Report by Val Page, Senior Librarian (Information)

A Best Sellers collection, introduced by North Tyneside Libraries, has proved to be an outstanding success.  The idea for the collection came from a report written by a member of staff who visited a public library in Frederickshaven, Denmark, North Tyneside's twin town.  The library at Frederickshaven has an established best sellers collection which is separate from the general lending stock and subject to different loan regulations. 

The results of North Tyneside's user survey in 1997 showed a level of frustration felt by many customers when popular titles are difficult to find on the shelves.  Falling book funds over the last few years have meant that multiple copies of all popular titles are hard to afford and waiting lists on the requests system are often long.  The fiction stock at the Central library is very well used and in one year accounted for 53.39% of all adult book issues.  The issues are, however, falling in line with the national trend.  We felt that if we could provide a collection which encouraged more customers to visit the library on a weekly basis it might have implications for other stock issues.