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Information about Luton Libraries and the library service in England
In England libraries are funded through their local authority (County Council, Borough Council for example) through a local Council Tax. Libraries are currently a statutory service, so the council has a legal duty to provide libraries, although the level of provision has not been clearly defined. This means that some library services receive more funding than others, and the range of services can vary greatly across England.
In Luton, the library service was funded directly by Luton Borough Council, until the creation of Luton Cultural Services Trust in 2008, which now manages libraries, museums and arts provision in the town. Becoming a cultural trust has given us some freedom in how we run our services, although we have set standards to maintain. It means that we can apply for extra funding that normal library services cannot access, and makes partners more interested in working with us.
Luton is a small but densely populated town, with almost 200,000 people, with many different nationalities and cultural backgrounds. This includes Pakistani, Irish, Bangladeshi, African and Eastern European communities. Poverty and literacy are big problems, approximately 30% of adults struggle with reading and writing. The town has more in common with an inner-city London borough than the rural counties surrounding it.
The main campus for the University of Bedfordshire is based in Luton, and because of Luton airport and our proximity to London, we have many students from overseas.
We have 8 libraries and one mobile library, as well as a Home Library Service, which delivers books to elderly and disabled customers. The Central Library is based in the town square and has three floors of books and other items for loan, as well as 66 computers for public use. We offer one hour’s free Internet use per person per day, and we provide support for customers who are learning how to use computers. More details of our services can be found at www.lutonlibraries.co.uk
As a small library service, we cooperate with two other library services in Central Bedfordshire and Bedford Borough Council, and loan books, DVDs, CDs and audiobooks to each other’s customers. We share an online library catalogue and try to work together on new developments where possible.
Why Ebooks?
In Luton we have a culture of using new technology wherever possible, to improve customer services and make best use of our resources. We offer remote online access to newspapers, the driving theory test and the UK Citizenship Test, as well as access in libraries to Ancestry.com, a subscription website which helps people trace their family tree. The range of services we offer remote access to can be found on our website under the section “Do It Online”.
Luton is a commuter town, and there are many people who travel to London each day for work, and do not have time to visit the library, so our online services help us to reach an audience who might not come to libraries on a regular basis.
We had previous experience of running a downloadable service in 2006, when we were involved in a Netlibrary (www.netlibrary.com) project providing downloadable audiobooks to approximately 50 customers. The project finished early because of legal disagreements between the publishers and the web host, but it proved to us that downloading could be popular and relatively easy for customers to do. Those people who had used the service continued to email us, asking for a replacement service, and this encouraged us to keep looking for a new downloadable provider.
When we were approached by Overdrive, in summer 2008, we were also planning for the closure of the central library for four months, as we had been given £1.25 million from the Big Lottery, for a complete refurbishment. We saw the introduction of ebooks/ e-audiobooks as a way of helping our customers cope with the closure period.
The Timing of the Decision
In June 2008 we were contacted by Overdrive and given an online demonstration. We were convinced immediately that was the audiobook service we had been looking for. We knew that they also offered ebooks, but we were concerned that the market had not yet developed, so we agreed to only stock downloadable audiobooks at that stage and began work to create our audiobook website.
In October 2008 I attended a conference run by Overdrive and saw the Sony EReader for the first time. Once I had the chance to handle it, see the quality of the text and the ease of use, I became convinced that we should launch our service with both audiobooks and eBooks.
I discussed with colleagues the kind of ebooks we thought we might stock, then created a selection for the website and we were ready to launch in December 2008.
Technical Issues
The advantage of buying our service through Overdrive is that their experience with American libraries meant that the process of creating the website and choosing books was quite straightforward. Overdrive’s package included staff training and support, so everything proceeded well until we came to the point of trying to make the service available to our customers. Because we wanted to restrict usage to Luton Library customers only, we decided to use a SIP2 connection (to allow the Overdrive server and the customer database server to communicate securely) and this took some time to organise, as it meant our library management system supplier (Axiell) liaising with our IT people and the IT support staff at Overdrive.
An added and unexpected complication was that the Overdrive staff were based in the USA, so the only time that everyone could be in “live” contact, was between about 1pm and 5pm each day. Despite this logistical problem, Overdrive staff were the ones who drove this side of the project, and eventually the technical issues were resolved. The site finally went live at the beginning of March 2009.
How Does Overdrive Work?
On our website http://lutonlibraries.lib.overdrive.com – you will find a tutorial you can follow, to see how the process works from start to finish. Customers can search for books, but to download they need to log on using their library card number and PIN number. The first time they use the service, they need to download some software, the Overdrive Media Console for audiobooks, and Adobe Digital Editions for ebooks. Once this is done the customer can download up to 10 books at a time and can choose their loan period, from 7, 14 or 21 days. The book is downloaded with a licence, which expires at the end of this period and “returns” the book to the library, so that they are available for other customers.
We only have one copy of most books, but customers add themselves to the waiting list and are notified when the book is returned. They can also keep a “wish list” of books they would like to borrow in the future. Customers can also rate books they have borrowed (up to 5 stars) and can use Twitter, Facebook or email to share their book choices with their friends.
Marketing and Promotion
Promoting such a new and innovative service is actually more difficult than you would imagine. You don’t have a physical “object” to display in libraries, and posters don’t work very well, as customers don’t really read them. We were unable to download from the website in our libraries, as the firewall prevents any downloading by customers or staff.
We have had to think of new ways of promoting the service, and Overdrive has helped with this. They designed bookmarks and “business card” style publicity, which we have put into books and audiobooks in our libraries. We also give them to anyone we think might be interested, at shows or events, and I always carry a number of cards with me to give to anyone I might be meeting.
We have a page in the monthly council newsletter (Lutonline –
http://www.luton.gov.uk/internet/references/A_Z/C/Communications/lutonlineemail.html) which nearly always features ebooks. Sometimes we do a press release talking about upgrades to the service, at other times we mention it as part of an article on another subject, for example:
The Twilight Saga Continues
Have you been caught up in Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight stories? New Moon, the second film in the series, comes out on DVD at the end of March, and the third film is due out this year. To find out now what happens to Bella and her new family, there’s only one way – borrow the books!
There are four books in the series - Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn. You can reserve the library books online at https://libraries.bedscc.gov.uk – all you need is your library card and PIN number. Or download the audiobooks from our Digital Media Library - at http://lutonlibraries.lib.overdrive.com”
Word of mouth is our best publicity, and we know that people will recommend it to their friends once they have tried it. We are however, continuing to think of new ways to promote the service.
The Customers
One of the strangest aspects of this service is that you don’t really get to know your customers, as they are downloading from home. We often hear from people as they first use the digital media library, saying how good it is and how much they are enjoying using it, but then they “disappear”. Because the SIP2 connection codes the borrower details to protect their identity, we cannot see which of our customers is using the service. We can see from the Overdrive management information that there is a high level of repeat usage, and we don’t hear of many problems, but equally we don’t get much feedback, which means that we have to use our own judgement in the development of the service. We look at what customers are downloading, what is most popular, and base our decisions on that and our own knowledge of “ordinary books” and how popular they are. We have worked hard to get a good balance of books for children, teenagers and adults, and for a range of subjects, but we are still trying to understand how the website will develop in the future.
Ebook Websites – The Ultimate Virtual Library
Overdrive made us think about this service in a new light; it may be expensive but:
• The books are always returned on time
• The books are never damaged, or lost
• You do not need library staff to issue the books, or to shelve and tidy them
• The books don’t wear out and need replacing.
• You don’t have to use an expensive building to run the service
Thinking about your eBook service as an extra “branch library” is a good analogy. One of our smallest libraries costs £44,000 a year for staff, even before heating and lighting and other building costs are paid for. The use of the service is growing steadily, and we hope it will reach “branch library” level within the next year, at least in terms of the number of customers.
Lessons Learned
• Each new Ereader or MP3 player will give us a problem, or an issue. For example, we have just discovered that the Sony Reader can hold EPUB books, or PDF books, but not both at the same time!
• It is difficult to get library staff engaged with a “virtual library” unless they are using it themselves. They may also see it as a threat to their own career.
• There is a minimum level of books you need to keep customers coming back; it seems to be around the 1,000 book level, but we are closer to 2000 books now.
• Not everyone can cope with downloading; a small percentage of customers will not be able to do it without support in the library itself. One customer even bought an Apple Mac, without checking with us that it would work with our system – it doesn’t.
• We have bought a laptop with wireless internet access, so that we can demonstrate the website to library staff, customers and non-customers.
• We started with WMA and PDF formats, and have had to add in MP3 and EPUB formats this year. The popularity of certain formats has changed rapidly in two years.
• Customers especially like downloading medical and self-help books, anything they might find too embarrassing to ask for in the library itself.
• Customers will give anything a try and aren’t too concerned about the bestsellers; they just want a good read.
• There is no “average” Ebook customer – they may be older, younger, professional, student, housewife or child – they are as diverse as all our library customers!
• In our next phase we will add our own eBook content, encouraging local people to give us their stories, poetry and creative work.
Other Ebook Services available to UK Libraries
Bloomsbury Online
- Has a range of book that can be read online (not downloaded) if a library subscribes to the service. The range is quite small but will expand in the future.
WF Howes
- Working in partnership with Netlibrary. Has a wide range of audiobooks available for download via library subscription. Each book can be downloaded by multiple users at the same time, but no ebooks are available.
Askews Ebook Project
Askews is one of the main library suppliers in the UK. They are currently working on an eBook project with several library services. Customers will be able to click on the catalogue record to be taken to the eBook website and the library service will have to buy the rights to the book, and then pay per download. The first services are expected to launch in Summer 2010.
A Few of Our Websites
Luton and Bedfordshire’s library catalogue - https://libraries.bedscc.gov.uk
Luton Libraries’ Digital Media Library - http://lutonlibraries.lib.overdrive.com
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