AITL26 is May 17 – 20, 2026

What is The Acquisitions Institute?

The Acquisitions Institute at Timberline Lodge has been providing a unique opportunity for acquisitions and collection development librarians, vendors, and publishers to meet and discuss pertinent trends and issues in libraries since 2000.

• Since 2000, the pre-eminent conference located in Western North America on acquisitions and collection development, held at Timberline Lodge.
• A three-day conference focusing on the methods and innovation of building and managing library collections.
• A small (capped at 80 attendees), informal and stimulating gathering in a convivial and glorious Pacific Northwest setting.

What topics are we looking for?

The planning committee is seeking submissions on all aspects of library acquisitions and collection management. Presenters are encouraged to engage the audience in discussion, whether the presentation leans more toward the practical “here’s what we did” sessions or toward the more abstract “here’s what we think” sessions. The committee may also seek to achieve balance in the program by bringing individual proposals together to form panels, or by recommending that a proposal be converted to a table talk. We invite you to indicate whether or not you’d be interested in these opportunities on the submission proposal form.

Topics we and/or prior year’s attendees are interested in include (in no particular order):

• Assessment tools, methods, and projects (e.g., linking collections with learning outcomes; usage studies)
• Collection strategies including new models for selection and managing liaison programs 
• Government, special, or academic library perspectives in acquisitions and collection development 
• Sustainable models for publishing/pricing 
• Effective management of collections with constrained resources 
• Vendor and publisher evaluation, including business skills to determine financial viability 
• Diversity, inclusion, representation, and social justice in acquisitions and collections 
• Negotiation skills and how to use them, including during library-vendor and library-publisher meetings 
• Innovative vendor-librarian relationships and/or partnerships 
• Staffing, training and development, and recruiting issues, challenges, successes (e.g., onboarding new acquisitions and/or collections staff) 
• Using data visualization techniques to tell our stories (e.g., budget, collections, staff successes, etc.) 
• Impacts of Open initiatives on acquisitions and collection development 
• Data curation, including Big Data, and management and other new roles for subject and technical services librarians 
• How Generative AI impacts our work

Important Dates

Fri 12/30/25: Proposals due
Mon 1/19/26: Review of proposals complete, and presenters notified
Fri 1/23/26: Presenters confirm commitment to present
Early February: Registration scheduled to open