I’ve had a couple of recent successes partnering my library with local businesses here in Brooklyn, and I thought I’d share them with you all. I hope that in the comments section some people will share their experiences as well. With the economy in a tight spot, I have no doubt that many library systems and small businesses out there see themselves in quite the old-time pickle. Partnering with new, budding businesses is a great way to bring energy and diversity to your programming portfolio, and a really nice way to lend them some of that library feel-good PR. That’s right- everybody out there loves the library, so when an upstanding local business is given the privilege of associating their public image with that of the library they tend to be pretty psyched.

My first example is a back-to-school party that we threw on Labor Day as a joint effort between Brooklyn Public Library and the Habana Outpost. I heard Sean Meenan, the owner of Habana Outpost, speak at a panel discussion at Pratt Institute back in January called Tipping Points: Art, Politics and Civic Engagement, and then I blogged about his commentary. His restaurant is an eco-eatery, a place where all of the plates and cups are made of corn plastic, everything is solar powered, and even the bathroom toilets flush with rainwater collected from the roofs. The Habana Outpost is already something of a community hub that offers children’s programming, a happy hour for local teachers to share their lesson plans, and an assortment of eco-friendly crafts. After they contacted me based on the blog post, we decided to take it to the next level, partner up, and throw a back-to-school bash for the record books. On September 1^st, while I should have been paying my rent in a timely fashion, instead myself and five other library staffers sat in the sun and gave out over 150 library cards, read stories to eager groups of children, had a kids dance party, saw displays with live honeybees in action, handed out mini worm compost bins (with real worms!), and promoted the library and all of the services we provide. The event was a great success for both the library and the restaurant, and the beginning of a lasting partnership.

My other example is still in the works, and it is a partnership that I really hope to see blossom. I recently received a phone call at the Bushwick Branch from a local soap manufacturer called Skinnyskinny Soaps. They make hand-crafted, high-end soaps out of all organic materials, and like Habana Outpost, they have an eco-friendly business plan. Skinnyskinny recently won an award for their clever and beautiful packaging, which is what drove them to call the public library. All of their products are wrapped by hand by artists who they employ to fold the pages of old, unwanted books into remarkably crisp boxes and envelopes. They thought the library might be a good place to track down discarded books, and if us librarians are keeping to our weeding schedules the way we ought to, they are absolutely right! Currently my library works with BetterWorld books to resell donations and discards and then use that money to bolster our materials budget. Still, there is a wealth of material that is beyond the point of resale, and this will be such an exciting way to pass it along for reuse. I’m pretty sure that this marks the beginning of a bigger effort to responsibly deal with vast quantities of material, so fingers crossed- let’s see what happens.

So again, I hope that readers will enjoy the stories of what I’m up to here in Brooklyn, but even more so I hope that we’ll be seeing more stories in the commentary. Blogging is all about sharing ideas. The Habana Outpost event I mentioned never would have happened if I hadn’t blogged about the panel discussion I visited; that was the way we made contact. Consider the fact that every time you tell a story, you give someone else the chance to react to it and create their own story, and use that as a starting point for your writing and programming schemes. Looking forward to reading about them!