Consortial Support

YBP welcomes the chance to work with library consortia. We are currently the monographs vendor for many broad-based consortia such as OhioLINK and the Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC), as well as many whose interests are much narrower, such as consortia of law libraries.

Technological Innovation
YBP offers library consortia a set of tools unique to the book industry. YBP's GOBI offers consortia the only available visual means of directly comparing subject, publisher, and non-subject decisions among member libraries. YBP has found that for most consortia, buying too many copies of a monograph is rarely a problem, but in disciplines that are chronically underfunded or where the books are many and expensive, such as engineering, the kind of cooperation that is possible through GOBI can help ensure that critical material is covered.

YBP's GobiTween enables any library in a consortium to review any action taken by YBP, on any title, for any member of the consortium. Many library selectors use GobiTween to determine how many members of the consortium own a particular title, in order to decide whether or not to buy the book.

YBP has also developed "Not Bought Reports" for OhioLINK and the CIC. YBP compares shipment history against the slips sent to the libraries in a consortium during a specific period. Titles for which YBP sent slips, but that no member bought, form the "Not Bought Report." This gives the consortium a second chance to buy overlooked titles and improve the breadth of its holdings.

Additional Benefits
YBP serves each consortium according to its particular needs and goals, and according to each member library's desired level of involvement. Approval profiles, for example, are typically specific to each member of the consortium, but may be written across like institutions such as community colleges, small liberal arts schools or research institutions.

A dedicated YBP staff team is frequently assigned to consortia to address any issues or concerns. In addition, regional managers and YBP bibliographers are able to offer frequent training sessions and in-depth technical support of workflow issues to these groups of customers.