During the pandemic, many customers who had previously been mobile now didn’t feel comfortable leaving home, and our outreach department wasn’t able to deliver library materials to nursing homes and other facilities because of infection risk. Books by Mail wasn’t working well due to postal delays, and it didn’t address the need for human interaction anyway. So we put our staff (eager to resume work) and our outreach vehicles back on the job, providing home delivery to customers on a monthly basis.

Our goal was to break down access barriers to bring the library to customers who cannot visit us in-person. Several library departments came together to make this happen: our Adult Outreach department contacted customers who couldn’t receive traditional service; our Marketing Department created targeted ads to make new customers and their families aware of the program; and our Early Childhood Outreach Team provided drivers and vehicles.

Home Delivery has served 120 customers since its launch in early January 2021. We’ve made 600 deliveries of 6,200 items, including books, Playaways, Chromebooks and hotspots. By design, we planned for users to decrease as Adult Outreach resumed visits to senior facilities. However, word of mouth about this program, along with library staff promoting it, has resulted in the service remaining robust and busy. The library has received positive feedback, both in informal conversations and formal surveys.