During the past two years I have written about many issues that are vital to the LBI including: quality control, testing, and amending the Standard to embrace change. No topic that I can imagine deserves praise more than the role that the LBI's Associate Members play in our organization. Associate Members are the suppliers of materials and manufacturers of machinery used by library binders. They make and sell products such as adhesive, covering material, endpapers, binder's board, cover lettering machinery, adhesive binding systems, and software. Associate Members contribute their time and energy (and often their money) to promote the long term health of the LBI and the library binding industry. The Associate Members are the vital link between binders and libraries that have enabled the LBI to meet the diverse needs of its members.

As I have said in other articles, umbrella organizations such as the LBI are most successful when member's individual interests are best served by promoting the welfare of the trade association. This is true for the associate members of the LBI. A healthy trade association enables our suppliers to visit with the core of the library binding market twice a year to learn about our industry and promote the products that they offer. Close involvement of suppliers and machinery developers in the LBI allows them to be fully aware of the problems that binders face and includes them in a partnership that seeks to find solutions to these problems.

In the recent past, associate members have served on LBI's Strategic Planning Committee, they have provided financial support for the Library of Congress video "Library Binding: A Shared Responsibility, A Collaborative Effort" and the ALA/LBI Institutes on Library Binding held in Atlanta, Georgia and Portland, Oregon. They faithfully run advertisements in The New Library Scene, subsidizing our journal so that it can be affordably priced. They attend our meetings, have served on our Board of Directors, and have given sage counsel to our industry leaders based upon their broad business experience with organizations large and small.

Social aspects of trade association meetings enable vendors to become friends with the binders. This facilitates team building. Once formal aspects of a business relationship are relaxed, more constructive "What If" dialogues become possible. This has lead to many fruitful project realizations--a few of which I would like to share with you. (Someone should write a book that chronicles the wonderful stories of LBI Associate Member's many contributions to our industry. The few that I recount are a small sampling that focus attention on several vendors. I could have filled this magazine with many similar testimonies to each of the Associate Members that LBI is fortunate to count in its membership.)

In 1984, I was struggling with a very poorly prepared binding order when it dawned on me that our method of handling customer instructions was too complex and error-prone. We routinely would re-write illegible binding slips, then key this information into our computer system from those paper slips, stamped buckram would then be proof-read against these slips to detect and correct errors before covers were made. Library staff would inspect bound volumes and would sometimes find errors. In addition to these redundant efforts, bindery staff would copy cloth and stamping color from the binding slip into the computer. Binding dimensions were determined by one process and then re-keyed into another computer. Paper slips were sorted, alphabetized, and shuffled in a dizzying routine that raises my hair to this day. In a moment of frustration/desperation, I wrote a letter to Jack Bendror (Mekatronics) and sought his help. As the developer of the RB7 computer-controlled cover lettering system, it seemed to me that he would be able to help design a system that would allow the computer to eliminate redundant steps. Jack immediately saw the need for a software package that would link the library and the bindery electronically. After hosting a fact finding symposium at his plant in New York (attended by 15 binders), Jack began developing ABLE (Advanced Bindery/Library Exchange). ABLE was first installed in libraries in 1986 and in binderies in 1988. Today ABLE is a full-featured system built on the principles of EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) and distributed processing. ABLE and Mekatronics were ahead of their time. As a vendor to the library binding market, Jack Bendror was in close contact with his market and willing to accept a challenge to serve his customers.

The Ultrabind is another example of a vendor going out on a limb to foster the health of the library binding industry. In 1986, the LBI endorsed the principle that double-fan adhesive binding is often the most appropriate way to attach the leaves of a volume. Unfortunately for library binders, in 1986 there was no machine available for sale that would produce affordable, consistent, strong double-fan adhesive bindings. Double-fan adhesive binding was an art that some had mastered, but it was not easy for all binders to produce quality bindings using this method and some libraries were reluctant to trust the process. Again Jack Bendror came to the rescue. With the support of several orders, Jack set out in 1988 to automate a process that many felt was too complex to master. Four years and four prototypes later, Jack delivered the first Ultrabind. To everyone's delight the machine surpassed all expectations. Set-up and operation of this sophisticated equipment proved to be no more complex that operating the most simple machinery in the bindery. Productivity was immediately improved because milling, notching, sanding, double-fanning, notch-filling, and spine lining all occurred concurrently with this in-line machine operated by three bindery staff. Quality was dramatically improved because adhesive was evenly, almost magically applied between the leaves, and was firmly forced into all notches for a near perfect job. Stretchable spine linings applied with a gentler touch enable rounding and backing operations to more effectively shape the most beautiful symmetrical arch that binders have seen since the days of hand-sewing and hand-backing. Bindery workers escape the risk of repetitive motion injury while the customer gets a perfectly consistent high-quality product that the binder can guarantee with confidence.

Jack Bendror is just one of several machinery wizards that our industry is lucky to have. Jerry Flesher, developer of the System 2 cover stamping machinery, is another. In 1990, Jerry saw that another generation of stamping equipment was needed to satisfy his clientele. Several vendors introduced stamping machines in the late 1970's that took the lead out of library binding and replaced it with solid state technology and networked computer chips. As the 20th century draws to a close binders were again anxious for another breakthrough to help them reduce labor cost, eliminate repetitive tasks and improve quality. Jerry accomplished this with the System 3, introduced in 1992. The System 3 enables the binder to run machinery unattended that can letter better than one cover per minute, stamping in any of three foil colors, horizontally or vertically, on the spine or front cover, using up to 300 characters and 6 fonts. The System 3 automatically feeds flat sheets of cloth into the machine, stamps queued title information, and drops the stamped cloth down a shoot into a growing stack of completed material. Watching a row of System 3 cover lettering machines operate is like watching a magician perform.

As we all know most good magic takes a lot of diligence and persistence. The suppliers of covering materials have become experts at persistence in recent years. As the library binding industry prepares to write a new edition of our industry standard, we have entertained the concept of improved covering material. Ideally this material would be thinner, stronger, more abrasion resistant, flatter, more consistent in thickness, easier to turn over board, use no polluting chemicals and be no more expensive. This is quite a tall order. Several suppliers (Holliston Mills and ICG-Industrial Coatings Group) working with Milliken Mills, a domestic supplier of woven greige goods (the base material for buckram), have developed new products that meet our demanding criteria. Other suppliers (DSI--Decorative Specialties International) have developed non-traditional solutions (non-woven products) that also offer promise.

At our Spring LBI meeting, a full day will be given to our suppliers to present their products and their ideas about the perfect covering material for library bound volumes. Last Fall we visited Milliken Mills to see yarn being spun, fabric being woven, and world class quality control being practiced. The LBI will continue its quest for continuous improvement in our binding specifications as we pursue better covering materials. In the Spring we will visit Mead Paper to see paper being manufactured, Holliston Mills to see buckram being manufactured, and Arcata Graphics to see a high-speed edition binding factory in operation.

The Associate Members of the LBI sometimes travel far and wide to promote their customers at home and sometimes they cross traditional boundaries to turn opportunities into benefits. Fritz James (Library Binding Service) is a supplier of many products to library binders. LBS supplies rolled and cut buckram, C cloth and Type II non-woven covering materials. They also manufacture and sell endpapers and a whole catalog of other products. This past February, Fritz James hosted three Germans from L.O.S. in Bavaria to demonstrate their radical but intriguing concept in library binding automation. Many LBI members made the trip to Des Moines to see what they had to offer. Fritz managed to excite the fancy of all who recognized the possibility of achieving a higher quality product at lower cost, if the idea of heat activated adhesives on endpapers, linings and covering materials could be combined with the rigid belief in computer generated material specifications, pre-assembly of component parts based on computer measurements, and multi-tasking. Rather than break down a task into a de-skilled assembly line a la Henry Ford, their concept encourages work groups where multiple steps are performed every time a volume is handled. Fritz James and the Germans will surely have a lasting impact on binding technology as this breakthrough is digested by our industry.

Suppliers of new products and services use the forum of the LBI to address all of the binders in an efficient manner. Since most North American binders are members of the LBI, vendors have a captive audience gathered together in one location at our bi-annual meetings. This facilitates the demonstration of machinery and products to potential buyers. At our Fall LBI Meeting in South Carolina last year new equipment, developed in Italy, was demonstrated by Library Binding Service. Other Associate Members including Bindery Supplies International, The Davey Company, DSI, Gane Brothers & Lane, ICG, Mekatronics and Wisdom Adhesives displayed their products and services at an afternoon supplier's fair. (Sally-Is this list complete and accurate??) This practice has enabled suppliers to test the waters with their products and attract new sales. It reinforces for them the importance of continuing to produce high-quality products delivered with reliable service. More important, it has enticed these suppliers to offer the products and services that binders need to stay abreast of the needs of their customers. Libraries need better quality bindings, returned in shorter cycle time, prepared with less effort, and purchased at lower cost.

The North American library binders have been able to move ahead of the world-wide market for library binding because our triad of partners is squarely focused on their own self-interest. Librarians, binders and suppliers working together through the LBI have created a positive framework where each partner urges the other to reach for a higher plateau. This constructive relationship is working as a model for the Europeans who are trying to duplicate the North American success story embodied in the LBI. Next October the French are hosting a symposium to celebrate the new Bibliotheque de France. One of their goals is to foster cooperation and partnering by European librarians, binders and suppliers. My advice to them is to concentrate on the suppliers, they are our most powerful catalyst for positive change as well as a strong voice for conservative prudence. Our silent partners have traditionally been behind the most lasting, biggest impact changes on our industry. A binder is generally regarded as having been far-sighted if he or she had the fortitude to take advantage of the opportunities presented by a supplier. I say we all owe the Associate Members of the Library Binding Institute a great debt for the progress our industry has enjoyed.

Paul Parisi, President
Acme Bookbinding