazing.
The NYT reports today that libraries are adopting the bookstore model, by stocking what readers want and offering bestsellers in quantity.
A brand-new concept?
Hardly, as a 1979 article from Publishers Weekly about Baltimore County Public Library’s move toward the “demand-oriented, public bookstore” direction proves (click here to view pages one, two and three in full size).
It’s a good reminder as we head into the New Year that “everything old is new again.”
Our thanks to our friends at Publishers Weekly for permission to reproduce this story. In case you are wondering, the author of the piece, Kenneth C. Davis, went on to write the “Don’t Know Much About…” series.
December 31st, 2012 at 12:06 pm
Thanks for the memories!
January 2nd, 2013 at 12:37 pm
How true! In the 33 years since BCPL pioneered the
bookstore approach, it is “new to the NYTs” and still probably to many libraries. Even in this digital age when library customers, aka patrons, continuously tell library planning consultants that they want the same atmosphere, amentities and browsing approach they experience in bookstores, many libraries are do (will) not “give em what they want.”