Recently a borrower returned a book in the CKI slot without its dust-jacket (they had taken it off to avoid damaging it and forgotten to put it back on). Staff were flat out at both checkin and checkout and failed to recognise the book as one of ours. It ended up in the Lost Property box and was sent down to Security. The borrower subsequently got in touch, as it was still on her record, and it was eventually tracked down and fetched back. Disputed return searches and lost book fees averted!
From the outside, without its dust-jacket this book had nothing to indicate that it belonged to the Library – no barcode, no call number label. The staff member at CKI should have opened it up to check for a book plate, but perhaps because of the rush, didn’t do that.
The question is, should we still keeping these flimsy paper covers and putting our expensive barcodes and labour intensive labels on them? Should we remove the dust-jacket straight away and apply the barcodes and labels directly to the hard cover outside of these books?
There may be cases where the dust-jackets should be routinely kept e.g. MB materials, Special Collections, but for ordinary, run-of-the-mill books – should we keeping the covers?
Your comments would be appreciated. Cynthia.
I think we shouldn’t be barcoding dusty/dull/tatty covers (the books look better without those anyway), but new books are a lot more likely to attract attention and be used/borrowed when wearing their glossy covers than in their plain hard cover.
(I’ve noticed that most of our books with dust jackets have the call number written on the hard cover as well, either on the spine or on the top left of the front cover. Or perhaps this is just the older ones we’re weeding – I can imagine that’s a time-intensive extra step to the process.)
Deborah
At Edu we attach the dust jackets to the books so that they can’t be removed easily. Its a quick and simple process and means we can keep the nice covers.
Elizabeth
Please oh please dont remove these covers. WIthout them many of the books look dull and unexciting. For the sake of an occasion problem the dust covers generally benefit the look of the collection.
Sue
Yes – it can’t be denied, a pretty dust jacket is definately appealing.
My problem with dust jackets, from a rebarcoding/relabelling point of view, is that many of them are flimsy, and (in a naked state i.e. without extra plastic covers e.t.c.) do not survive browse/photocopy/issue/returns procedures for long. They quickly end up on my repairs shelf battered and tattered and only just barely clinging to their book. Then i have to rebarcode and relabel the book anyway. Add to that the, not that occasional, problem of books returned without their barcoded jackets (requiring a fair bit of staff time to chase down covers e.t.c.) and i think the cost outweighs the benefit of prettiness.
If we do keep the dust jackets (i suggest only the nice ones) we need to, as Education do (and i do for the especially nice ones), physically attach them to the book (it just takes a couple of bits of cellotape) and give them a bit of protection so they will actually last for a few issues
Just looking at two new books on my desk and both have attractive dust jackets and are plain underneath. The more interesting thing about those jackets is that they are full of very quickly and easily read information; reviews, author/editor info, summary of book, other books by the author etc. It does only take a few moments to attach a bit of cellotape to secure them.
For a number of reasons, I think book covers are essential to the collection:
– details of author/contents often nowhere else in book
– cover images included in Catalogues
– visual quality of new books display
– Ranganathan’s Law: save the time of the reader
– colourful covers are examples of artistic design
If we discard them will we recycle, e.g. turn into gift bags http://greeningyourlibrary….
Deirdre
I have recycled a great many book covers in my 5 yrs of relabelling. A student took them to wallpaper a room in his house!
I imagine the campus childcare centres would be eager recipients too.
I wonder why the book covers are not just printed (or glued) onto the book in the first place…
I can’t prove misuse of dust jackets, but it is so easy to take the barcoded jacket off an open shelf book and wrap it around a 3 day or a Reference Collection item of the same size. Quick visit to the Self Check machine or a Lending desk to have it issued and desentized – who is going to look closely? Why make life easier for the dishonest amongst us?
Helen
They would then have to return to the libray and replace the jacket and somehow get that book returned (back through the security gates?) to get it off their borrowing record or they would be charged for it.
Then either go through the disputed returns bit or trot up to the desk with book in hand and accuse the librarians of not checking it in to get it off their record. Gets to a scenario worthy of Poirot almost. 🙂
Would it be too costly or time consuming to have the bindery glue and press the front and back cover of the more attractive dust jackets to the hard cover of the books?
What proportion of our new books are hardcovered? Not many, it would seem from a glance at the new books shelves… If we want to balance aesthetics with security and ease of issuing, we should consider gluing dust jackets to the front and back covers of selected books. Sellotape is not a really good solution in terms of conservation – it creates problems a few years down the track.
Sellotape is not suitable I agree as it can age to a sticky mess, firms like Raeco supply book tapes of different types designed specifically for use on books. Our call numbers are covered with a special tape, not sellotape.
We are only talking 2 very small (4-5cm) strips of tape to secure the cover to the front and 2 strips to secure to the back of the book.
Sellotape will yellow with age and doesn’t look pretty but it can usually be removed easily enough.
A bindery approved alternative is magic tape – cheap, easy to apply and reposition if necessary and can be removed without leaving behind much of a mark if needed.
Book tape is much stronger and will tear/damage the book surface if ever we want to remove the jacket in the future (i.e. if it gets damaged/torn).
Glueing the covers on is a much prettier and more permanent solution but we is more labour-intensive and we would lose them if the book has to be rebound later on
No Poirot like skill or imagination is required to reunite a misused dust jacket with the original book. The jacket isn’t stripped – you can walk back into the Library with it, re-unite it with the original book left behind and stick it in the CKI bin. If you don’t care about disputed returns discussions, put the jacket in the Afterhours drop box and claim you returned the book earlier by mistake – it’ll be found on our shelves.
The Library, University of Canterbury, stamp on page 99 is easy to check and leaves no doubt that the book belongs at The Library, University of Canterbury.
It is nice to have a topic that creates a bit of heat. My view is that the covers increase the attractiveness of the book making it more likely to be used so it is work a bit of extra work to encourage that use. But then I dont have to do the relabelling. Anne