A word with Nick Grove of the Meridian Library District’s ‘unBound’

Nick Grove is the tech library supervisor at unBound, a two-year-old program of the Meridian Library District that provides a technology library and education on emerging technology.

In some ways, unBound is a classic program of a public library, designed to provide access to education to all, regardless of income. But it’s also a maker space, digital design lab, and business help center that focuses on entrepreneurs, small business owners, and millennials. It’s open to all comers, and about 850 people per month use the space, Grove said.

Grove, who has been working at the Meridian library since 2011, was a driving force behind unBound, and he is the staff person present every day when people come in to execute projects on unBound’s 3D printers, use programs on the Macs, or take advantage of other offerings. unBound operates out of a former bank building on Meridian’s Main Street leased from the Meridian Development Corp.

Grove has a bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of Idaho and is working on a master’s degree in library science from the University of North Texas. Idaho Business Review spent some time with him learning about unBound and what he hopes to accomplish with it. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

How did this start?

I was always interested in trying new things. I did my first computer class for senior citizens when I was a junior or senior in high school and working at the Lewiston library.

In Meridian, I worked in the teen department and grew the program 400 percent. I tried to find ways to engage the teens after school, and we started programs like video games, open craft, a burger and books book club, and I started applying for technology grants.

I read lots of library publications, and I do webinars and conferences. Libraries were starting to explore new ways of engaging the public and providing new opportunities, and maker spaces across the world were taking off, and libraries kind of jumped on and said this is something we’re interested in and able to provide to our patrons. Everyone has done it with a different flavor.

When we decided to make this place, (Meridian Library Director Gretchen Caserotti) found an empty space in downtown Meridian. We came up with a pitch, and described in rough outline the facility as it is now, and presented it to the library board.

Why not do this at the regular library?

We had 3D printers and virtual reality at the library, but because of our limited space they lived in closets. We’d pull them out once a week or whatever.

How did you know there was a need for this?

We talked with members of different organizations, like the city, the Meridian Development Corp., and with Rick Ritter from New Ventures Lab.

We talked about complementing what he does.

What do you provide for patrons?

This space pulls off three different uses: maker space, digital design lab, and business help center. We focus more on design than on learning about the 3D printers, which don’t require much hands-on participation. We show them how to get started with the CAD software, depending on their skill level.

I would consider us the early phase prototyping. If you print a piece here it’s going to cost just a little. When you get to the point where you need a professional designer and a more market-ready prototype, you’re going to go to a facility that does that. But we can help you get to that point.

If you print something out, we charge 5 cents per gram for plastic, so most things are a couple dollars at most. We like to equate it to paper printing. We’ll charge you the cost of the material, but if you’re coming in to just use the space or the software, it’s free to anybody.

We do programs on Saturdays for kids and families, and we have people who come in weekly to do their podcasts. We recently started checking out digital devices. And the Small Business Administration has programs here.

Do you have any success stories?

There were two sisters, one in this area and one in Seattle, making a card game for kids and families. They needed special holders to hold the cards they were going to be making, and these aren’t something you can just pull off the shelf, so they started prototyping their designs, and would come in and print them out. They perfected their prototype and were able take them to the game-makers and pitch their idea.

For you, what is the ideal use of this space?

It comes back to democratizing access to information. Information has changed its form, and in a perfect world we will help fill the role of informal learning. We want to be a community resource for the people who need it. While our target audience for this space is small businesses and entrepreneurs, we still want to service and be a resource for the greater community.

The idea is for us to be the help that people need, or at least to be able to help create the connections if they don’t know who to turn to. That’s the beauty of a public library – that they all use the space differently. We have had startup companies that use it as their workspace.

That’s where the name “unBound” came from. We’re not bound by a traditional concept of libraries or what has been done in the past; we get to experiment and try new things.

What’s next?

We’re always looking for new machines to bring in, because we want to be an emerging technology facility. We are looking at getting a few different items, hopefully a laser cutter (another prototyping tool), and we want to get some more virtual reality devices. We’re looking for grants and sponsorships to pull in because new technology is not cheap.

One of the goals of the space is to help be a partner of downtown, and help provide foot traffic and to help revitalize this area. This building had been empty for seven or eight years, and now we’re bringing in 800 or 900 people per month downtown.