Munich Public Library

Getting into your customers’ good books: As a European library sciences leader, you fully understand the demands of operating a successful city library and its district branches. The proof is in the numbers: your facilities circulate more than 49,000 items each day and host more than five million visits yearly. How can you provide better service to your customers while streamlining operational processes and safeguarding your inventory?

Since cost, accuracy and the ability to meet growing customer demand are critical, you adopt RFID, teaming up with leading RFID library systems company Bibliotheca-RFID AG and UPM Raflatac to design a system that can be used on 1.5 million items in your 3.15 million-strong collection. In 2006, the team implemented self-checkout stations at Munich Public Library’s primary library and two at its district branches. By 2009, RFID systems will be in place at the remaining 25 district branches.

Self-service stations allow customers to check out and return library items quickly and easily; books are tagged with UPM Raflatac’s RaceTrack HF tags, while CDs and DVDs carry BullsEye HF tags. An RFID reader at the library exit reduces theft by sounding an audio and visual alarm if customers try to leave the library without checking out items properly. And after customers return items, the RFID-tagged materials are automatically sorted using criteria created by the library, reducing staff stress injuries caused by manual sorting.

RFID provides valuable benefits that customers can see, such as reduced queuing times, faster inventory circulation, the ability to scan multiple items simultaneously and a means to locate misplaced items quickly and easily. RFID also frees library staff from repetitive tasks, enabling them to focus on delivering a superior level of customer service.

When it comes to RFID, media management businesses from libraries to for-profit companies are on the same page. After all, it delivers the right results with every swipe.