What is P-CIP Anyway?

Click on the following image to see a sample MARC record provided by QBI.

Librarians require much more specific information about new titles to facilitate the acquisition and processing of those titles, including the determination of the exact shelf location for the materials within the library.

The purpose of Cataloging In Publication (CIP) is to provide librarians with all the information they need, in an agreed-upon format and vocabulary, prior to the time that full cataloging is available.

If you plan to market your book to libraries, you should include CIP on the title page verso of your publication. While it's not intended to be a marketing tool, it can help to sell your product to libraries.

CIP--The Two Types
There are two types of Cataloging In Publication: LC-CIP, for which the cataloging is prepared by the Library of Congress (LC), and P-CIP, for which the cataloging information is prepared by the publisher or his/her agent (i.e., Quality Books Inc.)
Unfortunately, though the Library of Congress provides CIP for well over 50,000 books per year, they cannot begin to process all of the requests for CIP that they receive. Incidentally, 80% of the publishers in the LC CIP program are small publishers, meaning they produce 10 or fewer titles a year.