1. Print Book Circulation & E-Book Usage: Data, Trends, & Implications Luke Swindler UNC University Library, Collections Management Officer TRLN Annual Meeting 15 July 2015

2. UNC Print Book Circulation Totals FY2009/2010 = 836,031 FY2010/2011 = 771,473 FY2011/2012 = 730,659 FY2012/2013 = 684,837 FY2013/2014 = 597,197  During this 5-year period the print collections grew by 405,534 volumes while their total circulation decreased by 238,839 or 29%  During this 5-year period print circulation declines accelerated, falling from 64,558 between FY2009/2010 & FY2010/2011 to 87,640 between FY2012/2013 & FY2013/2014

3. Print Books Circulation Data & Trends As research libraries buy more print books, their aggregate circulation steadily declines Increasing print acquisitions will not change this situation, especially since it would result in acquiring more specialized titles that will register even lower levels of need or no use at all Print books are an increasingly marginal niche resource for supporting instruction and research, especially with the growing acceptance of e-books E-book availability further depresses circulation of print counterparts (especially when they become accessible before the print versions)

4. E-Books Usage Data & Trends As research libraries buy more e-books, their aggregate usage steadily increases E-book usage growth exceeds the increase in the number of e-books UNC libraries acquires E-books now greatly exceeds print circulation at UNC—a trend that not only will continue but also probably accelerate 8 publishers/vendors representing the e-book platforms with the largest number of titles in UNC collections (ebrary, Springer, OUP, CUP, Wiley, SAGE, Elsevier, and EBSCOhost) alone registered 881,682 uses—or more than all print circulation for all publishers When placed in the context of total monographic titles available, the relative levels of use are even greater: 3,915,878 print titles as of 6/1/2015 registered 597,197 circulations in FY2013/2014, for a ratio of.15 245,442 e-books for these 8 publishers/vendors registered 881,682 uses in 2014, for a ratio of 3.6 or 23X more than print books

5. Changing Collections Contexts “Collections are no longer the defining feature of libraries. Collections that are important to users are found everywhere.” Deanna Marcum, ITHAKA S+R Managing Director Shift of collections from predominance to prominence Shift from finite collections towards infinity and the leveling affect Shift from book scarcity to abundance, if not ubiquity Shift from collections of record to collections of use Shift in answering the question of “how good are the collections?”

6. Changing Collections Goals & Objectives “The emergent electronic realm will, in time, pretty much relegate new analog materials to a diminishing subset of primary sources. Digital resources will increasingly define both the information and the scholarly landscapes.” Dan Hazen, then Associate Librarian for Collection Development, Harvard University Moving from an overall quantitative to qualitative approach to building library collections Print books title-by-title acquisitions as a loser proposition & strategies for cutting losses E-books en bloc acquisitions as a value proposition & strategies for maximizing academic support

7. Achieving Quantitative Excellence Qualitatively E-books Available from Core Publishers – as of 6/19/2015 (based on catalog records counts using publisher=exact name and format=e-book) PublisherUNC Count Springer 45,031 Oxford UP 18,034 Cambridge UP 12,936 Wiley 9,912 SAGE 5,052 Elsevier 3,124 Harvard UP 1,863