Patrons continue to devour our digital offerings. We've seen a 160% circulation increase since 2019. The pandemic and the growing popularity of listening to podcasts only strengthened the public transition to digital materials. With all this checking out, I thought it was time to do a quick check-in on our digital library.
Typically, publishers make roughly 40% profit on print books and 70% profit on digital materials. There is currently no legislation as to how publishers can charge libraries for digital materials. Most publishers meter each copy so that libraries can circulate only a certain number or length of time, typically two years.
This means that when digital materials expire, libraries need to repurchase them or let them go from the collection. The consortium that Camas Library belongs to allocates approximately one-third of the budget to new content and two-thirds of the budget to additional copies (so people don't have to wait so long on hold for popular items), or for replacing those expired copies.
The Camas Library offers digital materials to our patrons via two platforms: Overdrive (through the Libby app) and Hoopla. Here are a few differences between the two platforms.
Hoopla: Patrons don't have to wait in line; all content is available on demand.
Overdrive: This digital library is meant to act in many ways like a physical library: if an item is checked out, that means it's unavailable and patrons must wait in line. A library may choose to purchase a book via a different pricing model called Cost Per Circ (CPC), but this model is not always available for specific titles and the actual cost per item varies widely.
Hoopla: The on-demand pricing model is the only one that's available to libraries and, as such, we pay for every patron checkout, not for the item itself.
Overdrive: We are part of the Washington Digital Library Consortium, run by the State Library, which allows us to have access to tens of thousands more titles than we could afford with our own budget. To be part of this consortium, we pay by the size of our service population, which continues to grow faster than the rate of our budget. In addition, the consortium's general fees increase annually due to inflation and rising costs from publishers.
Membership in the consortium means we do not have to purchase specific titles; however, we may choose to buy either additional copies of existing titles or respond to a patron's request and buy a specific title not currently in the collection. While those titles would be available for the entire 45-library consortium, priority would be given to Camas patrons for the titles we select.
Hoopla: We started offering Hoopla in October 2021, paid for with ARPA funds administered through the Washington State Library. Now that those federal funds are disbursed, we are looking to absorb the cost and estimate the amount to be roughly $14,000 per year. In addition to ebooks and audiobooks, Hoopla offers movies, music, and television. Patrons are limited to ten checkouts per month.
Overdrive: We've offered access to digital materials (ebooks, audiobooks, and magazines) with the consortium for at least the last decade. Patrons are familiar with the platform and comfortable with the product. Current costs without any additional copies are approximately $22,000 for 2023 with an estimated 11% increase in 2024. Patrons are limited to five active checkouts at any given time.
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