Thanks for the quick responses, guys and gals.  Of 11 that emailed me in the first hour:

2 suggest instead of Prime, I open a business account with free 2-day shipping (I found out from amazon that you need a minimum $49 order for free 2-day shipping though).

4 pay for a Prime account ($99 a year), and made comments that it's a reasonable price for the service, and getting new videos cheaply on their release dates, for example (I'm going to use that one!).  Executive decision was also mentioned.

1 has her personal Prime account linked to the library's business account, so she gets free shipping both places and has two payment options at checkout; an amazon rep suggested it.

3 have regular accounts without Prime and group their purchases for free shipping over $35 (there are some exceptions), but it often takes more than 2 days to receive the items

1 is wondering about Prime as well and will be reading this.

Thanks again!

Sue Riegler, Director

Alden District Library