Many of you have contacted us regarding a recent letter received from Brodart's Books & Automation Division. Brodart has been made aware of your concerns and should be issuing a second letter that will clarify their statement "that participating member libraries will make a good faith effort to purchase at least 75% of their pledged MARLS materials category expenditures from the suppliers awarded Primary Vendor status".

Although the MARLS Cooperative has asked librarians to spend at least 75% of what they have pledged with the Cooperative, it is not stipulated that it must be with the primary vendors. The Cooperative does expect librarians to use the primary vendors, but if those vendors do not provide the level of service that is needed, i.e. good fill rates, quality of product, quick order fulfillment, etc., librarians can move onto the secondary vendor or the tertiary vendor if neither the primary or secondary vendor offers the type of service they need. When using vendors other than the primary because of specific problems, please document the reasons why on our Feedback Form so that we may have this information in hand for upcoming cooperatives. If using the secondary or tertiary vendors because a title is not available from the primary vendor, no documentation is needed.

Below is in response to your questions regarding how a vendor is chosen for the Co-op:

Higher discounts don't always represent the lowest costs for materials. This fact was taken into consideration in the bid process whereby vendors were asked to add the cost of processing supplies to a selected list of discounted titles or provide discounts off of a selected list of materials listed in their catalogs. Therefore, in some of the categories, the primary, secondary and tertiary vendors were determined based on the best value offered, not the best discount.

For categories that contained two material types, i.e. Category 11, Spoken Word Audio Cassettes and CD's - unabridged, and Spoken Word Audio Cassettes and CD's - abridged, determination was based on a point system; the greater number of points going to the material type that more money was pledged in. Vendors with the most points received these awards. Continuation Account was determined this way also as this category is comprised of two material types, Trade and Non-Trade.

Category 8, Non-trade was awarded to the vendors with the lowest surcharges. Categories 12, 13, 18 and 19 were determined by the quality of the product. In the case of two vendors with the same discount or number of points, the vendor with their main warehouse closest to Hatfield received the higher position. In some instances, the vendor with a greater number of titles in stock received the award over a vendor with a better discount.

Please use our Feedback Form if you have additional questions or would like more information.

Donna Augustus
WMRLS
58 Main Street
Hatfield, MA 01038
1-800-282-7755