The Appeal of Paperbacks

I had a patron come in today and ask why the library has so many pocket books (he meant paperback fiction). He said that many of ours were in bad shape and that they took up too much space in the library. I was caught offguard by the question and his arguments. So I told the patron that

• We don't really purchase that many of them
• Most of the library's paperbacks have been here for years
• Patrons donate more paperbacks than hardcovers
• Paperbacks are handy for travelling patrons.

At this point, the library manager wandered by, and the patron started asking her.

I thought about it some more, and there are many good reasons for the library to have an extensive collection of paperbacks.

Cost

1) A new paperback usually costs $12-13 dollars, while a new hardcover can cost over $35. We can just about buy three paperbacks for the same price as a single hardcover book. If the library had $1000 (random convenient number) to spend on new fiction, we could buy around 28 hardcovers, or over 75 paperbacks.

2) If we aren't generally convinced of a book's merit (if it received mediocre reviews, was overly esoteric, etc.), we will not purchase it in hardcover. Spending $35 on a book that won't be read is fairly painful. However, it might be worth spending $12-13 on a book to see if people will like it.

3) In a town (such as Tumbler Ridge) where the population is in a constant state of flux, there's always the worry that patrons will move without returning their library books. It's happened a few times this year alone, and I have not been able to bill those patrons for their books. If those patrons had borrowed paperback books, the library would have taken a smaller financial hit.

Space
[[Brief definitions for this section: "width" = width of spine, "depth" = width of cover]]

1) The limited height of paperbacks (even the annoying tall paperbacks) allows more shelves of them to fit in a limited amount of space. The bookshelf frames in the library are all roughly the same height, but the paperback shelves have two more shelves per frame (7 versus 5). Because paperbacks are generally no wider than the equivalent hardcover edition, it means that far more paperbacks can fit in a given shelf frame.

2) Because paperbacks also have a shallower depth than hardcovers, paperback shelves can be built narrower to take up less space than shelves for hardcovers.

Convenience

1) Because of the smaller, mostly standardized size of paperbacks, patrons can easily carry 7-8 of them without any trouble. A stack of 7-8 different sized hardcovers can be somewhat more awkward.

2) Paperbacks don't have dust covers to fight with. Library staff don't have to tape covers on paperbacks or deal with patrons who insist on removing dust covers and forget to return them with the book.

3) Travelling with a stack of hardcover books is often not an option. A pile of paperbacks however, can easily fit in a carry-on bag and keep patrons entertained throughout a lengthy flight.

4) Our library has a rack meant for holding paperbacks, so when we have to weed and sell some, we don't have to borrow every table in the library for the purpose.


Now, paperbacks are not perfect. They are easy to damage, hard to repair (cannot realistically be re-bound, etc.), and look shelf-worn much faster than hardcovers. However, a library without paperbacks would have far fewer books, a more homogenized collection, and many more frustrated patrons.