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For this assignment, I will consider the public library in the town of La Herradura, Spain. This library (biblioteca de la Herradura) is quite specialized as it tends to cater to the foreign population of the town. It is the library of the town, however, the Spanish language section is embarrassingly small and the Spanish reference librarian is almost never there (such is Spain!). The library is located in the basement of the town hall which happens to face the Mediterranean, and is open Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 10 am to 3 pm. The town of La Herradura is very dependent upon tourism, and its appeal draws many foreigners in for the long haul. They come, fall in love with it, and decide to stay (this happened to my Mom and Dad). Because of this population (mostly British, German, American, and Dutch), the library decided to open up a foreign language section a few years ago. At first it was managed by the Spanish librarians. Then, a few British ladies (one of whom was a librarian in Twickenham, England before she and her husband retired to Spain) decided they would volunteer as reference librarians, and eventually it was established that they would manage and work this section of the library which then became its own entity, the Foreigners' Library (biblioteca de extranjeros). The shared space library now is almost entirely taken over by the foreign language books collection (despite some small wars between the Spanish librarians and the sometimes loud and brash English speaking librarians...). It is a library in the most basic sense. There is no technical services staff nor administrative staff; just the good natured librarians who want to provide the best service possible (surely with very minimal pay).
I chose this library, not only because it is the library I am most familiar with, but also because I realized while thinking about this assignment that almost all of their services require a high level of participation by the customer. In fact, the library would not exist as it does today if not for the cross-over by unsatisfied customers (the foreign population) to being library employees. I guess this is the ultimate example of customer participation.
The first service of the library of La Herradura that I will discuss is their acquisitions policy which is a service in the manner that the library accepts and processes donations. Almost all of the material they own is donated by customers. These donations consist of materials people are looking to get off thier hands, such as materials that people believe others will benefit from that they no longer need (for example, self help or language instuction manuals or videos). The books are mainly in English in the foreign section, but also there are a fair amount of books in German and in Spanish. Obviously, customer participation in the process of donations in this case is absolutely necessary. These donations contribute greatly to the quality of service of the library in that they provide new materials, and increase the library's ability to satisfy customers. Some donations also come from local used books stores when they have too many books to shelve, or are wanting to get rid of books that have not sold.
Another service of the library is a book of the month club. This club which began last year meets at the end of every month to discuss a book that was chosen for all members to read. A person is chosen every for every meeting to lead the discussion. Unfortunately, this service has not really taken off. I've been twice, and there were never more than three people. This service requires a high level of customer participation, however, it seems that a big service gap exists here due amongst other things to lack of customer involvement. Maybe they should provide refreshments! I think the problem may be that not many customers of the library are aware of this service; perhaps the library should send out a newsletter or give everyone a call. Also, a few times a month, there are readings of stories for children in the library. This is quite interesting because sometimes local schools bring students who are learning English to listen in.
The third service of this library I will discuss is their policy of keeping track of customer preferences and actively searching and consulting customers for books which a customer has requested. As there is no fixed telephone in the library (most of the librarians have cell phones), a customer must normally come in to look for a book. By coming in, the customer can ascertain whether or not the book is owned by the library, and, if it is checked out, when it is due to be returned. The librarians will call the customer when the book has been returned. If the book they want is not in the library because the library does not own it, the librarians will take down the customer's request and will later call them to let them know if the book is available in the library of the neighboring town of Almunecar and can be delivered to la Herradura within a few days, or that they know somebody who has that book and is willing to "lend it." This last case is quite nice and I suppose it is possible to do this because the town is so small, and within the foreign community one feels a sense of solidarity and generosity. The librarians, once they get to know you and the type of books you like to read, will ask you if you would be willing to lend your books out to others who want to read them. The librarians are always on the look out for customers who are willing to share their personal libraries. There is a high level of customer participation in this respect. The customer tell the librarians that they have books by a particular author, or subject, or time period, and the librarians make note of this in their customer files (done by hand). They can then keep an eye open for books that would be of interest to a customer, or books that a customer may have and be willing to lend to another customer. Without this customer participation, the library's services would be quite poor, as there is not much funding for this library. By contributing to this aspect of the library's service, the customers make the library experience in this very small town much more fulfilling and complete.
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