I really enjoyed merchandising the bookshelves course. I particularly enjoyed the creative tasks of merchandising a particular part of the library, for example: the teen fiction section which often gets forgotten about. 

Coming from the school of social work, I didn’t learn visual merchandising in library school – so this training is new and I found it refreshing. And even if I had experienced it before, I would still keep an open mind and trust that I will learn something new and interesting! After all, we work in an industry that gives evolving, updated information regularly – and this is what this course is about - a refresher for the evolving, curious minds and something new, for someone like me!

I enjoyed this course – it gives simple and applicable approaches to merchandising the library with immediate effects. The information was easy to understand and to apply, the interactive elements were fun and I found I could use what I learned from the course immediately in my work.

Your course is excellent! I loved it. Our library has been trying to merchandise our collection before and we have had in house training. This course reinforced our library guidelines and my previous experience with displays in the library. The way your training was organized was very thoughtful and logical. It was easy to follow, fun to experiment and full of inspirational ideas and encouragement.

The course was excellent.
It has made me feel connected to my job and our readers and has given me renewed enthusiasm.
I think the course was written and presented in a user friendly way which inspired personal involvement - it made me think!

I really enjoyed the course and found the books that might appeal to men and the under 45s’ activity fun to do. It also was fun to research online, through blogs, and from family members and friends for their insight into what books to recommend to read. I did all my learning by using my knowledge of my own library and seeking insight from friends/family and colleagues on some of the questions.

I found this course very interesting and would recommend it to others. It has really made me think about how each display looks and how it might entice patrons to pick up and borrow different books in the collection. It also offers insights into how we can make the library more appealing to a variety of users and the hands-on assignments give confidence in setting up displays.

I love Opening the Book courses because I always learn something which greatly helps me in my day-to-day job. It helps change your perception and your thinking with regards to which books to promote and how to effectively promote them so that borrowers take them all!

The highlight of this course was the ability to have mini assessment style interactions. I felt like I was learning more and able to see the result when I chose the best covers in the selection. There is so much helpful information, and along with the interactive sections, it really gives people a chance to try and have immediate feedback on their choices. It will help staff bring a fresh frame of mind for their display choices - and understand the patron's point of view. The final bookcase tasks were so fun!

I do relief library work in several community libraries in a rural area so was able to visualise different libraries and book collections during the exercises. I thoroughly enjoyed working through the course, it was not an arduous task at all if you love books and working with readers. Well laid out and easy to use, not technically challenging. Good practical ideas to use in our own libraries.