Merchandising Library Materials to Young Adults

Merchandising Library

Materials to Young

Adults

LIBRARIES UNLIMITED

Mary Anne Nichols

MERCHANDISING LIBRARY

MATERIALS TO YOUNG ADULTS

Libraries Unlimited Professional Guides

for Young Adult Librarians Series

C. Allen Nichols and Mary Anne Nichols,

Series Editors

Merchandising Library Materials to Young Adults

Mary Anne Nichols

Library Materials and Services for Teen Girls

Katie O’Dell

Merchandising Library

Materials to Young Adults

MARY ANNE NICHOLS

2002

LIBRARIES UNLIMITED

A Division of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc.

Greenwood Village, Colorado

To Allen, Evan, and Bennett—I am truly blessed.

Copyright © 2002 Mary Anne Nichols

All Rights Reserved

Printed in the United States of America

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a re￾trieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,

electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,

without the prior written permission of the publisher.

The author gratefully acknowledges the permission of the following

companies for allowing photographs of their products to be included

in this work: Brodart Co., P.O. Box 300, McElhatten, PA 17748;

Demco, Inc., P.O. Box 1488, Madison, WI 53707; Displays 2 Go, 55

Broad Common Road, Bristol, RI 02809; Gaylord Bros., P.O. Box

4901, Syracuse, NY 13221; Gressco, Ltd., P.O. Box 339, Waunakee,

WI 53597; Highsmith, Inc., P.O. Box 800, Fort Atkinson, WI 53538;

Library Display Shelving, 173 W. Ohio Avenue, Lake Helen, FL

32744; Literature Display Products, P.O. Box 501790, Indianapolis,

IN 46250; Texwood Library Furniture, P.O. Box 431, Taylor, TX

76574.

Libraries Unlimited

A Division of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc.

7730 East Belleview Avenue, Suite A200

Greenwood Village, CO 80111

1-800-225-5800

www.lu.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Nichols, Mary Anne, 1967-

Merchandising library materials to young adults / Mary Anne Nichols.

p. cm. -- (Libraries Unlimited professional guides for young adult librarians

series, ISSN 1532-5571)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 0-313-31382-2 (alk. paper)

1. Libraries and teenagers--United States. 2. Young adults’ libraries--United States. 3.

Teenagers--Books and reading--United States. 4. Library exhibits--United States. I.

Title. II. Series.

Z718.5 .N53 2002

027.62'6--dc21

2001054545

Contents

Tables and Illustrations . . . . . . . . . . . . . viii

Series Foreword. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . x

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi

1—Marketing—An Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Product . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Price . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Place . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Promotion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

2—Knowing the Teen Patron. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Teens Today. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

3—The YA Collection—Giving Them What They Want . . . . . . . . 13

Collection Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

A Cool Collection. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

And the Survey Says . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Fiction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Nonfiction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Magazines/Comic Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Audio Visual . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Collection Maintenance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

4—Merchandising Your YA Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Getting Started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

v

5—The Case for Display Shelving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Face-Front Shelving. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

Browsing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Exposure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Attention . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Interpretation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Memory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Factors That Influence Borrowing Decisions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

What Are Good Books to Display? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

Fiction Classification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Reader’s Interest Categorization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

6—Techniques of Display . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

Visual Merchandising. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

Before You Begin. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

Principles of Display . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Balance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Emphasis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Simplicity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Variety . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Unity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Shapes of Design. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Techniques/Arrangements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Components of Display . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Color . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Lighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Signage. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Display Locations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Props and Other Materials Used in Display . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68

7—Fixtures for Merchandising . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Fixtures for Merchandising and Displaying the YA Collection . . . . . . 73

Fixtures for Shelving. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74

Fixtures for Displaying . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83

List of Vendors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

vi ◆ Contents

8—Promoting the YA Collection: Other Ideas . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

Promotion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

Contests . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

Tours. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106

Bulletin Boards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

Booktalking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108

Promotional Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110

Booklists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Websites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

Notes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

9—Library Services to Enhance Your Merchandising Efforts . . . . . . 119

Reader’s Advisory for Teens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126

Pacing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132

Characterization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132

Storyline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132

Frame . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

Notes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137

10—A Running Start! Ideas to Begin Your Merchandising Efforts . . . 141

General Themes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142

Specific Themes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142

Go to Jail . . . Go Directly to Jail . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143

Get Over It! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145

Who Do You Think You Are? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147

This Is Happily Ever After? Dump Your Significant Jerk Day . . . 149

Are We There Yet?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151

Working for a Living . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

What in the World? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155

Short on Time? . . . Try One of These . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157

Can You Haiku? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

Psst . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

Make Yourself Heard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164

That’s Not the Way I Heard It! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166

I Don’t Need No Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168

Got Guts? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170

Just the Way You Are . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172

And You Think You Have It Bad. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174

She Loves Me, She Loves Me Not . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176

This Is War! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178

Honorable Mentions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180

Yearbook Memores . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185

Contents ◆ vii

Tables and Illustrations

Tables

1. Most Popular Genres . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

2. Where Teens Turn for Reading Advice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

3. Resources for Bulletin Board Ideas and Themes. . . . . . . . . . . . 108

4. Booktalking Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

5. Sample Reading Log Form. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

6. Selected Reader’s Advisory Sources for YA Librarians . . . . . . . . 134

Illustrations

1. Acrylic Magazine Rack . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

2. Economy Wall Mounted Displayers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

3. Rotating Countertop Literature Holder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76

4. Periodical Module . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76

5. Hinged Display (Magazine) Shelf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

6. End-of-Range Display Panel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

7. Brodart Classic Double-Faced A-Frame Slatwall Displayer . . . . . . 79

8. Gaylord®

Baldwin Kiosk. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

9. Grid Wall Panel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

10. Back-Slant and Zigzag Shelf Inserts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

viii

11. End-of-Range Display and Shelving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

12. End-of-Range Space-Saver Displayer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

13. Bookstore Shelving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

14. Mar-Line Quad Rotor Stand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

15. Display Exhibit Divider System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

16. Lighted Display Case . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

17. Modular Display Cubes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88

18. Information Center with Slatwall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

19. Double-Sided Tent Sign Holder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

20. Three-Sided Sign Holder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

21. Gibson Easels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92

22. Acrylic Easels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

23. Tabletop Displayers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94

24. Brodart-Crafted Book Gondola . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

25. Best Seller Table, Riser, and Step Pedestals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

26. Octagonal Display Table . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

27. Triad Book Displayer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97

Tables and Illustrations ◆ ix

Series Foreword

We firmly believe in young adult library services and advocate for teens

whenever we can. We are proud of our association with Libraries Unlimited and

grateful for their acknowledgment of the need for additional resources for teen-serving

librarians. We intend for this series to fill those needs, providing useful and practical

handbooks for library staff. Readers will find some theory and philosophical musings,

but for the most part, this series will focus on real-life library issues with answers

and suggestions for front-line librarians.

Our passion for young adult librarian services continues to reach new

peaks. As we travel to present workshops on the various facets of working with teens

in public libraries, we are encouraged by the desire of librarians everywhere to learn

what they can do in their libraries to make teens welcome. This is a positive sign

since too often libraries choose to ignore this underserved group of patrons. We hope

you find this series to be a useful tool in fostering your own enthusiasm for teens.

Mary Anne Nichols

C. Allen Nichols

Series Editors

x

Introduction

Having served teens in a public library setting for fourteen years, as well

as playing an active role in the lives of my teenage nephews and “tween” nieces, I am

always in awe of their energy (and sometimes lethargy!), curiosity, and unique out￾look on life. Their hectic schedules certainly keep all of us on our toes. Over the

years, it has become obvious to me that in order for libraries to attract and keep busy

teens as customers, old ways of thinking must change. Teens are being courted by

advertisers of billion-dollar companies scrambling for a portion of their millions of

dollars in disposable income. They are also turned on by the instant gratification and

attractiveness of the Internet. Let’s face it, to these forward-thinking teens, dusty library

books shelved spine out are not going to cut it.

Having earned a B.S. in marketing, it was an easy extension for me to apply

retail/business concepts to a library situation. While some people may feel intimidated

with words such as marketing and merchandising or other business terminology,

you will see that many libraries are using these concepts, just not calling them by

such formal names. Successfully marketing and merchandising a library collection

to teens does not require a special education. It takes a dedicated staff member playing

an active role in creatively thinking out of the box in order to offer a current collection

that teens will like and use. Merchandising is not for the faint-hearted—it requires a

commitment to be on top of trends that teens are setting and working day to day to

fill their needs with an attractive and appealing YA collection, area, and service plan.

It also requires that the YA staff member become an advocate in teen services and in

merchandising to work with other staff members in the library, including administrators,

in order to offer a full-service plan aimed at teens.

This guide is meant to give you a basic understanding of merchandising so

that you can begin to apply these concepts in your library setting. Some of the ideas

are inexpensive, while others require a larger budgetary commitment. You can start

small and slowly increase your merchandising efforts. You will see that your co-workers

will notice and be impressed—but most important, the teens that use your collection

will know that you are working for them.

xi

This Page Intentionally Left Blank

1

Marketing—An

Introduction

Teens are a growing segment of the population. Their number has

been on the rise since the early 1990s, and by the year 2010 the number of

people aged twelve to nineteen years will reach 34 million. Teens are courted

by all sorts of advertisers such as Nike, Claire’s, Pepsi, and Revlon, who

are scrambling for a share of the $141 billion teens spend yearly.1

Libraries need to be just as active in pursuing teens and gear

their collections and services to them. Statistics show that almost one out

of every four people who enter a library is a teenager.2 If library staffs

serving young adults become aware of marketing and its tenets, teens will

notice and begin to use library collections and services more than they do

now. Peter Zollo is a researcher and marketing consultant with Teenage

Research Unlimited. He states in his book Wise Up to Teens that there are

two keys to success in marketing to teens: first, acknowledge the importance

of teenage consumers; and second, recognize their uniqueness.3

This chapter provides a brief introduction to the subject of mar￾keting. While an in-depth discussion of the subject cannot be covered in

one chapter, it is necessary to gain a rudimentary understanding of marketing

in order to understand its relative, merchandising. At the broadest corpo￾rate level, the function of marketing activities is to bring buyers and sellers

together. To relate this to libraries, YA patrons become “buyers” and the

library “sells” or offers services to them. Once the definition of marketing

is broadened to include non-profit organizations, the primary characteristic

becomes the exchange or transfer of goods, services, or ideas so that both

the marketer and the customer profit in some way.4

In essence, this is what

librarians do every day.

1

Librarians who understand marketing have changed the definition of what

they do. Before, emphasis was placed on collections and services, whereas the shift

now is to become customer-oriented. A true marketing approach determines the

needs and wants of its customers and uses resources available to deliver the products

and services. A library today must be willing to adapt collections and services to satisfy

the customer.5

This active, not passive, role involves purchasing materials such as

comic books and popular music, as well as more traditional YA books and magazines—

despite the fact that they are often the targets of theft and vandalism.

One of the key elements of marketing is knowing who your customers are

and then being able to deliver to them what you have (which also happens to be what

they need and want). Library staff has the opportunity to excel at this point. Librarians,

who are in close daily contact with young adults at the reference and circulation

desks or are available to the after-school crowd, know what materials are requested.

Another informal way of finding out what teens want is to ask them for suggestions

while on school visits or while they are in the library. Also, contacting schools for

summerreading lists or lists of required reading for the school year can provide answers.

These suggestions and requests should be the driving force in the development of

YA collections.6

Successful marketers truly understand their customers and what they need

and want. It is important to study the lives of teens in the community and to know the

answers to the following questions:

• What is the makeup of the community?

• Do teens have jobs?

• How do they spend their spare time?

• Where do they hang out?

• What extracurricular activities are out there for them?

• What businesses or services do they frequent?

• Are there latchkey programs in the community or large church youth

groups?

Knowing what teens do in the community will allow the librarian to plan collections

and services accordingly. For example, it is senseless to spend money on a large col￾lection of college catalogs or ACT or SAT testing books if most of the teens in a

community attend trade or two-year colleges.

Marketing is not solely for the purpose of providing YA patrons with new

services, but also to reinforce and improve existing services. Librarians need to be

prepared to capitalize on and expand strengths in the collection and remedy weaknesses.

The key to successful marketing also includes constant evaluation and monitoring.

The book Output Measures and More: Planning and Evaluating Public Library Ser￾vices by Virginia Walter is an invaluable tool to help with evaluating and analyzing

users and usage.

2 ◆ Marketing—An Introduction