Speakers: Ilda Cardenas, Keri Prelitz, Greg Yorba The process of looking at subscriptions with the goal of proactively downsizing revealed that the library’s existing renewal workflows were outdated and in need of regular analysis to identify underused resources. Additionally, this project uncovered shortcomings of analysis that is reliant on usage data, the unexpected ramifications of large-scale subscription cancellations, as well as the need for improved communication within and between the many library departments affected by subscription cancellations.

1. PRESENTATION TITLE
MEASURE TWICE, CUT ONCE:
How a Budget Cut Impacted Subscription
Renewals from Analysis to Workflows
Ilda Cardenas
Keri Prelitz
Greg Yorba
NASIG 2020

2. BACKGROUND
Slide Title
• FTE of 32,000 in 18/19
• 14% cut to Materials
Budget in 18/19
requiring immediate
cancellations
• Periodicals comprise
28% of materials budget
Figure 1. IMG_0180 from “(Building) Library Exterior” by
CSUF Pollak Library, 2006, https://flic.kr/p/aco1Pi under
CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

3. INITIAL PROCESS
Slide Title
• Focused on electronic
• Original list only had titles
• 2 ER Librarians pulled 1 year of usage
statistics for 432 titles
• Acquisitions staff entered pricing for each
journal which was gathered from Fokus

4. INITIAL ANALYSIS
Slide Title
• Used formula to predict ILL costs based on usage:
((#of “uses” x .25) -5) *$38
• Compared subscription cost to potential ILL cost
in CD Team.
• Packages – looked at journals individually first
then compared total of “keep” titles to package
cost

5. OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Slide Title
• Unique content
• Blowback from department
• Expected increase in usage based on usage or
other factors such as current events
• Embargoed content

6. WORKFLOW ISSUES
Slide Title
• No established workflow
• Staff and faculty new to the library
• Dropbox made simultaneous editing
problematic
• Information lived in too
many places
• Not efficient use of time

7. USAGE STATS ISSUES
Slide Title
• Contradictory usage stats depending on where
pulled from
• Bad admin site info - data that migrated to Alma
came from several sources
• Non-counter compliant usage – what is a “use”?
• No usage at all

8. • 1 title change on the renewal list
TITLE CHANGESSlide Title

9. • Renewal list includes new and older title
TITLE CHANGESSlide Title

10. • Oral History Review was transferring to Taylor
and Francis in 2020 but the Oxford portfolio
was deleted in Alma before the change in 2019
MISSING TITLESlide Title

11. • For usage statistics it was important to gather
the Oxford statistics for this journal.
• However because of the Oxford portfolio no
longer existing in Alma, there needed to be an
asterisk for this journal. Were the statistics
incomplete for this journal?
MISSING TITLESlide Title

12. • Social Research was in the Project Muse Premium Collection
but moved to the Standard Collection for 2020.
• This is important because the Chancellor’s Office for the
California State Universities pays for this collection so that it is
accessible for all of the CSUs, it is part of their Electronic Core
Collection.
COLLECTION CHANGESSlide Title

13. • Journal transfers are problematic.
• It may take time before the new platform has a journal portfolio
for the transferred title in Alma’s Community Zone. This can
cause problems with tracking usage on the new platform since
there is usually no immediate access to the journal title in the
new platform in Alma/Primo.
JOURNAL TRANSFERSSlide Title

14. • I joined Fullerton’s Serials department in 2004 when I came
back to Fullerton after a medical leave (before then I was their
branch campus librarian). During this time I learned the
importance of keeping track of journal transfers.
• This was something that I had to teach myself.
JOURNAL TRANSFERSSlide Title

15. • Started checking journal websites for transfer information and
checking title lists when the next year’s list came out
• Learned how valuable NISO’s Journal Transfer Service is to this
task: https://journaltransfer.issn.org/
• Signed up for email alerts and also check their database.
• It should also be noted that Harrassowitz is very good at
sending out journal transfer information.
JOURNAL TRANSFERSSlide Title

16. POST-CANCELLATION
Slide Title
• Over 90 online journal titles cancelled (over
140 including Research Now package)
• Nearly $80,000 in cancellations

17. CANCELLATION LIST

18. • For titles that were owned previously before
being managed by Harrassowitz, we provided our
legacy order information.
TITLES PREVIOUSLY OWNEDSlide Title

19. • Update the coverage of the portfolio, adding the
local threshold and always change the coverage
from global to local
ALMA WORKFLOWSSlide Title

20. UNEXPECTED OUTCOMES
Slide Title
• Moving other subscriptions to Harrassowitz
• Discovery of bad data migrated to Alma led to
another clean-up project
• Cancellation issues with Harrassowitz-created
packages
MORE PROJECTS
Slide Title

21. CH-CH-CH-CHANGES
Slide Title
• Utilize reports from Fokus
• Timing
• Google sheets vs. Dropbox
• Formula adjustment, more criteria for analysis,
and review ILL costs
• Where usage lies when there is an embargo
Chchchange. From “Illustration” by
Cole0007, 2009, https://flic.kr/p/6wLVQT
under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

22. LEARNING OUTCOMES
Slide Title
• Need for cooperatively established workflows
• Notes, notes, notes
• Focus on data cleanup

23. LEARNING OUTCOMES
Slide Title
• COUNTER 5 issues
• Setting up SUSHI
• Cleaning up vendor admin records