A Funeral for Print

Today, the New York Times announced that Conde Nast will be shutting the doors of Cookie, Modern Bride, and Gourmet magazines.  All three in one fell swoop.  In doing PR consulting, I've worked with Cookie a bit and the people were fantastic so it's sad to see it go by the wayside. 

However, seeing Gourmet go down is even more surprising.  Started on the heels of the Great Depression in 1941, the magazine (along with Bon Appetit) was considered by foodies to be an institution.  However, a study conducted by the consulting firm McKinsey & Company, recommended cuts of up to 25% throughout the Conde Nast family of publications due in part to the large vacuum sound of advertisers pulling their dollars out of print.

As much as I like Gourmet, I have to say it's a bit inevitable for print to die such a slow death.  As daily newspapers across the country fight to stay afloat with Craig's List wiping out their revenues and advertisers pulling back, big questions regarding journalism and our society are being debated by pundits.

But is all the hub bub really spot on?

What we're seeing is the final act in the shift of media consumption habits by consumers.  In a Long Tail world, anybody can become an expert within their sphere of influence if they do the work.  Maybe that's just the ultimate in democracy on the web. 

And when all the channels grow by exponential factor, than the old "broadcast network" model quickly ceases to be relevant.  I can watch/read/listen to what I want, when I want, without intrusion of advertisers bugging me without my permission.

This makes it pretty hard to go back to the old way of consuming media and the swiftness of this change is still catching people off guard.  The Great Recession is simply putting the final nail in the coffin for some publications.  It was time to evolve or start dying about five years ago.

A quick story to close: last week I was meeting with a long-time client that I've worked with doing PR and brand strategy work.  They've always passed the first test of marketing by making great products.  However, they have continually tried the old way of marketing for the past 5 years with diminishing returns (physical catalogs, print ads, etc.)  At the meeting, the decision maker was ecstatic because he had just closed a one-time full page ad in a major publication at 1/3 the cost of the normal rate.  It's going to run ONE TIME.  That's it.

Here's the kicker...

This one time ad was still a full 25% beyond what they've invested in their web presence to date since they launched in the US market.  Huh, I wonder why it was knocked down so cheap?

When the writing is on the wall, changing doesn't have to be hard.