Newsletter on Serial Pricing Issues 098 (October 23, 1993) URL = http://hegel.lib.ncsu.edu/stacks/serials/nspi/nspi-ns098 ISSN: 1046-3410 NEWSLETTER ON SERIALS PRICING ISSUES NO 98 -- October 23, 1993 Editor: Marcia Tuttle CONTENTS 98.1 SHOULD LIBRARIANS BECOME PUBLISHERS? Connie Maslow 98.2 MCB PRICING, Allan Foster 98.3 RESPONSE FROM MCB UNIVERSITY PRESS, Dr. Keith Howard 98.1 SHOULD LIBRARIANS BECOME PUBLISHERS? SSP SEMINAR IN CHARLESTON Connie Maslow, Society for Scholarly Publishing, 5686814@MCIMail.com. The Society for Scholarly Publishing is pleased to announce new LOWER REG- ISTRATION FEES for the "Should Librarians Become Publishers" seminar to be held Wednesday, November 3 in Charleston, South Carolina. This seminar, chaired by _Library Journal_ editor-in-chief, John Berry III, and Katina Strauch, Head Collection Development, College of Charleston, addresses the possibilities and perils faced by the library community should they assume the role of publisher in an electronic environment. The new rates are for all attendees: Full Day Registration $99.00 Half Day Registration $60.00 Maximize your attendance at the Charleston Conference that week by attend- ing (for even a half-day!) this exciting program at the Omni Hotel featur- ing the following speakers: "Publishing in the Electronic Environment: Brave New Author" -- Becky Len- zini, CARL Systems, Inc. "Publishing in the Electronic Environment: Brave New Library" -- Joe Boy- kin, Clemson University "Intellectual Property, Copyright, and Authors' Rights" -- John Cox, Black- wells "The Library As Author" -- Ann Hartman, Research Publications, Inc. "The Death of the Scholarly Monograph" -- Richard Abel, Consultant "The Role of Partnering in the Publishing Relationship" -- Julie Gammon, University of Akron "The Consortium as Publisher" -- Frank Grisham, SOLINET Join us at the Omni Hotel, Charleston Place, for a day or a half-day for discussion of this timely topic. Accommodations: The Omni Hotel at Charleston Place, 130 Market Street, Charleston, SC 29401. Please phone: (803) 722-4900 for reservations. Group Rate based on availability: $152 (plus applicable taxes). Mention "SSP Seminar" to qual- ify. SHOULD LIBRARIANS BECOME PUBLISHERS? REGISTRATION FORM Please print out a hard copy of the registration form and FAX to SSP's office at (303) 422-8894. Last Name: First Name: Title: Organization: Address: City: State: ZIP: Phone: FAX: E-Mail: ____ Full Day Registration $99.00 ____ Half-Day Registration $60.00 I ___ am ____ am not a member of SSP. Do you need disabled or other special services? Yes No If yes, please describe: Vegetarian Meal Required? Yes No $_________Amount Enclosed _____This form confirms a FAX registration. ____ Check made payable to SSP ____ Visa ____ MC Credit Card #: Exp Date: Name of Cardholder: Signature: ___________________________________________________________________ ____ Please send me SSP membership information. CANCELLATION POLICY: Full refund for cancellation received at least one week prior to the seminar date. All others subject to $25 service fee. There are no refunds for cancellations received less than 72 hours prior to the seminar. Society for Scholarly Publishing 10200 West 44th Ave., #304 Wheat Ridge, CO 80033 Phone: (303) 422-3914 FAX: (303) 422-8894 E-Mail: 5686814@MCIMail.com 98.2 MCB PRICING Allan Foster, Manchester Business School Librarian, A.FOSTER@fs2.mbs.ac.uk. It was excellent to see Deana Astle's thorough analysis of the mysteries of MCB pricing. This matter has been a 'cause celebre' amongst UK business librarians for a long time and it is interesting that our US colleagues are increasingly becoming aware of their practices. MCB has had quite a long history in the UK. It started in the 1960s with a major involvement by Gordon Wills, then a well known, entrepreneurial pro- fessor at the University of Bradford's Management Centre. It is still based in this area of Yorkshire but has no connection with the University. Over the years MCB has built a thriving business by acquiring existing business journal titles, and starting up others, and injecting a fairly hard headed business approach into their management, including a high pro- file commercial marketing and promotion strategy. Editorial Boards of their journals are large, and many business school faculty who are involved in this way press their libraries to maintain subcriptions. Some of their titles are, irrespective of cost, regarded by my academic colleagues at MBS as core journals which we must retain -- the _European Journal of Marketing_ certainly falls into this category. Fellow business librarians in other schools have not been so persuaded and at least one major school has simply cancelled all MCB subscriptions, on grounds of principle if not finance. I do wonder what the rate of cancella- tions has been, and what impact these will have on MCB's business. The normal (but to me unconvincing) response by MCB to searching questions from librarians about pricing policies is to draw attention to the increas- ing number of pages year on year (and supplements) and justify proportional increases on this basis. Make your own minds up about this! Because some of their titles are important, this is a serious matter. I simply wish the library community could have a sensible dialogue with the company. 98.3 RESPONSE FROM MCB UNIVERSITY PRESS Dr. Keith Howard, Chairman, MCB University Press, 60-62 Toller Lane, Bradford, West Yorkshire, England BD8 9BY; Fax: 44 274 543576. An analysis of journals published by MCB University Press Ltd undertaken by Ms Deana Astle of Clemson University recently appeared in the _Newsletter on Serials Pricing Issues_. I am always pleased to contribute to such de- bate as, however sceptically librarians may regard publishers' arguments, it is important that both supplier and customer in this segment of the information chain be aware of each other's circumstances and concerns. Before discussing the broader arguments which arise in the debate there are two matters arising out of Ms Astle's article which I would like to cor- rect. The first of these concerns the illusion of advertising in MCB jour- nals. Paid advertising is included in a very limited number of journals published by MCB and usually occurs because a journal has been acquired with advertisements as a regular feature. We endeavour to wean journals off advertising as soon as possible as we do not consider it appropriate that journals such as ours should carry material of this nature. It is certainly the case that none of the titles for which academic libraries are a major customer group carry paid advertising. The second point concerns circula- tion levels. As a niche publisher MCB does not expect high market penetra- tion and considers a journal successful if it has circulation in the few hundreds. The circulation figure quoted for _Industrial Lubrication and Tribology_ is very far from the truth, and is based, one must assume, on the previous publisher's requirement for a high circualtion image to sup- port the advertising revenue required at the time the figures were provid- ed. The current circulation is, in fact, less than one thousand. Such are the dangers of believing the statistics published with regard to individual journals. All the journals discussed by Ms Astle attract circualtion levels in the hundreds rather than the thousands. Turning to the broader picture of pricing levels, it is a commercial reali- ty that journals must rely on subscription income for survival. Such sub- scription income must be at a level compatible with the financial viability of the individual journal. No-one wants journals which are here today and gone tomorrow simply because the publishers were insufficiently financially astute. Several of the journals which MCB has acquired from other publish- ers -- who were not prepared to make hard decisions with regard to price -- would have ceased publication as they were previously commercially unvia- ble. These include such significant titles as _Kybernetes_ and _Library Review_. Nor do publishers wish to sit back on their laurensl and adopt a "Luddite" attitude to new developments in information dissemination. MCB has been able to reinvest revenue to develop electronic versions of its secondary publishing activities, the _Anbar_ suite of titles and _Computer Ab- stracts_. It is one of the first publishers to invoke Bulletin Board tech- nology to improve communications with its librarian customers and facili- tate interaction with them. These developments are undertaken in response to librarian demand and we will continue to invest in whatever is necessary to make our products and ancillary services more appropriate, and accessi- ble, for our librarian customers and their constituents as their needs develop. Equally, publishers should not ignore the demands of their librarian cus- tomers for access to journal articles as well as, or, instead of, ownership of journals. MCB is cooperating with a number of ventures both in Europe and North America to facilitate the dissemination of individual articles, and investment in this respect is considerable. However, until alternative information chains -- which may or may not include printed journals -- are developed, it is advisable to remember that without the journal, with its editorial scrupulousness and high production quality, there isn't an arti- cle to retrieve. I was impressed by Ms Astle's thorough analysis of the various combinations of factors relative to journal subscription price. As commercial publishers we do not link elements of a journal in quite the same way. In order that journals should satisfy the needs of the individuals who read them there are a number of factors which are _sine qua non_ in journal publishing: 1. that the journal maintains sufficient numbers of issues and pages so that the learned Editor can include all the important academic writings which s/he thinks the journal's readers need to see; 2. that the Editor is in no way prohibited from publishing whatever materi- al s/he thinks fit because of the journal's financial dependence on advertising revenue or support from particular academic institutions or professional or industry associations; 3. that the journal satisfy production criteria consistent with the re- quirements of its users; 4. that the journal is sufficiently viable financially to assure its con- tinued publication; 5. that a journal, wherever possible, can be maintained no matter how small the number of academics who require it. The economies of journal publishing are quite complex. It is often not appreciated that if journal renewal rates fall below 80% a price rise of at least 25% is required simply to stand still -- and that ignores the effects of inflation. Nor, sadly, is it true that minimising price rises improves renewal levels. MCB has tracked the renewal behaviour of its customers over many years and has proved that, even when there is no price rise from one volume to the next, the level of renewal does not improve. Other publishers adopt different strategies to maintain profitability, but the number of important journals which cease publication each year are mute testament to the difficult decisions which publishers, like librarians, have to make. I hope that this contribution is of interest to the readers of your news- letter and that, in some small way, it has illuminated the processes by which a small niche publisher is able to participate in, and add value to, the information chain. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Statements of fact and opinion appearing in the _Newsletter on Serials Pricing Issues_ are made on the responsibility of the authors alone, and do not imply the endorsement of the editor, the editorial board, or the Uni- versity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Readers of the NEWSLETTER ON SERIALS PRICING ISSUES are encouraged to share the information in the newsletter by electronic or paper methods. We would appreciate credit if you quote from the newsletter. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ The NEWSLETTER ON SERIALS PRICING ISSUES (ISSN: 1046-3410) is published by the editor through the Office of Information Technology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as news is available. Editor: Marcia Tuttle, Internet: tuttle@gibbs.oit.unc.edu; Paper mail: Serials Department, CB #3938 Davis Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill NC 27599-3938; Telephone: 919 962-1067; FAX: 919 962-0484. Editorial Board: Deana Astle (Clemson University), Jerry Curtis (Springer Verlag New York), Janet Fisher (MIT Press), Charles Hamaker (Louisiana State Universi- ty), Daniel Jones (University of Texas Health Science Center), James Mouw (University of Chicago), and Heather Steele (Blackwell's Periodicals Divi- sion). The Newsletter is available on the Internet, Blackwell's CONNECT, and Readmore's ROSS. EBSCO customers may receive the Newsletter in paper format. To subscribe to the newsletter send a message to LISTSERV@GIBBS.OIT.UNC.EDU saying SUBSCRIBE PRICES [YOUR NAME]. Be sure to send that message to the listserver and not to Prices. You must include your name. To unsubscribe (no name required in message), you must send the message from the e-mail address by which you are subscribed. If you have problems, please contact the editor. Back issues of the Newsletter are available electronically. To get a list of available issues send a message to LISTSERV@GIBBS.OIT.UNC.EDU saying INDEX PRICES. To retrieve a specific issue, the message should read: GET PRICES PRICES.xx (where "xx" is the number of the issue). +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ *****ENDOFFILE*****ENDOFFILE*****ENDOFFILE*****ENDOFFILE*****ENDOFFILE*****