To buy or not to buy? A case study of Western books at Peking University Library

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to develop a decision-making model for buy vs borrow selection decisions. Design/methodology/approach - The authors conduct a statistical analysis of circulation transactions and Interlibrary Loan (ILL) request data related to Western books as well as the overall subject content of local collections. They compare the relative costs and delivery times for obtaining materials through interlibrary loan channels vs purchase from domestic or foreign publishers. Based on this analysis, they make recommendations for buy vs borrow decision-making model relevant to the Western books collection at the Peking University Library. Findings - For materials available domestically, requesting through ILL is the preferred acquisitions strategy because of the low cost of domestic service and the comparable speed of delivery. Materials that can only be obtained from foreign libraries are best acquired through a combination of purchase-on-demand and ILL. Originality/value - This paper adds to the corpus of professional literature on buy vs borrow collection development models but adds a unique perspective by applying this model to a Western book collection in a Chinese academic library.