The logistics of delivering Free Library books to local branches
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With a few clicks, you can get any of the Free Library's vast collection of physical materials — from books to DVDs — sent to your local branch.
- Behind the scenes, a small team based in a South Philly warehouse is orchestrating it all.
Why it matters: The free, on-demand benefit for patrons greatly expands access to the library's resources.
Driving the news: On any given weekday, the Regional Operations Center (ROC) in Pennovation Works receives hundreds of bins full of books and other items that have been requested for borrowing, and hundreds more are sent out.
- Elsewhere at the climate-controlled site, most of the library's reference books and periodicals are stored, along with older items like yearbooks and directories.
Zoom in: Overseeing the library's sorting and delivery system is Clint Fargason, assistant chief of materials management.
- It's a warehouse environment, where organizing the incoming and outgoing material on pallets is like playing Tetris, he says.
- "It is a constant flow," he says. "There is always stuff coming in and always stuff going out."
Fargason oversees five drivers and roughly a half-dozen library assistants who sort requested materials.
How it works: When patrons want a book or physical item that's not at their neighborhood branch but is elsewhere in the library's system, they can place a "hold" on it and request their preferred branch for pick-up.
- That triggers a message, typically within 24 hours, at the library that has the material.
- Library staff drop the requested item in gray bins — which staff call totes — to be shipped out. Each tote holds around 25 pounds' worth of books and other items.
- Drivers in electric vans and box trucks visit roughly 10–15 of the city's more than 50 library branches each day to pick up totes.
By the numbers: Between 400 and 500 totes are delivered to the ROC each weekday.
- Materials are then fed to a super sorter, which scans 4,000–6,000 items each day and separates them into piles corresponding to their destined library branch.
The materials are reorganized into totes then hand-delivered to their destined branch.
- There, library staff place the items on a holds shelf where they await patron pickup.
Timeline: The process takes about five business days on average between placing a hold and receiving an item.
Zoom out: Each month, the Free Library makes an average of 36,000 books and other physical items available to patrons through hold requests (which includes items already located at a patron's branch).
🤯 1 crazy thing: Before the arrival of the library's super sorter at the ROC circa 2016, requested items were being sorted and processed by hand at the Parkway Central Library.
What he's saying: Fargason says he's never at a loss for what to read now that he has a front-row seat to what's trending in Philly in real time.
- "I put holds on things all the time based on what I see," he joked.