Glad you liked the suggestion.
We started off with a dip stick check about the response within the company itself... (though it was limited to book donation and not monetary contributions..)... We announced that we would be setting up a library; enlisted topics/authors, and magazines that employees were keen to read about.
We published this list, requested employees to bring in their books, magazines of the enlisted topics/authors. The response was good. We even had employees going out of their way and pursuading thier relatives, friends and nieghbours to divulge with their priceless treasures. Some even went an extra mile to the local "raddiwalas" and asked them if they would like to make any contribution! and agree they did (only we had to let them sign those books as a contribution from their stall/shop - talk aboout branding!).
Next we set up a team of voluntary employees and sorted these books (any B.Lib? please help with sorting..). The ones that had pages missing, we tracked a few other owners of the same books, got the missing pages photocopied, and reinstated the matter... books that had covers missing, we got them bound and covered. Then we stamped each book with the company stamp and set up library cards and registers to track whichever books were loaned for how long.....
Then after zeroing down on the place, we bought some aluminium racks (cheaper and easy to maintain in comparison to wood) and displayed those books......... and... ... ..., we soon lost track of the number of registers we've used... :)
We really din' need to purchase any specific books, because the book donations never stopped. It kept on trickling in from employees wanting to clear their homes, realtives whose kids had moved and found no use of their books, and even the local libraries that wanted some publicity or had too many editions/copies of the same books.
All the best, Manas.
Regards
Nayana. C