1. Building Useful Collection Statistics from Scratch
Collection Analysis 101
Building Useful Collection Statistics from Scratch
Lisa Bobis
Technical Services Manager, Joliet Public Library
Matt Hammermeister
ILS Manager, Pinnacle Library Cooperative

2. Who are We? Joliet Public Library Pinnacle Library Cooperative
Population: 148,000
Collection: 431,000 items
2 locations
105 employees: 43 full time, 62 part time
Annual budget: $6.5 million
ILS: Polaris
Pinnacle Library Cooperative
6 member consortium formed in 2012
1.3 million items
300,000 e-content
1 Staff Member

3. Setting Up the Collection For Prime Stats

4. Organizing Collection and statistical codes
Think broad and go specific.
Talk to staff to figure out what they want.
Other considerations
Developing collections
Multiple formats
Naming structure

5. Data cleanup Make sure call numbers match stat and collection codes.
Get counts of items in each collection to make sure it’s worth creating that collection or stat code.
Check format of Dewey Numbers
Ongoing maintenance

6. Determine what stats Are needed

7. Factors to consider Monthly or yearly?
Rolling, Fiscal, Calendar year?
Compare Month to Month or Year to Year?
Think about how specific?
Dewey 10s
By Format
By Language
Audience
Multiple locations

8. Relative Use
Ratio of the Percentage of Library’s circs vs. Percentage of Library’s holdings for each collection.
Goal - 1:1 Ratio
If a collection makes up 30% of holdings, it should make up roughly 30% of circs
Greater than 1 – circs higher than holdings
Consider increasing size of the collection
Less than 1 – circs lower than holdings
Consider weeding the collection or publicizing it better.

9. Turnover Rate
The average number of circs per item in an area. (the number of circulations divided by the number of items)
Example: A turnover rate of 10 for picture books would indicate that on average, each picture book checked out 10 times per year.
Goals are library specific.

10. Active Use / Dead collection
Percentage of Items that have been checked out recently (Active use)
Percentage of Items that have not been checked out recently (Dead collection)

11. Average age Current year – Publication date = Average age
Determine system for books that don’t have a publication date, like serial records or unknown pub dates)

12. Percentage checked out
Percentage of items checked out at the time the report is run

13. How do you get the data?

14. Data Retrieval Polaris Sierra
Simply Reports
SQL
Sierra
Create Lists
Anything that will allow you to raw get data out of the system easily
Schedule the reports so the data comes when needed.

15. Circs Number of Checkouts in a particular section
Can be used on its own or part of another calculation
Monthly Circs
Relative Use
Turnover rate

16. Total Items Total number of items in a particular section
Will be used in other calculations that use holdings data
Relative Use
Turnover Rate
Exclude:
Missing
Lost
Claims Returned
On-Order
In Processing

17. Relative Use
Ratio of the Percentage of Library’s circs vs. Percentage of Library’s holdings for each collection.
Data needed
Circs
Number of Items

18. Turnover Rate The average number of circs per item in an area.
Data needed:
Circs
Number of Items

19. Active Use Percentage of Items that have been checked out recently
Data needed:
Items with recent circs
Total Items in Section

20. Dead Collection Percentage of items that have no recent checkouts
Data needed
Items with no recent checkouts
Total items in section

21. Average age The average age (in years) of each item in a section.
Data needed:
Total (Sum) age of all items in a section
Total Items in section

22. How do you present your data?

23. Presentation Think about how you want to present the data
Digitally?
Printed out?
Can your audience manipulate it?
Have full access or just a copy?
ed? Shared Drive? Etc.
How often to update?

24. For Joliet… Monthly Updates Excel Formulas Pivot Tables
Form controls for interactivity
One worksheet for the source data
One worksheet for each type of report

25. Demo

26. Getting buy-in by staff

27. Getting Buy-IN Support from Admin is key
Expect to answer LOTS of questions
Include definitions of terms
Selector Summit
Create benchmarks and have accountability
Information overload

28. Resources Excel and SQL courses Colleagues Lynda.com YouTube
Library collection
Colleagues
System Admin/ILS Staff/IT Staff
IUG Forum

29. Questions? Lisa Bobis Matt Hammermeister Technical Services Manager
Joliet Public Library
Matt Hammermeister
ILS Manager
Pinnacle Library Cooperative