ONGOING STEPS MU LIBRARIES TAKE TO STRETCH DOLLARS

• We have canceled duplicate subscriptions.
• We use competitive bidding for our subscription business to reduce costs.
• We make prepayments and deposit accounts with suppliers to earn interest and reduce costs.
• We take full advantage of available discounts for groups of journals (i.e., packages).
• We strategically canceled high-cost subscriptions to save money (sometimes we are able to recoup the lost journals very inexpensively through large e-journal contracts with publishers).
• We work closely with departments to make the best use of funds.
• We consult available usage data when making purchase, renewal, and cancellation decisions.
• We have canceled standing orders for books readily obtainable from other MOBIUS libraries.
• We have converted from print to Internet format to save money.
• We check book order requests against the holdings of other MOBIUS libraries; if the books are widely available, we do not order them (unless they are essential or needed for class reserves).
• We coordinate larger purchases with other MOBIUS libraries to minimize duplication and reduce cost.
• We make strategic use of free resources:  e.g. Google books.
• We rely on document delivery or Interlibrary Loan (instead of subscriptions) for low-use material.
• We have canceled subscriptions to journals available for free on the web.

Collection Development Committee, MU Libraries, November 30, 2007