If you work in a public library then there’s an excellent chance that you’ve already heard that Demco is pulling out of the software market. If not, here’s the email they sent out this past Thursday.
So this communiqué has raised more questions than provided answers. Why is the timetable so short? Some libraries have their programming booked into 2024. Why aren’t they selling this off to someone else? There are a lot of current and former Demco customers that might argue that Demco was never able to offer adequate support for the products they sold. Their support forums have questions that have never been answered. There’s no easy to find data about how big of a market share Evanced has, but it has to be significant. This is going to create a large power vacuum in the calendar/room reservation space. This should come as welcome news to all of Demco’s competitors. Some are already sending out specials for new customers. This will be a really great opportunity for someone to snatch up a ton of Demco customers. Here are some companies offering library calendars:
BiblioWeb https://www.bibliocommons.com/products/biblioweb
Burbio https://www.burbio.com/states
Communico https://communico.us/
Engaged Patrons https://engagedpatrons.org/
EventKeeper https://www.eventkeeper.com/eventkeeper_prweb.cfm
LibCal (SpringShare) https://www.springshare.com/libcal/
Library Market (LibraryCalendar) https://www.librarymarket.com/
Local Hop https://getlocalhop.com/
SignUpGenius https://www.signupgenius.com/
Some libraries go DIY and use Google Calendars, Drupal, or WordPress. What is your library doing?
