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Press Release from Primary Research Group, Inc.
New York, New York August 21, 2002
Approximately 13% of a sample of 70 corporate librarians felt that management would likely phase out the physical library over
the next five years, but the overwhelming majority of librarians surveyed felt that their institutions enjoyed
strong management support, according to a new report
CORPORATE LIBRARY BENCHMARKS, 2002-03 EDITION, just published by Primary Research Group Inc.
Data in the survey is broken out by 11 major industry groups including Consulting, Pharmaceuticals,
Chemicals/Petroleum, Heavy Manufacturing, Light Manufacturing, Electric Power, MBA/Business Education,
Government/Regulatory, Media & Publishing, Finance/Insurance and Defense/Aviation.
Mean annuals sales of the companies in the sample was $7.7 billion. Seventy companies participated.
Among the report's major findings:
More libraries in the sample increased their content budgets than decreased them in 2002,
reflecting the economic recovery and the recapture of confidence after the initial
national trauma of the September 11 attacks.
Manufacturers -- both in heavy and light manufacturing -- were the most likely to increase content budgets.
The libraries in the sample examined a mean of 4.3 databases on a free-trial basis in the past year.
Delivery of Journal Articles
A shade more than half of all the libraries in the sample provide electronic delivery of journal articles.
Nearly 36% of the libraries in the sample absorb all costs of document delivery.
The Library in Management's Eyes
Consulting firm librarian's viewed their company management as the most likely to want to
phase out the "physical library" in favor of a "digital library" over the next five years.
Print /Electronic Journals
The mean number of print journal subscriptions maintained by the libraries in the sample was 280.
The libraries in the sample maintain a mean of 71.1 subscriptions to electronic journals that
require subscription fees.
Cataloging
The median cataloging budget for the libraries in the sample was $22,500.
Site Licenses for Content
A shade more than 37% of the libraries in the sample maintained site licenses for market research reports.
50% of the libraries in the sample had site licenses for directories or reference books.
Books/Directories
Nearly 45% of books ordered directly were ordered through web sites.
The libraries in the sample spent a mean of $3716 for directories in print formats in 2002
The corporate librarians in the sample spend nearly 60% of their time helping patrons who are not
physically present in the library.
Corporate Library Benchmarks, 2002-03 Edition (ISBN ## 1-57440-054-1) is available from PRIMARY
RESEARCH GROUP for $136.95. The report contains more than 250 tables of data exploring corporate
library use of new and emerging information services, cataloging systems, online services, CD-ROM's,
document delivery services, electronic and print journals, books and other information vehicles.
The report also looks at library policy making and management practices.
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