We did curbside for a week, and I expect to offer it entirely or in part when we reopen. While not everything we did will work for you, since PWPL is a much bigger library, here is what we did, and a few recommendations.

1. If patrons have internet access and can place holds online, pull them as normal.

2. If patrons do not have internet access, allow them to call to request books. Sometimes, they may not know what they want and have vague suggestions. This will end up being a combination of requests and reader advisory. ("I want two Debbie Macombers" or "I like books about people, choose something for me.")

3. Normal checkout limits apply.

4. If they have cell phones, ask that they call when they arrive. (This is similar to the Marquette Food Co-op's system.)

5. If they only have landlines, ask for an estimated time of arrival or schedule it with them. (This applies to many of our patrons, who are older.)

6. Our holds notifications consist of a staff member calling people; that did not change.

7. Wear a mask and fresh gloves for each and every curbside interaction.

8. I recommend putting items in a plastic bag to hand to the patron.

We also did curbside faxing that week. I don't particularly recommend this, as it requires money to be exchanged.

Jessica Holman

We did curbside pickup for 5 days before calling it quits. Here are my responses:

1.   Did you impose limits on # of titles for pickup/patron?
No. We had enough of our staff still reporting to work that this wasn't an issue for us; we had time to get them all checked out and brought to the curbside pretty quickly, even if they had a dozen books.

2.   Did you have a family pack, or some other librarian collected set of picture books by topic to offer families who may not have time to place individual titles on hold?
We didn't plan for this, but we ended up doing it for a few patrons! Some of our regulars who don't use Enterprise, but still stop in to checkout up to 25 kids books each week, called us with some subject ideas, and our staff hand-picked their books. We were only able to do this is a family called ahead of time, and then we let them know when the books were available.

3.   Any advice on how to stagger pickup appointments, or how to encourage folks to spread out while waiting for pickup?
There were times when we got pretty busy, with a line of cars waiting out front. We don't have a parking lot that abuts our building like you do thought; maybe you could use cones and signage in your parking lot to direct curbside pickup patrons? We really encouraged our patrons to call ahead (sort of like an appointment) but they often just showed up outside and gave us a call, or knocked on the door. This wasn't really ideal because sometimes we were trying to locate their holds from the stacks.

4.   What about your ILS generated holds notifications? Did you change messages with new instructions regarding curbside pickup?
No, but I'm so glad you mentioned this. We are considering returning to curbside pickup as the 'first phase' in our reopening and maybe we ought to adjust those notifications, too. Good idea!

5.   Any other helpful tips, or even things that didn't work for you?
One thing we tried to be really careful with was hygiene safety. If a patron called to pick up their holds, we always asked them if they were symptomatic, and if they were, we told them we cannot help them. A lot of people want to get out of their car and walk to the front door, and we really tried to discourage this. We also always delivered books to the passenger side of the vehicle if there was no one seated there. That way we could maintain distance from the driver (we would wave and motion for them to roll the window down). Staff also had a glove on in case they would need to open a patron's door.

We did curbside pickup for 5 days before calling it quits. Here are my responses:

1.   Did you impose limits on # of titles for pickup/patron?
No. We had enough of our staff still reporting to work that this wasn't an issue for us; we had time to get them all checked out and brought to the curbside pretty quickly, even if they had a dozen books.

2.   Did you have a family pack, or some other librarian collected set of picture books by topic to offer families who may not have time to place individual titles on hold?
We didn't plan for this, but we ended up doing it for a few patrons! Some of our regulars who don't use Enterprise, but still stop in to checkout up to 25 kids books each week, called us with some subject ideas, and our staff hand-picked their books. We were only able to do this is a family called ahead of time, and then we let them know when the books were available.

3.   Any advice on how to stagger pickup appointments, or how to encourage folks to spread out while waiting for pickup?
There were times when we got pretty busy, with a line of cars waiting out front. We don't have a parking lot that abuts our building like you do thought; maybe you could use cones and signage in your parking lot to direct curbside pickup patrons? We really encouraged our patrons to call ahead (sort of like an appointment) but they often just showed up outside and gave us a call, or knocked on the door. This wasn't really ideal because sometimes we were trying to locate their holds from the stacks.

4.   What about your ILS generated holds notifications? Did you change messages with new instructions regarding curbside pickup?
No, but I'm so glad you mentioned this. We are considering returning to curbside pickup as the 'first phase' in our reopening and maybe we ought to adjust those notifications, too. Good idea!

5.   Any other helpful tips, or even things that didn't work for you?
One thing we tried to be really careful with was hygiene safety. If a patron called to pick up their holds, we always asked them if they were symptomatic, and if they were, we told them we cannot help them. A lot of people want to get out of their car and walk to the front door, and we really tried to discourage this. We also always delivered books to the passenger side of the vehicle if there was no one seated there. That way we could maintain distance from the driver (we would wave and motion for them to roll the window down). Staff also had a glove on in case they would need to open a patron's door.

Dillon Geshel

We were able to offer curbside only for three days after March 16 before the county health department informed us that we had to stop.  We simply took phone calls for requests and asked that patrons call as they were pulling up to the library.  Some patrons just asked us to pull a few movies we thought they’d like.  Others asked for books by specified authors.  We never had the chance to customize book sets, but that is a great idea.  We adhered to our limits of 15 items out at a time and a limit of 5 movies at a time (we did away with movie fees at the beginning of the year).

Mimi Herrington, Director
Bad Axe Area District Library