Tuesday, March 29, 2011

The bottom line


Among our spending reviews is year-end unit cost analyses of the databases we buy for your use (Ancestry (library edition), Mergent, Morningstar, Dun & Bradstreet, etc. etc.) At the end of the calendar year we divide the annual cost of a database by the number of uses, to get the per session amount. $2 or less is acceptable, over $2 means its time to reconsider the subscription.

A few titles are on the 2012 chopping block at this point, will be dropped if use doesn't increase substantially and lower the per use cost this year. AllData Automotive, Mergent Online, Morningstar Investment Research Library and Valueline are all candidates for a drop..the last for an announced $3,000 price increase, the others for low use. Best ROI? Ancestry, the library edition (which is far superior to the home edition); folks love genealogy research.

Databases you can use from home are found on our remote resources web. Our library value calculator estimates the cost benefit of your library visits.

Friday, March 04, 2011

Morris County Magazine


For 15 years, between 1982 and 1995, the county Chamber of Commerce published Morris County Magazine. Reference librarian Donna Burkey has indexed the entire run, identifying the local places and people the magazine highlighted.

We have the entire run of the magazine in our NJ collection. Drop us a note if you need one of the indexed articles.