To ask you how to encourage more people to use the library?

[LibraryLibrary]

My local library wants and needs to attract more users. It's set up a group of volunteers to brainstorm ideas. Predictably, the volunteers are mostly drawn from the people who already use and value the library, which I think is limiting our ideas. Can you help with any suggestions, based on what the library you go to does well? Or based on what you'd like your local library to do? And what do you think puts people off from using the library?
A bit of info on our library: It's in a small to medium-sized town which is socially quite mixed. It's close to several schools (primary and secondary) and to a supermarket. It has parking, but the car park is sometimes full. It has a large open space, plus a couple of meeting rooms.
Among other things, it would be good to hear what you think about opening hours. When would you like your local library to be open? And if the library has to have an annual 2 week shut-down period, to save on costs, when would you prefer that period to be?
Thanks!

@C152 Thank you for that document - I've forwarded it to the head librarian and I'll have a look at it myself too.

Sorry for jumping in. At my local library, every Saturday morning a member of staff would read a couple of books to a group of about 20 toddlers sitting on the carpet. That 20 minutes felt like a real break for me and afterwards we would browse the books together to choose some for the week. There are also little tables with colouring equipment and a cafe for tea and cake. We were in there for a couple of hours most Saturday mornings. The attraction was that its a nice, calm, cheap way to foster a love of books.

He's 11 now and still loves that place. Squeezes into one of the reading nooks with his nose in a book.

I don't want to limit people's ideas by talking about what the library already does, as I'm sure that the things that they already do could be done differently, for different audiences, etc. I'm happy for people to assume that the library needs to start from scratch. There are various groups and activities, some of which are better attended than others, but the library certainly doesn't do a lot of the things that people are suggesting on here, so this is a useful exercise.
At the moment, the library relies on paid library staff, and as with everywhere money is short. So any advice on recruiting and making use of volunteers, work experience people, etc, is welcome.

I've actually already suggested a regular story telling time for young children. I's been suggested that this could be done by volunteers. I think it's important that it's done weekly and is never cancelled, so perhaps it could be done by volunteers and library staff could fill in if necessary. Saturday morning would be ideal.

@665theneighborofthebeast A few people have suggested a cafe. I'm not sure that there's the space, but I think a regular event which included drinks and biscuits or possibly a little tuck shop might be do-able.

@GreenGodiva That sounds amazing. I've suggested a creative writing group, but I'm told there isn't the money. Does the library you're talking about pay people to run the groups, or are they run by volunteers? Presumably they can afford to pay some of them because of the profit from the cafe.

Get in touch with schools/ colleges offering work experience/volunteering.

I work with young people and there’s a few that would love to volunteer in libraries.

I like the idea of craft groups for adults - so maybe knitting and embroidery, possibly something like model-making? We'd need to find some keen crafters to volunteer to run the groups.

Shutting down for 2 weeks in the Christmas school holidays worries me. It's cold, children have time on their hands and there's nothing much to do in a small town, families are stuck together in small houses, older people are on their own and struggling with heating bills. I wonder whether shutting for 2 weeks during term time and when the weather is better would work better?

As an author, libraries are essential (thank you, PLR!) so I'd like to see them used a bit more for 'book related' activities as well as being social hubs.

Libraries should make more of the fact that you can read books FREE! Maybe hosting book clubs, author talks, writing groups - things centred around reading and books. Children's book clubs. Magazines (lots of older people don't like reading on apps). Maybe book clubs around different topics - a romance book club, a sci fi book club.

Our library is a very rural small town so suffers from being used chiefly by older retired people who only go in during the day. A few more evening events would help. so people could get used to the library who work during the day and therefore never see it open!

Social media is definitely a weak point. But paid library staff only have so much time, so I think this would really need to be taken on by a volunteer, if someone can be found!

I think there is a mobile library, though I don't know the details. I agree that that's important for a small town library - primarily to reach older and disabled people in the surrounding villages.

Free hot drinks and biscuits has been discussed. Do you think that having those available just at certain times works well? Or should they perhaps be attached to certain events, like children's storytelling time, for instance?

@LibraryLibrary my local library is run by the borough.
They provide the librarian (or other paid staff), the books, computer access and Rhyme Time for the little ones.
They then offer loads of stuff similar to what's been suggested on this thread but that part of it is a mix of charity/and funding and paid for groups who hire the space (such as a adult sewing group).
If your finances are provided by your council/borough then you are going to very limited in what you can do.
I know a lot of Lego Clubs are basically a huge box of donated Lego that children have access too - not an actual club club.
I think one of the biggest issues is so many people not actually realising their local library still exists. Sounds crazy but it's true.
My mother in law was totally certain her local library had closed.
It closed for repairs (actually still ongoing) but that is just the building.
The actual library facilities just moved to a temporary community space literally next door.
Good advertising is what is needed.
There should be a regular (weekly) "What's happening at the library" post on local Facebook groups for a start.
Any community events like summer festivals that have stalls - have a stall basically advertising and promoting everything that happens there.
You need to shout "We are here..We exist" as a starting point.

If you are doing events, how about a dads and toddlers group? And bear in mind Saturday mornings are peak kid activity times.

I think it would be great to do something Christmas themed, like an elf talking about what it's like to work for Santa.

Have two libraries in my town. The main one does early opening 2 days a week (9-16) and late 3 days a week (11-18) which is good as there's a chance for people to go after work/school and one of the early opening days is on market day which is across the road so people can combine trips to both.

The library holds talks regularly and has a changing photo exhibit up and runs activities for children in holidays like gaming day. It has a sewing machine people can book to use and lends out tools, dressing up costumes for children, board games, dvds, video games, and sports equipment. It also sometimes lends out season tickets for the local ice hockey team.

The other library is only manned a few hours a week but it has a system where you can enter by scanning your library card and use self service check out machine outside of the manned hours (until 8pm) every day of the week, which is bloody brilliant but does obviously have risks (but there's been no problems here).

I visited an amazing library last month that had all kinds of machines you could pay or book to use like 3d printing, all kinds of clothes making tools, had gaming rooms you could book, an indoor play area and an outside one, lots of seating to read, cinema, restaurant. Absolutely massive place.

We have already discussed the possibility of literacy sessions. Volunteers working with children would need to have criminal record checks, which I think would be an issue financially - need to look into the cost implications. I like the idea of evening classes, as these don't really seem to exist anymore near us. These would need to cover their own costs.

@Pinkfluffypencilcase Your idea of recruiting young people from the local secondary school to volunteer / do work experience has been discussed a little. Older teenagers are often popular with younger children (but if working with children there would be the issue of criminal record checks). I do think this could be a win win for the library and the teenage volunteers, who'd get useful experience and something to put on their CV. They'd need some close supervision though.

In addition to literacy lessons numeracy lessons too; the very basics that people don't seem to be able to do like practical applications of percentages etc.

That's an interesting idea. I wonder what the demand is? What do you think would be the ideal time for running children's activities, if children are too busy on a Saturday morning?

I have taken the laptop there to work in the past. They could open up to that more and have a separate zone for this with power sockets and good wifi. No calls allowed though. Or have booths with sound proofing that can be booked out for calls for a fee.

I know it's not the intended use for a library but they can evolve too.

My job is hybrid and on WFH days I often like to pop into town and work from a coffee shop/library type of space.
Our library has set up a 'study space' area with desks (individual and multi-user) with plugs etc. It's really good, with the one downside that there's no expectation of working quietly per se so some people talk loudly which annoys others trying to work/study/etc.
I would highly recommend setting up a similar area.
The other strong recommendation I would make is to have COMFY seating - ideally a variety of seats e.g. tub chairs, sofa type chairs, and proper office chairs. I have left other libraries as their chairs are just horrible straight back plastic things with zero lumbar support.

The other suggestion I have is to put on events that people would actually like to attend. Not just the usual knitting groups, book clubs, toddler time, but events that target other demographics/interests - tabletop game clubs for example.

The advertising point is very useful, thanks. Yes, the library is funded via the local council, and money is obviously an issue. But it seems to me that you need to spend money to make money, even in this context. A lot of these suggestions do require a bit of upfront spending, such as getting criminal record checks for volunteers, buying in some lego, etc. If that money can't come from the council, then I'm not sure how it can be raised. I suspect that a lot of people won't want to get involved with activities if they have to pay for them.

@SnippySnappy I agree that we need to think about activities that non-typical library users may be interested in. So for children maybe Minecraft or whatever the current thing is. For men it will be something different (I'm not sure what - need to do some research). Book clubs are great and are a natural fit for a library, but they tend to be dominated by older women. That's fine, but we need something for the other demographics too.